ECONOMIC VALUE OF THE STARLING. 37 
deposited in places where they can not grow. In the actual spread 
of this noxious weed, the starling is probably less responsible than 
many of our native birds, which scatter most of their regurgitated 
seeds where they have at least a fair chance for growth. 
MISCELLANEOUS VEGETABLE FOOD. 
Of the total annual food of the starling 13.57 per cent may be 
classed as miscellaneous vegetable matter. This consists almost 
entirely of refuse eaten during the winter months, as coffee grounds, 
orange seeds, beans, parings of various fruits and vegetables, and 
similar material commonly found on garbage piles. Mast and 
various grass and weed seeds are also present in insignificantly small 
quantities. Ragweed (Ambrosia artemisirfolia) and foxtail grass 
(Chetochloa glauca) were most commonly found, and as the starling 
habitually feeds in fields and pastures contaming an abundance of 
these two weeds, it is not surprising that a few seeds are occasionally 
taken. 
The garbage eaten has no economic significance, even so indirectly 
as the cutting down of the available food of native birds, as they 
seldom resort to such food. 
FOOD OF NESTLINGS. 
From an economic standpoint, the food habits of nestling passerine 
birds are, as a rule, more commendable than those of the adults, and 
when one considers that during the nestling period the young birds of 
many species outnumber the parents two to one, the importance of 
knowing what they are capable of domg is manifest. Then, too, it 
must be remembered that the food required for the young growing 
bird is vastly more than that needed for its parent. During the 
first few days of the nestling’s life, especially, it consumes enormous 
quantities of food, estimated in the cage of some species to be on each 
day a mass equal to its own weight. This demand for food, much of 
which consists of injurious insects, is greatest durmg May, June, and 
July, a time when growing crops are benefited most by a suppression 
of their insect enemies. 
