624 



ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE 



the time in grass and weeds are com- 

 monly overlooked. Unobtrusive as they 

 are, they lay the farmer under a heavy 

 debt of gratitude by their food habits, 

 since their chosen fare consists largely 

 of the seeds of weeds. Selecting a typi- 

 cal member of the group, the tree spar- 

 row, for instance, one-fourth ounce of 

 weed seed per day is a conservative esti- 

 mate of the food of an adult. On this 

 basis, in a large agricultural state like 

 Iowa tree sparrows annually eat approx- 

 imately 875 tons of weed seeds. Only the 

 farmer, upon whose shoulders falls the 

 heavy burden of freeing his land of noxi- 

 ous weeds, can realize what this vast con- 

 sumption of weed seeds means in the 

 saving and cost of labor. Some idea of 

 the money value of this group of birds to 

 the country may be gained from the state- 

 ment that the total value of the farm 

 products in the United States in 1910 

 reached the amazing sum of $8,926,000,- 

 000. If we estimate that the total con- 

 sumption of weed seed by the combined 

 members of the sparrow family resulted 

 in a saving of only one per cent of the 

 crops — not a violent assumption — the sum 

 saved to farmers by these birds in 1910 

 was $89,260,000. 



The current idea in relation to hawks 

 and owls is erroneous. These birds are 

 generally classed as thieves and robbers, 

 whereas a large majority of them are the 

 farmer's friends and spend the greater part 

 of their long lives in pursuit of injurious 

 Insects and rodents. The hawks work 

 by day, the owls chiefly by night, so that 

 the useful activities of the two classes 

 are continued practically throughout the 

 24 hours. As many as 100 grasshoppers 

 have been found in the stomach of a 

 Swainson's hawk, representing a single 

 meal ; and in the retreat of a pair of barn 

 owls have been found more than 3,000 

 skulls, 97 per cent of which were of mam- 

 mals, the bulk consisting of field mice, 

 house mice and common rats. Nearly half 

 a bushel of the remains of pocket goph- 

 ers — animals which are very destructive 

 in certain parts of the United States^ 

 was found near a nest of this species. The 

 notable increase of noxious rodents during 



the last few years in certain parts of the 

 United States and the consequent dam- 

 age to crops are due in no small part to 

 the diminished number of birds of prey, 

 which formerly destroyed them and aided 

 in keeping down their numbers. A few 

 hawks are injurious, and the bulk of the 

 depredations on birds and chickens 

 chargeable against hawks is committed 

 by three species — the cooper's hawk, 

 the sharp-shinned hawk, and the gos- 

 hawk. The farmer's boy should learn 

 to know these daring robbers by sight, 

 so as to kill them whenever possible. 



From the foregoing it will at once ap- 

 pear that the practice of offering boun- 

 ties indiscriminately for the heads of 

 hawks and owls, as has been done by 

 some States, is a serious mistake, the 

 result being not only a waste of public 

 funds but the destruction of valuable 

 birds which can be replaced, if at all, 

 only after the lapse of years. 



As a rule birds do not live very long, 

 but they live fast. They breathe rapid- 

 ly and have a higher temperature and a 

 more rapid circulation than other verte- 

 brates. This is a fortunate circum- 

 stance, since to generate the requisite 

 force to sustain their active bodies a 

 large quantity of food is necessary, and 

 as a matter of fact birds have to devote 

 most of their waking hours to obtaining 

 insects, seeds, berries, and other kinds of 

 food. The activity of birds in the pur- 

 suit of insects is still further stimulated 

 by the fact that the young of most 

 species, even those which are by no 

 means strictly insectivorous, require 

 great quantities of animal food in the 

 early weeks of existence, so that during 

 the summer months — the flood time of in- 

 sect life — birds are compelled to redouble 

 their attacks on our insect foes to satisfy 

 the wants of their clamorous young. 



Field observations of the food habits 

 of birds serve a useful purpose, but they 

 are rarely accurate enough to be fully 

 reliable. The presence of certain birds 

 in a corn or wheat field or in an orchard 

 is by no means proof, as is too often as- 

 sumed, that they are devastating the 

 grain or fruit. They may have been at- 



