112 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



ever, really are aware of the great amount of valuable services 

 he renders through the year in the destruction of noxious 

 insects. And, indeed, in some localities, he is regarded as inju- 

 rious, from the fact that he is often seen among the branches and 

 leaves of the fruit trees and shrubs, pecking off and destroying 

 the buds. Many gentlemen present have doubtless observed 

 this bird twist a bud from a twig, nibble it a little, and then 

 drop it. It does not do this for the bud for food, but really for 

 the grub contained in it. If these buds be examined after the 

 chickadee has thrown them away, there will appear the burrow 

 of a grub or caterpillar in the very heart of them. The bird is 

 able to discover the presence of these vermin much more readily 

 than man could, and he is thus able to assail it at a period of its 

 existence when it is doing the most harm. But it is not the 

 insects and their larvae alone that he destroys. His microscopic 

 eyes enable him to discover their eggs deposited on and in 

 the crevices of the bark and in the buds, and in an instant he 

 can destroy the whole future brood. The eggs of the moth of 

 the destructive leaf-rolling caterpillar, those of the canker-worm, 

 the apple-tree moth, and others of these well-known plagues, are 

 greedily eaten by him, and this in the inclement winter, when 

 most of our other birds have abandoned us for a more genial 

 climate. 



In the summer time his labors are more easily noticed ; and 

 as he raises a large brood of young, the female laying six or 

 eight eggs at a litter, he is very busy through the whole day in 

 capturing vast quantities of caterpillars, flies and grubs. It has 

 been calculated that a single pair of these birds destroy, on the 

 average, not less than five hundred of these pests daily, a labor 

 which could hardly be surpassed by a man, even if he gave his 

 whole time to the task. 



" Moreover, the man could not be as successful at so small a 

 cost ; for, setting aside the value of his time and the amount of 

 a laborer's daily wages, he could not reach the denser and loftier 

 twigs on which the caterpillars revel, and which the titmouse 

 can traverse with perfect ease. No man can investigate a tree 

 and clear it of the insect hosts that constantly beleaguer it, 

 without doing some damage to the buds and young leaves by his 

 rough handling ; whereas the chickadee trips along the branches, 

 peeps under every leaf, swings himself round upon his perch, 



