16 GAME, AQUATIC, AND KAPACIOUS BIRDS. 



beetles; cutworms, army worms; cotton worms; cotton cutworms, 

 sawfly larvae; and leatherjackets or cranefly larvae. They befriend 

 cattle by eating horseflies and their larvae, and cattle ticks. 



They eat a variety of other animal forms, such as moths, ants, and 

 other Hymenoptera, flies, bugs, centipeds and millepeds, spiders, 

 snails, and earthworms. Practically 97 per cent of the food consists 

 of animal matter, chiefly of injurious and neutral forms. The 

 vegetable food comprises the seeds of such weed pests as buttonweed, 

 foxtail grass, and sand spurs, and hence is also to the credit of the 

 bird. 



Notwithstanding that the upland plover injures no crop and con- 

 sumes a host of the worst enemies of agriculture, it is one of the 

 numerous shore birds that have been hunted to the verge of extinc- 

 tion. Can it be that the American public will allow one of the best 

 friends of agriculture to be exterminated by hunters who care only 

 for the momentary excitement of dropping these swiftly flying birds 

 and the pleasure of devouring the few mouthfuls of savory flesh they 

 afford? w. L. M. 



KILLDEER. 



(Oxyechus vociferus.) 



The killdeer (fig. 6) is one of the best known American birds. It 

 frequents cultivated lands and even roads and the vicinity of build- 

 ings. It is well named "vociferus," for it delights in repeating the 

 loud and penetrating call of "kill-dee, kill-dee," from which its com- 

 mon name is taken. The killdeer nests throughout the United States 

 and southern Canada. Some individuals spend the whiter in the 

 southern half of the United States or occasionally even farther north, 

 while others go as far south as northern South America. 



Like the upland plover the killdeer spends much of its time away 

 from water. It frequently nests in cornfields or pastures and, as 

 noted above, even comes about the abode of man. These preferences 

 naturally influence the food habits of the species, affording it an 

 opportunity to destroy insects which are directly related to agricul- 

 ture. The food of the killdeer is varied, being composed of the fol- 

 lowing principal items: Beetles, 37.06 per cent; other insects, as 

 grasshoppers, caterpillars, ants, bugs, caddis flies, dragon flies, and 

 two-winged flies, 39.54 per cent; and other invertebrates, as centi- 

 peds, spiders, ticks, oyster worms, earthworms, snails, crabs, and 

 other Crustacea, 21.12 per cent. Vegetable matter composes 2.28 

 per cent of the total food, and is chiefly made up of weed seeds, such 

 as buttonweed, smartweed, foxtail grass, and nightshade. 



Among the injurious beetles consumed are the following weevils: 

 Alfalfa weevil, cotton-boll weevil, clover-root weevil, clover-leaf 



497 



