Economic Reasons for Protection 95 



amined, 54 contained poultry or game birds; 

 51, other birds; 278, mice; 131, other rodents; 

 37, frogs, toads, and snakes; 47, insects; 8, cray- 

 fish; I, centipede; 13, ofifal, and 89 were empty. 



The red-shouldered hawk, another large 

 species, which is a bird of eastern North Amer- 

 ica only, is even more beneficial in proportion 

 to the size of its range. Though it is continually 

 persecuted as a poultry thief, as a matter of fact 

 it hardly ever touches poultry and most of the 

 very few wild birds which it kills are possibly 

 sick or decrepit ones. On the other hand this 

 splendid bird wages an unceasing warfare on 

 mice and many kinds of injurious insects, and 

 the balance of its food consists chiefly of frogs, 

 toads, and snakes. Though I have on several 

 occasions closely observed red-shouldered hawks 

 from the time their eggs were hatched until the 

 young flew away, I have never seen one carry 

 a chicken or in fact a bird of any kind to its 

 young. I once reared two of these hawks in a 

 poultry yard, actually confining them with the 

 poultry for two months, and though they were 

 not overfed, they never in a single instance even 

 showed an inclination to molest the poultry. 



Perhaps the most beneficial of all is the 

 marsh hawk, because it is not only a useful bird, 

 but also has a very wide range, being found in 



