24 



How TO GET THE MaRTINS. 



The bird house must be erected in a conspicuous place and 

 the Enghsh sparrows and starlings kept out. This maj^ be 

 accomplished by the use of a shotgun,^ or the entrances may 

 be kept closed until the martins come, when a few may be 

 opened and the martins may be able to beat off the sparrows, 

 but if even one pair of sparrows becomes established in that 

 house, and is allowed to breed, the martins are doomed to 

 eviction sooner or later. They may hold on for a few years, 

 but the sparrows will possess the house in the end. I have 

 never known them to fail. If the martins persist, the sparrows 

 break the eggs or kill the young. 



Screech owls and cats must be watched. Cats catch the 

 male martins when, in fighting, they come to the ground, take 

 both parents when they alight on the ground for nesting ma- 

 terial, and kill many young ones before they are able to fly 

 well. The owls sometimes get the habit of reaching in at night 

 and pulling out young birds. The martins will drive all hawks 

 away. 



The English Sparrow. 



The European house sparrow is the greatest and most 

 ubiquitous enemy of all native birds that nest in bird houses 

 and nesting boxes. The United States Department of Agri- 

 culture, after a long and patient investigation that covered the 

 greater part of North America, decided that it was "a curse of 

 such virulence that it ought to be systematically attacked and 

 destroyed."^ 



Von Berlepsch rates it as one of the few birds which must be 

 destroyed at the Ornithological Experiment Station at Seebach.^ 



Although the sparrow, like most birds that live with man, is 

 beneficial at times, most expert testimony is against it. In 

 view of a multitude of requests for information regarding the 

 means for destroying it, a bulletin on the subject is in prepara- 

 tion which will be issued by the Massachusetts State Board of 

 Agriculture as Circular No. 48. 



1 A long-barreled 22 caliber rifle, with extra long shells, smokeless powder and dust shot, is not 

 noisy and ought to be effective at 40 or 50 feet. 



2 Barrows, W. B.: "The English sparrow in North America," U. S. Dept. Agr., Div. Ec. 

 Ornith. and Mam. Bull. No. 1. 



3 Hiesmann, Martin: "How to attract and protect wild birds," translated by Emma S. 

 Buckheim, 1912, p. 92. 



