THE EED- WINGED BLACKBIRD. 37 



destroys an astonishing quantity of corn, rice, and other kinds, of grain, cannot be 

 denied; but that before it commences its ravages, it has proved highly serviceable to 

 the crops is equally certain. * * * 



Their food at this season [spring] , is almost exclusively composed of grubs, worms, 

 caterpillars, and different sorts of coleopterous insects, which they procure by 

 searching with great industry, in the meadows, the orchards, or the newly plowed 

 fields. * * * The millions of insects which the redwings destroy at this early 

 season, are, in my opinion, a full equivalent for the corn which they eat at another 

 period.^ 



Of more recent writers, probably Dr. B. H. Warren has made the 

 most extensive researches upon the food habits of these birds. 

 In stating the results of the examination of 25 stomachs, he says: 



The redwing * * * destroys large numbers of " cutworms. " I have taken from 

 the stomach of a single swamp blackbird as many as 28 " cutworms. ' ' In addition to 

 the insects, etc., mentioned above, these birds also, during their residence with us, 

 feed on earth-worms, grasshoppers, crickets, plant-lice and various larvae, so destruc- 

 tive at times in the field and garden. During the summer season, fruits of the 

 blackberry, raspberry, wild strawberry, and wild cherry are eaten to a more or less 

 extent. The young, Avhile under parental care, are fed exclusively on an insect 

 diet.^ 



N. S. Goss says of the redwings: 



During the fall and winter months they assemble in large flocks, and do much 

 damage in the ricefields, and are often more or less injurious to the grains within 

 their summer homes ; but the damage they do in the latter case is overbalanced by 

 the destruction of injurious insects, upon which they almost wholly feed during the 

 breeding season; busy hunters of the field and followers of the plow.^ 



Stomach examination does not indicate that the redwings are 

 especially fond of grain. The diagram here given (fig. 5) illustrates 

 the variation in the relative proportions of the more important ele- 

 ments of the food throughout the year. The preponderance of weed 

 seeds over grain or other vegetable food is apparent at a glance. 

 Weed seeds, such as CliwtooJiloa {Setaria), Amhrosia^ Rumex^ Poly go- 

 nimi, etc. , constitute more than half the food of the year, while grain 

 (nearly half oats) is less than one-seventh. The only varieties of 

 Chcetochloa that are cultivated extensively are Hungarian grass and 

 millet, but as these are raised to a great extent as forage plants no 

 great harm is done by taking the seed, except when it is newly sown 

 or where the crop is raised for seed alone. The other species are all 

 noxious weeds, and probably the greater part of the Choetochloa eaten 

 by birds is from wild plants, which are as much of a nuisance as any 

 of the other weeds when they get into cultivated fields. In the matter 

 of fruit the redwings are almost total abstainers, only on rare occa- 

 sions tasting a blackberry or some other of the smaller varieties by 

 way of experiment. 



^Ornith. Biog., Vol. I, pp. 348-349, 1831. 



^ Birds of Pennsylvania, revised ed., p. 212, 1890. 



^ History of the Birds of Kansas, p. 399, 1891. 



