TWELVE WINTER BIRDS. 273 



oftentimes brings upon himself the unqualified rage 

 of the farmer or fruit grower. When Indian corn is 

 in its rich, succulent, milky state he attacks it with 

 great eagerness, opening a passage through the numer- 

 ous folds of the husk, and feeding on it with voracity. 

 But for every cherry, apple or ear of corn thus de- 

 stroyed, a thousand injurious insects are annually 

 eaten; and so the farmer when he tells his boys "to 

 show no mercy to the red-heads in the orchard" is 

 only " saving at the spigot to lose later on at the 

 bung." 



Professor Forbes of the Illinois University exam- 

 ined the stomachs of a number of these birds during 

 the month of May and found that their food at that 

 season consisted of: canker-worms, 15 per cent.; 

 beetles and other injurious insects, 65 per cent. ; seeds 

 and grain, 20 per cent.; thus proving their value as 

 insect destroyers. In 101 stomachs examined at 

 Washington, 50 per cent, of the food was of animal, 

 47 per cent, of vegetable, and the remainder of min- 

 eral origin. Beetles and grasshoppers formed 86 per 

 cent, of all the food, while the vegetable portion was 

 mainly wild fruits, though 17. of the stomachs con- 

 tained corn. 



The red-head is ever ready to pick a quarrel, not 

 only among members' of his own species, but fre- 

 quently with other birds, and their noisy chatter when 

 thus engaged too often makes a bedlam of our fairest 

 woodlands and drowns out the pleasing notes of the 

 more favored songsters. 



is 



