80 THE RELATION OF SPAEKOWS TO AGRICULTURE. 



The amount of grain taken during most of the year is about 4 

 percent, but in August the bird visits oat stubble and feeds on oats, 

 often to the extent of a quarter of its diet. The chipping sparrow 

 has the same habit. Apparent!}^ no such predilection exists in the 

 case of wheat. During the last week in June a dozen sparrows of 

 both these species were collected in a wheat field at harvest time. 

 Thej were, however, not eating wheat, but were feeding on insects 

 and weed seed. Some of the oats that are found in the stomachs are 

 obtained from horse droppings. This is particularly true in the case 

 of the chipping sparrow, a species which is often found foraging along 

 roadsides. 



Both of these sparrows feed verj^ little on an^- seeds other than 

 those of grasses, in which propensity they are like the tree and lark 

 sparrows. They subsist less on ragweed than any other species of 

 upland sparrows, and take comparativelj'' little lamb's-quarters or 

 amaranth, but at times show a marked liking for wood-sorrel, chick- 

 weed, purslane, or some of the smaller-seeded species of polygonums. 



Both of these birds are abundant and useful tenants of the farm, 

 but comparison shows the chipping sparrow to have the more favor- 

 able food habits. It destroj^s fewer beneficial insects and more pests 

 than its congener. 



JUNCO. 



(Junco hyemalis and subspecies.) 



The junco (see frontispiece), unlike the chipping and field sparrows, 

 is not a summer but a winter bird so far as most of the agricultural 

 districts of our countrj^ are concerned. It is a bird of the Canadian 

 and upper Transition life zones, and hence breeds principally in the 

 mountains or near the Canadian border. In winter it migrates south, 

 spreads over the whole of the United States — though less abundant in 

 the northern portions — and ranges as far south as Mexico. 



The best-known junco is the slate-colored, familiarly known as the 

 snowbird, or sometimes black snowbird, in contradistinction to the 

 snowflake of the Northern States. It comes from the north with 

 the first frost, and is as definitely associated with the beginning of 

 cold weather as the robin is with the first breath of spring. In its 

 winter home the bird is verj^ friendly and hops up to the doorstep 

 for crumbs Avith the same engaging confidence manifested by the 

 chipping sparrow in summer. But should the expected crumbs be 

 wanting, it is not disturbed. With a sharp chirp sounding like the 

 click of two marbles against each other it is off to the weed patches, 

 or to the barn if the weeds are buried under the snow. From the 

 haymow it can procure food, even though the snow be fence deep; 

 and at such times, or during blizzards, a few meals of hayseed are 

 not distasteful to it. But as soon as its forced retirement is con- 

 cluded — that is, when the inclemencies that drove it to shelter have 



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