62 BIRDS OF PENNSYLVANIA. 



the premiums paid for the destruction of certain species of birds and 

 mammals, alleged to be injurious and classed as noxious within the 

 meaning of that act, is at hand. 



u I must confess a surprise at the truly lamentable ignorance of the 

 framer of that act in regard to the supposed noxious character of the 

 Hawks and Owls, upon whose lives a premium has been set for their 

 destruction. 



" It is well kown that no more beneficial bird exists than the Owl, 

 whose nocturnal habits render it specially fitted to pursue the smaller 

 rodents, such as mice, whose ravages upon the field, grain, root and 

 orchard are so well known that all farmers have from time imme- 

 morial exclaimed against the destructiveness of those quadrupeds 

 whose annual devastation causes the money value of the losses sus- 

 tained through their ravages to swell into countless thousands of 

 dollars. 



u The tender growths of the orchard are decorticated by the mice 

 and rabbits, which are in turn devoured by the Owls sought to be de- 

 stroyed simply because some one desires to become notorious as a law- 

 maker, and through utter ignorance of the subject endeavors to de- 

 prive the farmer of his best nocturnal friends, which guard the grow- 

 ing crop with zealous care while the owner sleeps to regain a strength 

 to enable him to continue the daily toil of protecting his crops from 

 the devastation of his sleek-furred enemies, most insidious at night. 

 There is not a species of Owl but that amply repays for the few in- 

 cursions made at irregular periods upon isolated hen roosts. Where 

 a single fowl is thus lost, a thousand mice pay the penalty of their 

 lives to the same Owl. 



" The nocturnal habits of the Owls render their services far more 

 beneficial than may be accurately ascertained. 



" In regard to the Hawks their reputation is much exaggerated so 

 far as their injurious propensity is concerned, yet when truthful evi- 

 dence is placed in the scales the beneficial services of the Hawks will 

 preponderate in a most satisfactory manner. 



" Certain species of the diurnal birds of prey are well known to 

 feed almost exclusively upon small rodents, and in fact differing but 

 little from the Owls in regard to their food. Two or three species of 

 Hawks (those belonging to the genus Archibuteo) are notoriously the 

 best diurnal mouse-catchers of all birds. Their habits to soar over the 

 level tracts devoted to grasses and search for their food are so well 

 known that further consideration of them is but repetition of estab- 

 lished facts. The bolder species of hawks so rarely commit depreda- 

 tions upon the farm-yard fowls that these instances are, without doubt, 

 the result of an individual predeliction for which the entire family 

 should not be branded. The number of rabbits and mice which the 



