106 



THE OOLOGIST. 



5. Would public opinion in your lo- 

 cality favor the adoption of effective 

 measures to exterminate the species? 



6. Please state the facts and argu- 

 ments, pro and con, which decide this 

 problem in your mind. Please send 

 replies as early as possible — before 

 June 1 — to the undersigned. It is 

 hoped to gather a consensus of opin- 

 ion from all parts of this Country and 

 Canada. The data will be published 

 as soon as possible. 



Signed. 

 March 5, 1906. A. H. Estabrook, 



Clark University, Worcester, Mass. 



From this questionnaire and from 

 letters sent out by me personally, I 

 have received about eighty answers'. 

 I also wrote to all the Experiment 

 Stations in the United States, and to 

 prominent ornithologists in Canada. 

 The answers practically all agree that 

 the English Sparrow is an obnoxious 

 bird to our native population. Sever- 

 al letters state that we have no right 

 morally, to kill the English Sparrow, 

 or any other living creature. But it 

 must be plain to anyone that we have 

 as much right to kill a bird that is 

 generally considered obnoxious', as we 

 have to kill mice, rats, fleas, mosqui- 

 toes, bedbugs, and the like. This 

 standpoint of false humanitarianism is 

 derided in most emphatic terms in 

 many of my letters. 



I will take up the questions in the 

 order in which they appear in the 

 enquiry, and will endeavor to give the 

 main results secured by the question- 

 naire. 



1. Are you familiar with Bulletin 

 Xo. 1, etc. This was inserted in the 

 questionnaire to see if the bulletin 

 referred to, had, to any great extent, 

 been circulated through the country, 

 and also to see if it had had any mark- 

 ed effect on the ideas of the people 

 in regard to the sparrow. A good por- 



tion had seen the bulletin and most of 

 those agreed with it perfectly. 



2. Is the English Sparrow present 

 in your locality? Increasing or de- 

 creasing? 



The data for the distribution of the 

 sparrow I have secured from the Dir- 

 ectors of the different Experiment Sta- 

 tions, and from the prominent ornith- 

 ologists in Canada. The English Spar- 

 row exists in enormous numbers in 

 the whole region east of the Rocky 

 Mountains; with the exception of Flor- 

 ida, where it is found in a few places, 

 and in 'Texas, Oklahoma, and the 

 northern part of Montana where it is 

 reported absent. West of the Rockies, 

 he is reported in Utah, Colorado, and 

 in and about San Francisco, and Port- 

 land, Oregon. It is found throughout 

 Canada, south of latitude 50°, and as 

 far west as the Rockies. It does not 

 seem to be either increasing or de- 

 creasing its numbers to any appreci- 

 able extent anywhere in this area. 



3. What is being done with you to 

 exterminate them? Outline methods. 



In a great many localities', much is 

 being done towards extermination; 

 nearly one half of those answering 

 were doing something to hold . them 

 in check, but as .these few are scat- 

 tered throughout the country, no last- 

 ing, permanent effect is secured. The 

 methods used are mostly that of pois- 

 oned grain, destroying nests and 

 young, and shooting. 



4. What influence have you observ- 

 ed the English Sparrow to have upon 

 native birds? 



The influence of the sparrow upon 

 native birds is the crucial point in 

 this discussion. It is not a question 

 of how many insects it eats; it is 

 whether our native birds would be 

 better off without the intruder or not. 

 There were two people, who liked to 

 see the bird about in winter, when 

 the other birds were away. A larger 

 number honestly believed that the: 



