MAMMALS OF PENNSYLVANIA AND NEW JERSEY. 99 



confine their foraging to neglected fence rows, abandoned fields, weed 

 patches, brush piles, rubbish, and litter, caused by that clog to American 

 civilization, the shiftless farmer. In these situations the meadow mouse 

 destroys nothing, but utilizes a great deal which otherwise would cumber the 

 ground. 



" 7. The arable land of every well-kept and cultivated farm or nursery, 

 whether in pasture, grass, grain, orchard, truck, or young trees, is practically 

 deserted by this mouse. In short, it can only exist where a food supply is 

 found in conjunction with proper shelter, a shelter in almost every instance 

 synonymous with neglect and waste on the part of the farmer and of utility 

 on the part of the mouse. 



" 8. The meadow mouse rarely eats grain except when the rigors of excep- 

 tional winters deprive it of green food. It then confines its appetite to what 

 is found on or in the ground, and which has been exposed by the farmer's 

 improvidence. It very rarely disturbs seeds, fruits, tubers, roots, or vegetables 

 during the growing season, and does little damage in winter to those buried 

 in the ground, most of the ravages in these cases being the work of the short- 

 tailed meadow mouse (Microtus pinetorum) and the white-footed mouse 

 {Peromyscus leucopus}. 



" 9. On upland soils the meadow mouse is a surface feeder, forming its run- 

 ways almost entirely above ground in the shelter of surrounding vegetation 

 and debris. The burrowing of this species is confined chiefly to easily 

 worked, moist lowlands, where it conduces largely to better drainage and an 

 increase of vegetable growth. 



" To summarize the case briefly, it may be truly said that as a converter of 

 waste vegetable matter into flesh-food for bird and beast the common meadow 

 mouse has no rival in the regions it inhabits. Besides the numerous species 

 of hawks and owls depending almost entirely on this mouse, other carnivorous 

 birds, as the crow, jay, shrike and heron, devour a great many. It forms a 

 large part of the menu of several of our mammals, as the wild cat, house cat, 

 fox, marten, weasel, mink, raccoon, skunk, and opossum. The larger species 

 of snakes, the bullfrog, and some of the turtles, also devour them. Strike the 

 meadow mouse from the food list of the tens of thousands of animals which 

 devour him in the eastern United States, and the problems of the economic 

 zoologist would multiply an hundred fold. 



" The worst charges proved against him are : (a) the undermining and 

 tunneling of artificial water barriers; (b) the destruction of a small amount 

 of grain and vegetables not seasonably harvested or housed; (c) the con- 

 sumption of a very small percentage of grasses which would have been util- 

 ized by the farmer; (d) the gnawing of the bark of fruit trees in severe 

 winter weather.* The insignificance of these items compared with the value 



* Dr. A. K. Fisher, in a recent answer to my inquiries regarding the possible economic 



