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JOURNAL OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



bee.'* I shall attempt to show the 

 reason for these doubts. 



First of all. I have not been able to 

 discover that those who should be 

 most interested, the active, hard work- 

 ing farmers, have been instrumental 

 in putting the scheme in motion. In 

 the case which has come particularly 

 under my notice, the participants are 

 largely village loafers, (I regret the 

 term, but can find no better), who go 

 into it for the sake of the shooting, 

 and to get out of doing anything use- 

 ful. I cannot discover that any of them 

 take any thought as to the use of what 

 they are doing, the whole idea is to 

 make the best score. 



Next, setting aside the question of 

 foxes and other mammals, are the 

 birds that are killed really injurious? 

 If we examine the list we will find 

 that no distinction is made among the 

 hawks, except perhaps that a small 

 one is given a lower value than a 

 larger one. Now, out of all the hawks 

 that are common in the State, we can 

 at once pick at least three which do 

 the farmer absolutely no harm, the 

 Sparrow Hawk, the Broad-Winged 

 Hawk, and the Fish Hawk. Of the 

 others, he groups several large species 

 together, calls them all hen hawks, 

 and once in a great while takes it up- 

 on himself to make war upon them. It 

 is certainly true that these birds are 

 responsible for the death of a large 

 number of chickens, but to anyone 

 who will look into the question thor- 

 oughly and fairly there is plainly an- 

 other side. Does anyone imagine for 

 a moment that the number of chickens 

 stolen each year can anywhere near 

 suffice to feed the thousands of hawks 

 that make Maine their home? And 

 what, then, makes up the rest of their 

 diet? The question is not difficult to 

 answer, the number of mice, and other 

 small rodents, killed by the hawks 

 tremendously exceeds the number of 

 chickens that could possibly fall a 



prey to them. That this is not a mere 

 matter of guess work is shown by a 

 government report on the food of 

 hawks and owls, published some years 

 ago, and quoted in Chapman's "Birds 

 of Eastern North America." 



Now it is a fact that admits of no 

 argument that even with plenty of 

 hawks in the neighborhood, the dam- 

 age done to young trees, etc., by these 

 small animals is a noticeable factor in 

 farm economy, and it is plain to see 

 what would be the inevitable result if 

 an indiscriminate slaughter of the 

 hawks were to take place. And the 

 same things hold good for the owls, 

 with the exception that there is not 

 half the ground for killing them that 

 there is for killing the hawks. And 

 so on, from an economic point of view 

 it is the worst policy imaginable to 

 kill off birds or mammals merely be- 

 cause they do harm, without stopping 

 for a moment to enquire as to the 

 possibility of their doing good. In al! 

 probability it could be shown that the 

 harm done by any of the so-called bird 

 enemies of man is far outweighed by 

 the help they give him in destroying 

 the smaller, and less easily detected 

 enemies. 



The trouble is, we are too ready to con- 

 demn a whole family of animals mere- 

 ly because one member has been 

 caught in a nefarious act; most of us 

 are willing to take the guilt of the 

 rest on faith. ■ without bothering to 

 enquire into the matter. We brand 

 all Hawks and Owls as " a thieving 

 race." and hesitate to believe any good 

 of any of them: — as a natural conse- 

 quence the beneficial are destroyed 

 unthinkingly with the harmful. Every 

 farmer's boy knows perfectly well that 

 some hawks.,— as the White Tail- 

 spend hour after hour winging up and 

 down over the fields and meadows, 

 looking for mice; every farmer's boy 

 also knows that mice are among his 



