92 

 individual to self-help — i.e., if an animal is troublesome to anyone, he 

 must be able to obtain permission to get rid of it. In this way the 

 lives of our birds, especially the rarer kinds, are respected, as well as 

 the reasonable wishes of individuals." 



These words seem to show us a golden mean, and they give food for 

 reflection both to those who love to destroy as well as to those who wish 

 to restore Nature to its primitive condition by leaving animals and 

 plants to thrive at wiU. 



I will confine myself to the measures taken at Seebach in discussing 

 this subject. 



The following animals are considered at Seebach as thoroughly 

 harmful, and they are treated as such, rewards being offered for their 

 capture and death : cats, weasels, martens, polecats, house and tree 

 sparrows, sparrow-hawks, goshawks, jays, and magpies. At certain 

 times in certain places we must add squirrels, crows, and shrikes. 



Certain birds, which are useful enough in themselves, may become 

 harmful if they increase too rapidly — e.g., blackbirds — and interfere 

 with the settling of other birds : of the nightingale, for instance, 

 according to what is reported from many districts.* 



Sparrows, thougli they do not directly injure other birds, interfere 

 very much with their setthng. Tlieir wild behaviour and continual 

 noise make other birds take a dislike to a place, and drive them away 

 from feeding and nesting-places. Where success with nesting-boxes 

 is aimed at, the fight against sparrows must not be overlooked. 



The war of extermination against sparrows has been waged for fifty 

 years in Seebach with great energy, and they are now to be found there 

 in small numbers only. The other species of birds, on the other hand, 

 are represented all the more numerously, so that Baron von Berlepsch's 

 assertion " that the increase of other birds is in inverse ratio to the 

 decrease of the sparrows," ajspears to be' confirmed. 



* The struggle for existence is to be found everywhere in Nature. If two 

 creatures, such as the nightingale and the blackbird, enjoy the same conditions 

 of existence, the weaker of the two must succumb if occasion for a struggle arises 

 in consequence of insufficient food, scarcity of nesting-places, etc. This state of 

 things has led to those observations which at first sound contradictory, on the 

 relations between the blackbird and nightingale. In one place the former is said 

 to drive away the latter, in another they live peacefully side by side. Both 

 statements are correct. It all depends whether there is sufficient to satisfy the 

 two sjDecies in a district, or whether anything occurs to cause a struggle for 

 existence. In the latter case the weaker of the two — i.e., the nightingale — 

 must, of course, succumb. 



