118 WILD SPORTS OF THE HIGHLANDS. [CJIAP. xv. 



CHAPTER XV. 



Increase of Wood-Pigeons and other Birds Service to the Farmer of these 

 Birds Tame Wood-Pigeons : Food of The Turtle-DoveBlue Rock- 

 PigeonsCaves where they breed Shooting at the Rocks near Cromarty. 



OWING to the decrease of vermin, that is, of all the carnivorous 

 birds and beasts of the country, there is a proportionate increase 

 in the numbers of the different living creatures on which they 

 preyed. I do not here allude to game only, but to all the other 

 fercB naturce of the district. Wood -pigeons, blackbirds, thrushes, 

 and all the smaller birds increase yearly in consequence of the 

 destruction of their natural enemies. The wood-pigeon in par- 

 ticular has multiplied to a great extent. The farmers complain 

 constantly to me of the mischief done by these birds, whom I 

 cannot defend by giving them the credit of atoning for their 

 consumption of corn by an equal or greater consumption of 

 grubs and other noxious insects, as they feed wholly on seeds 

 and vegetables. An agricultural friend of mine near this place, 

 who had yielded with a tolerably good grace to my arguments in 

 favour of the rook, pointed out to me the other day (March 6th) 

 an immense flock of wood-pigeons busily at work on a field of 

 young clover, which had been under barley the last season. 

 " There," he said, " you constantly say that every bird does 

 more good than harm ; what good are those birds doing to my 

 young clover?" On this, in furtherance of my favourite axiom, 

 that every wild animal is of some service to us, I determined to 

 shoot some of the wood-pigeons, that I might see what they 

 actually were feeding on ; for I did not at all fall into my 

 friend's idea that they were grazing on his clover. By watching 

 in their line of flight from the field to the woods, and sending a 

 man round to drive them off the clover, I managed to kill eight 

 of the birds as they flew over my head. I took them to his 

 house, and we opened their crops to see what they contained. 

 Every pigeon's crop was as full as it could possibly be of the 



