PRELIMINARY CENSUS OF BIRDS. 5 



farmed or on- which the conditions were evidently far different from 

 the average farm, these censuses have not been used hi computing 

 the following averages, which are based on the enumerations appar- 

 ently representing average farm conditions. 



The average farm in the Northeastern States, according to the 1910 

 census, contains 108 acres, while the average area in the selected cen- 

 suses is 58 acres, i. c., the census area consisted on the average of the 

 farm buildings and the ground surrounding them together with ap- 

 i proximately one-half of the land of the farm, leaving an average of 

 50 acres of land farthest from the buildings not covered by the cen- 

 sus. Thus two problems are presented: First, how do the 58 acres 



Fig. 1.— Places from which bird census reports -were received in 1914. 



covered by the census compare with the average farm; and second, 

 how do the remaining 50 acres compare in bird population with the 58 

 acres chosen. 



CENSUS-COVERED FARM LANDS. 



That portion of the average farm covered by the census contained 

 30 per cent of plowed ground and 14 per cent of hay land/which, ac- 

 cording to the 1910 census, is exactly the average percentage for the 

 farms in this section of the United States. There is, however, a great 

 difference in the relative size of the orchards; these farms contained 

 7.4 per cent of orchard, whereas the average for the northeastern 

 quarter of the United States is only 1 .2 per cent, or, in other words, the 

 areas selected for the bird census contain six times as many acres of 

 orchard as the average. Each area also contains the farm buildings 

 with accompanying shade trees, ornamental shrubs, small fruits, 

 and vegetable garden, forming the most favorable nesting sites on the 



