CHAPTER VII. 



NATURAL ENEMIES OF THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN 

 LOCUST. 



BIRDS AND OTHER VERTEBRATE ANIMALS. 



It is fortunate for man that, as in the case of most nox- 

 ious insects, this locust is not without its numerous enemies. 

 Chickens, turkeys and hogs devour immense quantities, 

 and are happy during years of locust invasion, or whenever 

 these insects abound. Prairie chickens and quails devour 

 them with avidity, and even hunt for their eggs; swallows 

 and blackbirds pursue them unrelentingly ; the little snow 

 birds devour great quantities of eggs when these are 

 brought to the surface by the freezing and thawing of the 

 ground ; and the same may be said of almost all birds in- 

 habiting the Western country in winter ; for in the crops 

 of warblers, plovers, snipe and other birds killed by the 

 telegraph wires in the vicinity of Lawrence, Kansas, my 

 friend, G. F. Gaumer, found these eggs last winter. 



The good offices of birds are especially noticeable in 

 spring, when the young locusts are hatching in the lower 

 Mississippi Valley. Immense flocks of the different species 

 of blackbirds, of the Lapland Longspur (Plectropha?ies 

 lapponicus) and of plover attend the hatching grounds, 

 and clear entire fields. In 1875, Prof. F. H. Snow, of 

 Lawrence, Kansas, found the young locusts in the gizzards 

 of the Red-headed Woodpecker (Melanerpes erythro- 



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