156 SIDE THOUGHTS ABOUT BIRDS. 



increased. The work of each depends for its success upon 

 that of the others, and derives its special value from such 

 co-ordination. 



A great change has taken place since the observation and 

 study of birds was confined to a comparatively few men, who 

 worked with little other motive than a love for searching out 

 the haunts and habits of their woodland, field, and roadside 

 friends. Popular thought has been turned to the ways of birds 

 and the interest awakened in them. Of late years our best 

 periodicals have given us many bright and charming glimpses 

 of the homes and employments of the small fowl which make 

 their summer quarters with us, or stay resolutely through 

 the period of cold and snow. We have visited our " little 

 brothers of the air," have looked at "birds through an opera 

 glass," and have learned that the student of birds is by no 

 means of necessity a hoarder of dried skins, or a careless 

 slayer of his friends. 



Perhaps of the practical applications of accumulated 

 knowledge regarding birds, the most recent is that which is 

 now being made by our Department of Agriculture and the 

 allied experiment stations of the several States, in an attempt 

 to determine what species are beneficial and what are harm- 

 ful to agriculture. 



Naturally enough, the farmer takes particular notice of the 

 birds which have their homes near or occasionally visit him, 

 only when some pronounced useful or deleterious agency is 

 often enough repeated to excite remark. Moreover, it is 

 principally the damage suffered that he can estimate, for the 

 gain in the destruction of noxious insects, field mice, go- 

 phers, etc., is indirect, unlike the harm, which is always patent. 

 Thus many birds are associated in his mind with rifled corn- 

 fields and missing poultry. His own eyes have seen the 

 wary Crows decamp from newly planted fields at his coming ; 

 he has seen his rice field darkened with swarming Black- 

 birds, and has many a time run out, gun in hand, just too 

 late to save his fattest pullet. 



