LAND BIRDS. 667 
bugs. Subject therefore to many reservations I should say that the 
ordinary services do not entitle it to special protection” (Trans. Ill. State 
Hort. Soc., Vol. 13, 1879, 135, 136). 
In 1880 Prof. Forbes, after further study of the food of the Thrasher, 
states: “It takes ants more freely than the Robin, but eats comparatively 
few caterpillars; 7 percent of each were found in the food of the year. 
Diptera are taken in very trivial quantity, and hemiptera in moderate 
number only. In the garden it plays a part very similar to that of the 
other thrushes, but is less mischievous on the whole. It relishes the whole 
list of garden fruits and later in the season resorts to the wild fruit of the 
woods and thickets. Compared with the Robin this bird is seen to be 
especially peculiar in the filth-eating habit already mentioned as dis- 
tinguishing it from all other thrushes. It takes about half as many 
lepidoptera, about half as many again coleoptera, nearly twice as many 
carabidee and three times as many leaf-chafers, but eats comparatively 
few grapes and cherries” (Ibid, Vol. 14, 1880, 113-114). Reporting in 
1881 on two Brown Thrashers killed in a canker-worm orchard in Tazewell 
county, Ill., Prof. Forbes says: ‘Nearly one-fourth of their food consisted 
of canker-worms and 10 percent of cut worms. Ground beetles (harpalids) 
brought the average of predaceous beetles up to 24 percent. Twelve 
percent of spring beetles and 5 percent of snout beetles were the most 
interesting items remaining.” In regard to the chinch bug Prof. Forbes 
writes as follows: ‘‘Among the birds shot in 1880 during midsummer, 
when the chinch-bug was abundant enough in central Illinois to cause some 
alarm, three Brown Thrashers were found to have eaten these insects in 
barely sufficient number to show that they have no unconquerable prejudice 
against them” (Ibid, Vol. 15, 1881, 130). 
Dr. Judd, in his report on the food of the Brown Thrasher, says: ‘The 
proportion of the different elements of food of the Brown Thrasher, as 
determined by an examination of 121 stomachs collected from Maine to 
Florida and as far west as Kansas, is as follows: Animal matter 63 percent; 
vegetable 35; mineral 2. Beetles form one-half of the animal food, grass- 
hoppers and crickets one-fifth, caterpillars somewhat less than one-fifth, 
bugs, spiders and thousandlegs about one-tenth. The percentage of 
food taken from cultivated crops by the Thrasher amounts to only 11 
percent; of this 8 percent is fruit and the rest grain. * * * The Thrasher 
eats 8 percent of ground beetles supposed to be beneficial, but to offset 
this he destroys an equal volume of caterpillars, to say nothing of grass- 
hoppers, crickets, weevils, click and leaf beetles. Two-thirds of the bird’s 
food is animal; the vegetable food is mostly fruit, but the quantity taken 
from cultivated crops is offset by three times that volume of insect pests. 
In destroying insects the Thrasher is helping to keep in check organisms 
the undue increase of which disturbs the balance of nature and threatens 
our welfare. * * * Although the Thrasher takes its maximum of 
17 percent of cultivated fruits, mainly red and black raspberries, with a 
few currants, in July, the horticulturist at this time does not mind the loss, 
because there is plenty; on the contrary, when cherries and berries first 
commence to ripen they bring good prices and the loss is keenly felt” 
(Yearbook, U. 8. Dept. Agr., 1895, 412-413). 
In Michigan the Brown Thrasher is nowhere too abundant, on the 
whole is decidedly useful, and should be rigidly protected. Cherries 
and other fruits can be protected in the same way as recommended for 
other birds, and the Thrasher can be preserved to destroy the thousands 
