14 FOOD OF BOBOLINK, BLACKBIRDS, AND GRACKLES. 
C. J. Maynard speaks of its feeding in Pennsylvania on a somewhat 
peculiar grass which springs up after the wheat is harvested and affords 
abundant food for them during the latter part of October.’ 
Dr. Warren also confines himself to its feeding habits in Pennsyl- 
vania. He says: 
The food of these birds during their spring sojourn in Pennsylvania is composed 
chiefly of different kinds of terrestrial insects, also the seeds of various weeds, grasses, 
etc. I have examined the stomach contents of twenty-seven Bobolinks * * * 
and found that eighteen had fed exclusively on beetles, larvee, ants and a few earth- 
worms; five, in addition to insects and larvee, showed small seeds, and particles of 
green vegetable materials, apparently leaves of plants; the four remaining birds 
revealed only small black and yellow colored seeds. After the breeding season the 
Reedbirds * * * about the middle of August, again make their appearance in 
our meadows and grainfields. At this time, although various forms of insects are 
abundant, they subsist almost entirely on a vegetable diet. They visit the cornfields 
and * * * prey toa more or less extent on the corn; * * * they tear open 
the tops of the husk and eat the milky grain. Fields of Hungarian grass are resorted 
to and the seed eagerly devoured. The different seeds of weeds and grasses which 
grow so luxuriantly in the marshy swamps and meadows are likewise fed upon with 
avidity.? 
In these statements the bird’s destructiveness in the South is not 
considered; but it has been well understood for along time. Mark 
Catesby, whose work on the natural history of Carolina contains the 
first published general account of the birds of this country, says: 
In the beginning of September, while the Grain of Rice is yet soft and milky, 
innumerable Flights of these Birds arrive from some remote Parts, to the great detri- 
ment of the inhabitants. Anno 1724, an Inhabitant near Ashley river had forty 
acres of Rice so devoured by them, that he was in doubt, whether what they had 
left, was worth the expense of gathering in. 
They are esteemed in Carolina the greatest delicacy of all other Birds. When they 
first arrive, they are lean, but in a few days become so excessive fat, that they fly 
sluggishly and with difficulty; and when shot, frequently break with the fall. They 
continue about three weeks, and retire by that time Rice begins to harden.’ 
Wilson says these birds are looked upon by the careful planter asa 
devouring scourge, and worse than a plague of locusts. In disputing 
the assertion that they were unknown in this part of the continent 
previous to the introduction of rice plantations he states that the 
country produces an abundance of food of which they are no less fond, 
including insects of various kinds, grubs, May-flies, and caterpillars, 
young ears of indian corn, and seeds of wild rice (Zizania aquatica). 
He believes, however, that the introduction of rice, and more particu- 
larly the progress of agriculture, in this part of America has greatly 
increased their numbers by multiplying their sources of subsistence 
fiftyfold within the same extent of country.‘ 
Birds of Eastern N. A., p. 131, 1881. 
* Birds of Pa., revised ed., p. 207, 1890. 
* Natural Tistory of Carolina, Vol. I, p. 14, 1731. 
‘Am. Ornith., Edinburgh ed., Vol. I, p. 219, 1831. 
