280 USEFUL BIRDS. 



to the weeds and take the seeds from the stalks ; while Song 

 Sparrows and Chipping Sparrows subsist largely on such 

 seeds as they can find on, or reach from, the ground. Song 

 Sparrows, Fox Sparrows, and Tree Sparrows are persistent 

 scratchers, and dig out seed that has already fallen, and is 

 buried by dead leaves, straw, earth, or other litter. Meadow 

 Larks and Quail are useful in digging out seed from the 

 ground, which, already buried, would otherwise spring up 

 and grow. When the snow is deep, a large proportion of 

 the seed-eaters must of necessity go south ; but as soon as 

 the ground is bare, tliey return to scratch and dig for their 

 favorite food. Thus, as various species of differing habits 

 and different haunts frequent the fields and their borders, and 

 as the work of one supplements that of another, they exert 

 together a constant repressive influence against the undue 

 multiplication of weeds. The birds most actively employed 

 in consuming weed seed in field and garden are Sparrows 

 and Finches, Blackbirds, Cowbirds, Meadowlarks, Doves, 

 and Quail. 



Dr. Judd found about five hundred and twenty-five birds 

 eating weed seed from a single acre of truck land on a Mary- 

 land farm, and estimated that they destroyed forty-six thou- 

 sand seeds for their breakfast. About the last of April he 

 attempted to learn what proportion of the weed seed on the 

 place had been destroyed by birds during the fall and winter. 

 In a wheat field where ragweed was plentiful it was diflicult 

 to find half a dozen seeds in a fifteen-minute search. In a 

 growth of pigeon grass the examination of an area where 

 there had been hundreds of seeds the year before would 

 sometimes fail to disclose one ; and in some crab srass in the 

 same field not one seed out of a thousand was left. 



The following list of seeds eaten by birds, taken from Dr. 

 Judd's interesting account of the "Birds of a Maryland 

 Farm," will serve to indicate the habits of the same birds in 

 Massachusetts. It will be noted that most of the weeds in 

 this list are common here, and some of them are very abun- 

 dant, widespread, and troublesome. Chickweed seeds ma- 

 ture very quickly, and purslane has to be dug up and carried 

 out of the field, else it will persist in spite of the gardener. 



