PASSERES—FRINGILLIDZ. 153 
the spring migrations in Lorain county. It frequents rather 
wet woods which are much grown with brush, as well as the 
more swampy places. 
In food habits this sparrow is not injurious, but its pref- 
erence for swampy places, where it feeds upon the insects 
and seeds, does not give it a high standing as a beneficial 
species. However, it must be classed as one of the sparrows 
which does more good than harm. 
This sparrow reaches Lorain county about April 21, 
and remains until about the middle of May, returning again 
late in September for ten days or two weeks. 
212. (585.) PAssERELLA tL1aca (Merr.). 108. 
Fox Sparrow. 
Synonyms: Fringilla iliaca. 
Eastern Fox Sparrow, Fox-colored Sparrow, Rufous Spar- 
row. 
Kirtland, Ohio Geol. Surv., 1838, 164. 
This is a common migrant both spring and autumn. It 
is found in the brushy woods in company with the other 
sparrows which haunt such places, but it seems to feel an 
aloofness to them. It is rather slow and sedate in carriage, 
not skulking in the brush piles as much as the others. 
Fox Sparrow is fond of millipeds in April, and eats 
many ground beetles during that month also. Of the 86 per 
cent. of vegetable matter which constitutes its food, some 
30 per cent. consists of the seeds of fruit. The remaining 
vegetable matter is largely seeds of ragweeds and poly- 
gonum. While some of the insects are useful, and possibly 
some of the fruit is cultivated, the destruction of weed 
seeds is so large that the birds perform a great service to 
agriculture. 
This is one of the early spring sparrows, arriving at 
Oberlin about the middle of March and remaining five 
weeks. It returns again during the last week in September, 
or the first week in October, and remains a month. 
