tensive group of highly useful, as well as beautiful, birds. They spend most 

 of their time during the summer months when not actually occupied with 

 nest building and rearing their young, in hunting for and destroying different 

 kinds of insects. But this is not all the good they do. In fall, winter, and 

 early spring, when Mother Earth has lost her beautiful green dress and is 

 clothed instead in somber browns and wrapped in a, mantle of snow and ice, 

 the longspurs, snowbuntings, snowbirds and some of the sparrows that have 

 remained with us, are busily engaged in gathering for themselves a living. 

 They hop and fly about from place to place hunting for and picking up little 

 seeds of grasses, weeds, shrubs, and trees with which to feed themselves and 

 keep alive until the warm weather of spring returns and brings back to them 

 the abundant supply of nourishing insects of which they are so fond. Even 

 during this busy cold season, they chirrup merrily as they work, so satisfied 

 are they with the kind of life they are living. The English, or European 

 House-sparrow, has the worst reputation of the entire family. But even 

 this bird has some good traits which tend to secure for it our friendship. 



The swallows, as we all know, are insect destroyers; and, seizing their prey 

 as they fly, they naturally take such forms among these pests as flies, gnats, 

 and mosquitoes — our worst personal enemies. We should by all means 

 encourage these birds to build their nests in our barns and sheds in order 

 that they may pay rent by destroying the various flies that attack and worry 

 ourselves and our domestic animals. 



The shrikes or butcher-birds are genuine brigands or pirates when it comes 

 to killing other forms of life. They are true to their name, and butcher large 

 numbers of insects, mice, lizards, small snakes, and even occasionally a few 

 of the smaller birds. They take their prey to some thorn bush or barbwire 

 fence and impale the victims for future use or to dry up and blow away. The 

 good they do will more than outweigh the harm which they inflict. 



The vireos or greenlets, as they are commonly called, which frequent 

 thickets and hedgerows, live almost entirely upon an insect diet. Their food 

 is composed chiefly of little caterpillars and grubs picked from the leaves of 

 small trees.and shrubs which form the shelter in which they make their homes. 

 They are not entirely averse to eating some of the hairy forms, and in this 

 respect aid the cuckoos mentioned in a preceding paragraph. 



The warblers are insect destroyers. Brightly-colored, active creatures as 

 they are, they fill a gap in nature which would be empty without them. 

 They flit about the terminal twigs and leaves of our trees and shrubs where 

 they detect and capture many of our smaller, but at the same time very 

 dangerous, insect pests. Plant-lice and the smaller caterpillars are at times 

 quite prominent in their bill of fare. 



Much could be written about birds like the wrens, the Mockingbird, and the 

 Catbird, but they are too well known in one way or another to make it neces- 

 sary to spend time or space here for the purpose of introducing them anew. 

 Suffice it to say, that they more than pay for what they eat by killing off 

 some of the decidedly harmful insects. Then, too, they are to be numbered 

 among the most beautiful singers of the feathered choir, which latter fact 

 in itself fully offsets the harm done by them in the way of fruit eating. 



