18 F< oi) OF WEST VIRGINIA BIKHS 



a -single season." This illustration proves in a most conclusive way how 

 much good a single species may do. Multiply the amount of good done 

 by the Tree Sparrows by the large number of like birds that remain 

 here over winter and we may begin to see how important a function 

 the winter birds perform in the destruction of weed seeds. We have 

 not, in the past, fully appreciated the helpfulness of birds in subduing 

 the masses of weeds that grow up everywhere as often as spring and 

 summer return. In their excellent book entitled "Birds in Their Rela- 

 tion to Man" Weed and Dearborn say, "The largest proportion of the 

 seeds eaten by birds are produced by herbs, most of which are useless, 

 while many of them are noxious weeds. The quantity of pestiferous 

 seeds thus annually destroyed is enormous, and man is deeply indebted 

 to the birds that destroy them. The great group of many-flowered plants, 

 the order Compositae, supplies food for a multitude of small finches. 

 Early in the season the downy heads of the dandelion call Sparrows 

 and Goldfinches to lawns and road-sides. A little later horse-weeds and 

 thistles furnish similar food to the same hungry company. The ragweed, 

 which springs up unbidden everywhere, is perhaps the best bird provider 

 in this family, in grain-fields along road-sides, and in worn-out pastures 

 this plant affords the birds a feast unsurpassed either in amount or 

 duration. During the latter part of their stay the summer Sparrows 

 largely depend upon it; while in the winter Bob-whites, Goldfinches, 

 Redpolls, English Sparrows, Snow-flakes and Horned Larks make festi- 

 val among its miniature branches. Even the Red-headed and Red- 

 bellied Woodpeckers as well as the Flicker have been known to partake 

 of these ragweed seeds. * * * * Knotweed. sheep-sorrel, dock, 

 bindweed and many more each contributes to the birds that frequent 

 its station. ***** Tne see( j s O f t h e pigweeds, hemp, mullein, 

 and a host of other weeds belonging to less numerous families are also 

 freely drawn upon for the support of bird life." Most of the seeds 

 eaten by birds are crushed and their germinating power is destroyed. 

 Therefore the birds which feed upon these seeds do not scatter them 

 as the fruit-eating birds scatter the indigestible seeds of fruit. The 

 seeds the birds eat are crushed and digested and can not grow. This 

 means that practically all the millions of pounds of weed seeds eaten each 

 fall, winter and spring in West Virginia are forever destroyed. What 

 a wilderness of weeds would spring up if the birds did not help so 

 effectively in keeping them under control! 



Insect Food of Birds. 



Another portion of this chapter must be given to the study of the insect 

 food of birds. By far the largest number of our species are insecti- 

 vorous, and of all the food taken by our West Virginia birds in the 

 course of the year I suppose that fully three-fourths is made up of 

 insects in the egg, larva, pupa or imago stage. The incalculable good 

 done by the birds in the destruction of insects can not be fully com- 

 prehended till we face some of the almost overwhelming facts of the 

 insect world, nor can we comprehend fully then, for the facts and figures 

 are beyond our powers to understand. A few of these facts may be 



