4 BIRDS IN THEIR RELATIONS TO MAN. 



poorwills are rushing everywhere through the air catching in 

 their capacious maws insects of all sorts and sizes. With all 

 these birds to devour them, it is evident that the insects of 



the air are well provided 

 against, if we will only en- 

 courage our aerial friends 

 as they deserve. 



But insects are not the 

 only pests troublesome 

 upon our farms. In and 

 about the barns and out- 

 buildings mice and rats do 

 much damage to grains, 

 eggs, and poultry ; in the 

 grass-fields moles and 

 meadow-mice are some- 

 times injurious; in the or- 

 chards rabbits often girdle 

 young trees by gnawing 

 the bark. Against these 



THE YELLOW WAKBLEK. . 



also the birds help us : the 

 hawks and owls feed largely upon all these rodents, and per- 

 form a great though little appreciated service in keeping them 

 in check. 



After many years of study, in New Hampshire as well as 

 many other States, of these relations of birds to agriculture, 

 we are convinced that the birds are a most potent factor in 

 making crop production possible, that without them we should 

 be overrun with pests — vertebrate and invertebrate — to an 

 extent of which we now have no conception. And so we are 

 disposed to be lenient towards the few shortcomings of the 

 birds which loom so large to many who see only one side of 

 the picture. Fruit is pilfered by some of the birds, though 

 in our region so few cherries and small fruits are raised and 

 there is relatively so much wild fruit that the loss is of small 



