FOOD HABITS OF SOME WINTER BIRD VISITANTS. 



Animal Food. 



Lygaeidae (chinch bugs, etc.). 



Nysius sp 1 



Carabidae ( ground-beetles ) . 



Platynus sp 1 



Scarabaeidae ( leaf -chafers, dung- 

 beetles, etc.). 



Dichelonycha sp 2 



Lucanidae (stag-beetles). 



Platycerus quercus 1 



Tenebrionidae ( darkling-beetles ) . 



Blapstinus sp 1 



PINE GROSBEAK (Pinicola enucleator). 



(Plate I.) 



The handsome red and slate-colored pine grosbeak, a bird breed- 

 ing in the Canadian forests, in Alaska, and in the mountains of the 

 United States, also appears in the lower areas of the Northern States 

 in winter. As is the habit of several other species discussed in this 

 bulletin, the pine grosbeak wanders more or less irregularly about 

 the country in flocks of considerable size. This species is widely dis- 

 tributed in northern parts of both the Old and New Worlds. 



For the study of the food habits of this grosbeak 394 stomachs 

 collected in 13 States, Alaska, and 5 Provinces of Canada were avail- 

 able. Of these, 365 were collected during the winter months and only 

 29 during the summer season (April to September, inclusive). On 

 account of this unequal seasonal distribution of the material and the 

 fact that this species is of more importance in this country during 

 the winter, the food habits of the pine grosbeak for the two seasons 

 are considered separately. 



Winter food. — One of the most striking features of the literature 

 pertaining to the diet of this species is the number of apparently 

 contradictory statements as to its food preferences. A number of 

 different writers refer to its fondness for buds; John O'Leary 3 states 

 that it feeds principally on mountain ash berries ; Ernest Thompson 

 Seton 4 confirms this and adds the seeds of black ash as another 

 favorite food. E. A. Mearns 5 reports that the seeds of maple and 

 red cedar berries are the staple articles of diet, but adds seeds of 

 conifers and weeds, frozen apples, and all kinds of berries and buds 

 as other elements eaten. Elliott Coues 6 believes that its principal 

 food is pine seed supplemented by seeds of birch and alder; and 

 Baird, Brewer, and Ridgway T state that red cedar berries were the 

 chief food in eastern Massachusetts during the winter of 1835, and 

 record the grosbeak as doing considerable damage in 1869-70 to the 

 fruit buds of apples and pears. William Brewster, 8 in a discussion 

 of a flight of this species into eastern Massachusetts, gives a table of 

 the food items in which are included the seeds of ash, various coni- 

 fers, apples, waxwork, ailanthus, weeds, and grass; buds of maple, 

 ash, conifers, and a few other trees ; and soft fruits of apple, moun- 



8 Forest and Stream, vol. 16, p. 28, Feb. 10, 1881. 

 *The Auk, vol. 7, p. 211, April, 1890. 

 6 Bui. Essex Inst., vol. 2, p. 201, 1879. 

 6 Birds of the Northwest, p. 105, 1874. 

 ' North American Birds, vol. 1, p. 455, 1875. 



8 A remarkable flight of pine grosbeaks (Pinicola enucleator) , The Auk, vol. 12, pp. 245- 

 256, July, 1895. 



