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THE ROSE STARLING. 



(Pastor roseus.) 



In Hungary this bird is only a summer guest, and 

 single pairs may be met with in various parts of the 

 country. Its appearance in large numbers always coin- 

 cides with the time of the grasshopper plague; a fact 

 which was first observed in 1814. The distinguished 

 Hungarian ornithologist, Petenyi, described his observa- 

 tions in 1837. He states that, so long as the grasshop- 

 pers are not fully developed, the bird feeds on all sorts 

 of insects ; but as soon as the grasshopper is sufficiently 

 matured, this insect forms its sole food, and is pursued 

 with great eagerness. Thus, in the year 1907 great 

 numbers of Rose Starlings appeared on the well-known 

 Puerta of Hortshagy where just at that time the grass- 

 hopper plague was raging. There we may enjoy the 

 spectacle which Petenyi described as follows : " To the 

 eye of the beholder a flock of these birds in flight has the 

 appearance of a roseate cloud, always moving, back- 

 wards, forwards, sideways, in ever changing forms of 

 beauty or, alighting, they give an exquisite impression 

 of whole bunches of wandering roses moving on the 

 green turf." 



Although the Rose Starling also loves fruit-berries 

 and causes such damage to them by its great numbers, 

 that in some parts it is called the "devil's bird" 

 the fact remains that its chief food is the grasshopper. 

 In Tartary, its native land, it destroys the locusts which 

 in former times visited Hungary. A Turkish proverb 

 says that the Rose Starling kills ninety-nine grasshoppers 

 before it eats one. When a flight of these birds de- 

 scends upon a grasshopper infested district, it consumes 



