﻿Beneficial to Agriculture. 41 



STAELING, or STAEE. 



Stumus vulgaris. 



During recent years the Starling has become generally common 

 throughout the British Islands, having greatly increased its range 

 in the west as well as in the north. In Ireland it is somewhat 

 local during the breeding season, but large numbers occur there in 

 the winter. In the autumn great flocks arrive on the east coasts 

 and disperse over the country. In many parts of England this 

 bird has become excessively abundant, so much so that the vast 

 multitudes which visit certain woods and shrubberies for roosting 

 purposes have poisoned such places by their droppings and have 

 become a general pest. 



The Starling is one of the most beneficial birds to the farmer if 

 its numbers are kept in check, but when allowed to multiply to an 

 unlimited extent, as it is at present, it becomes equally injurious, 

 owing, to the insufficient supply of its natural food, and it then 

 acquires destructive habits by feeding on grain and fruit. No bird 

 is more destructive to cherries than the Starling, which of late 

 years has become destructive to pears. 



Like rooks, Starlings should be annually thinned out, and steps 

 immediately taken for a general reduction of their numbers 

 throughout the country, a reduction of 40 or 50 per cent, being 

 desirable. 



The Starling, when in limited numbers, is mainly insectivorous, 

 and it eats many of the most injurious insects, such as leather- 

 jackets (larvae of the crane-fly or daddy-long-legs), grubs of the 

 cockchafer, and wire-worms, as well as other destructive kinds, also 

 slugs, worms, and both wild and cultivated fruit, but insect food is 

 always preferred when obtainable. 



The nest of this bird is placed in almost any convenient hole 

 it can find for the purpose, crevices in banks, cliffs or walls, in 

 chimneys, gutter-pipes, and most commonly in holes in trees and 

 under the roofs of houses. The nest is usually a mass of straw or 

 grass, with more or less of a lining of wool and a few feathers. 

 The eggs vary from four to six ; they are spotless and of a pale 

 blue colour. 



The adult bird in the breeding season is handsomely coloured ; 

 the whole of the plumage is glossy black, shot with metallic green, 

 blue and purple ; k the feathers of the upper parts are tipped with 



