EVIDENCE. — FROM EUROPEAN PUBLICATIONS. 341 



[FROM a THE HOUSE SPARROW" (PART 1), BY J. II. GURNEY, JR., 1885.] 



The various ways in wliich Sparrows do harm to crops are well known to agricult- 

 urists; but perhaps by no one has the sequence of their proceedings in the field been 

 better put than by the Rev. C. A. Johns (Brit. Birds, p. 202). Sometimes they make 

 descents on the standing corn before the grain has attained full size, and near the 

 hedges the busy pilferers are at work, and fly up in a swarm as you approach them, 

 but when it is quite ripe they do the greatest harm. It is not only what they eat, 

 but what they knock out. 



A gentleman who is a practical farmer in North Lincolnshire — Mr. J. Cordeaux — 

 tells me he has seen acres which had the appearance of being thrashed with a flail. 

 Taking this into consideration, the opinion of the Melbourne (Derbyshire) Sparrow 

 Club — that Sparrows destroy a quart of corn apiece during the summer (vide Zoolo- 

 gist, p. 2299) — is probably true. If thirty grains a day is a Sparrow's ordinary meal 

 during June, July, and August (and I do not think this is far from the mark, having 

 repeatedly found twenty and twenty-five whole grains, and once, in November, forty, 

 in a Sparrow's crop), it would have eaten, during those three months, two thousand 

 seven hundred and sixty grains, which is nearly a third of a pint; or if, take tbe 

 whole year round, each Sparrow eats, on an average, fifteen grains a day, then each 

 Sparrow eats in a year five thousand four hundred and seventy-five grains. This is 

 none too high an estimate, for the quantity which Sparrows eat at stacks in winter- 

 time equals what they take from the fields in the summer. Daring the operations 

 of harvest, I understand they may often be seen sticking to the gradually lessening 

 square of corn until all the field is cut. They then transfer their attention to the 

 sheaves, and also divide with the gleaners what is left on the stubble. Finally, when 

 the farmer has sold his produce, Sparrows take a very large toll out of any portion of 

 it which a iDurchaser may give to his poultry, as every breeder of chickens and tur- 

 keys knows very well. At the end of September a marked decrease is to be seen in 

 their numbers, but whether this is caused by real emigration or by local movements 

 is not clear. It has often been said that Sparrows come to us over the North Sea in 

 the autumn; but among the numerous " wings" I have had from light-houses and 

 light-vessels I have never received this species. * 



In October Sparrows pack into flocks of from two hundred to three hundred and 

 leave the homesteads. That month is mostly spent in the fields, and so is November; 

 and here they find plenty of occupation, sometimes hunting on their own account, 

 sometimes with other small birds. With the first fall of snow away they go to the 

 stacks, on the sides of which they may be seen clustering; or, if it is not too deep, 

 searching on the ground for grain which has been shaken out, with chaffinches and 

 yellowhammers. At all times stacks are a great attraction. It is said that prefer- 

 ence is given to a wheat stack ; but Sparrows are not particular so long as they can 

 get grain. Needless to say, that threshing is a matter of the highest interest to 

 Sparrows, t 



Februarv and March are spent almost entirely in the vicinity of houses and farm- 

 yards, or any place where corn is to be found, unless, as previously mentioned, they 

 are attracted to a distance by the operation of threshing. I agree in thinking that 

 at this period the opinion of Colonel Russell, who continues the discussion after me, 

 that corn forms 90 per cent, of their food is true. At the end of March fields are sown, 

 and Sparrows show not infrequently, by their presence, that they wish to levy the 

 usual tribute ; but it is certain that where a drill is used the grain is deposited too 

 deeply in the soil for any" small birds to reach it, except skylarks, which are said to 

 dig it up sometimes ; but Sparrows get the drilled barley and oats when they begin 

 to si>rout. 



* But the nearly allied tree-sparrow (Passer montanus) is a well-known migrant. 



t Mr. B. B. Sapwell remarks that when a stack has been threshed ever so far away 

 from the yard, the Sparrows in the yard have always had their crops full of the 

 grain (in litt.). 



