Let the Birds Save a Billion Dollars a Year 



A quail can eat 2,000 Hessian flies in a day and a prairie 

 chicken four times as many. Let them keep insects off the farm 



By Robert H. Moulton 



CHARLES E. WHITE, of Chicago, 

 grain broker during his business 

 hours and bird protector during his 

 leisure, believes that it is possible to lop a 

 billion dollars off of the Nation's cost of 

 living by the simple expedient of feeding 

 insect-eating birds. Farmers and fruit 

 growers of this 

 country are los- 

 ing over $1,000,- 

 000,000 a year 

 by reason of the 

 destruction of 

 birds in the last 

 thirty years. The 

 cotton growers 

 are suffering a 

 loss of $100,000,- 

 000 annually be- 

 cause of the rav- 

 ages of the boll 

 weevil. The rea- 

 son is that quails, 

 prairie chickens, 

 meadow larks 

 and other birds 

 have been swept 

 away by gun- 

 ners. 



Grain growers 

 are losing over 

 $100,000,000 a 

 year on account 

 of the chinch bug 

 and another 

 $200,000,000 a 

 year on account 

 of the Hessian 

 fly. Both are 

 very small in- 

 sects, almost mi- 

 croscopic in size. 



Over 24,000 chinch bugs weigh one ounce. 

 Nearly 50,000 Hessian flies weigh an ounce. 

 A quail killed in Kansas and examined by a 

 government expert had in its craw the re- 

 mains of over 2,000 Hessian flies it had 

 eaten in one day. A quail killed in a 

 potato field in Pennsylvania and ex- 

 amined by a government entomologist had 

 in its stomach the remains of 126 potato 



bugs. The farmers of the Northern States 

 are paying out $16,000,000 to $20,000,000 

 a year for Paris green to put on their 

 potato vines. 



The quail is the most valuable insect- 

 eating bird of its size. Each adult quail 

 is worth $25 a year to the farmer on whose 

 land it lives. The prai- 

 rie chicken consumes 

 about four times as 

 many insects each day 

 as the quail does, be- 

 cause it is about four 

 times as large. In a 

 lesser degree, our small 

 birds, almost without 

 exception, are responsi- 

 ble for the destruction 

 of many insects each 

 day. 



Mr. White plans to 

 save all insect-destroy- 

 ing birds and prevent 

 the destruction of 

 $1,000,000,000 worth of 

 grain and foodstuffs each 

 year. 



When ten years ago 

 Mr. White bought a 

 five-acre wooded tract 

 . near Kenilworth, Chi- 

 cago, he found many 



An open-air cafeteria to 

 encourage the coloniza- 

 tion of insect-eating birds 



