184 Birds of Oregon and Washington 



alarm the growers. It was then that a wise 

 man, who knew the relations between mice and 

 Hawks and Owls, gave the fact to the farmers. 

 It resulted in the repeal of the law ; and with 

 the increase in these hitherto blindly feared 

 birds, the mice scourge disappeared. 



Dr. E. Hart Merriam, Ornithologist and 

 Mammalogist of the United States Department 

 of Agriculture, has estimated that Pennsylva- 

 nia lost by this folly four and a half millions of 

 dollars in one year and a half. 



Oregon and Washington have quite a num- 

 ber of the varieties of the Hawk. 



But these are unequally distributed, for while 

 some are common in one place, they are rare in 

 another. Only a part of those found within our 

 States are described below. They are the 

 Sharp-shinned, Cooper's, Western Red-tailed, 

 Swainson's, American Rough-legged and Ferru- 

 ginous Rough-legged Hawks, the Pigeon-Hawk, 

 Black Merlin, and Desert Sparrow-Hawk. 



THE SHARP-SHINNED HAWK. 



Rather small ; length, n to 14 inches. 



This is one of the two Hawks which prefer 



