348 



USEFUL BIRDS. 



cold storms in the breeding season. It is also one of the 

 most purely insectivorous of all birds, and feeds almost en- 

 tirely on winged insects. Therefore, when the air is cleared 

 of flying insects by long, cold rains or hard frosts, it must 

 starve. Its note is a full-toned chirruping carol, musical 



and clear, beginning peuo-peuo- 

 peuo. It feeds largely on some of 

 the greatest pests of the farm. 

 Kose beetles and May beetles are 

 caught in large numbers. John S. 

 Russell writes that a quart of the 

 wing cases and other rejecta of that 

 common pest, the striped cucumber 

 beetle, were taken from a hole in a 

 Martin box ; and Dr. Packard makes a similar statement. 

 House flies and flies that trouble horses and cattle are taken 

 in considerable numbers from the sides of houses and barns. 

 Mr. Otto Widmann states, in "Forest and Stream," that 

 thirty-two parent Martins made three thousand, two hun- 

 dred and seventy-seven visits to their young in one day, 

 — June 27, 1884. 



Every efi'ort should be made to induce these birds to again 

 take up their abode throughout the State. 



Fig. 150. — Purple Martin, 

 female. 



