52 FOOD HABITS OF THE GROSBEAKS. 
browntail, the hairs of which so irritate human flesh, also is eagerly 
eaten, and other caterpillars clothed with spines were found in the 
stomachs examined. In several gizzards, indeed, a mass of branching 
caterpillar spines was all that remained to show the nature of the 
ee a 
WA 
eee Ree 
LE 
Fig. 29.—Orchard tent-caterpillar (Malacosoma americana). (From Riley, Bureau of 
Entomology.) 
food. It is evident that neither hairs nor even pricking, stinging 
spines are adequate to protect a caterpillar from a hungry grosbeak. 
Besides Hymenoptera, Coleoptera, and Lepidoptera, which have 
been discussed in the order named, but one group of insects of impor- 
tance in the dietary of 
the rosebreast remains, 
that of true bugs 
(Hemiptera), includ- 
ing the stink bugs, 
tree hoppers, plant lice, 
and scale insects. From 
this miscellaneous as- 
semblage the grosbeak 
Fic. 30.—Gipsy moth caterpillar (Porthetria dispar). selects 3.89 per cent of 
(From Bureau of Kntomology,) . 
its food, and two- 
thirds of this amount consists of the minute pests known as scale 
insects. From an economic standpoint also the latter are of great- 
est importance, as they rank among the worst enemies of agriculture 
in the United States. Orchards, both of the deciduous and citrus 
