1907.] Some Notes on the Food of Birds. 



407 



apple trees, as well as aphides,, which are given to the young. 

 Mr. H. Rivers, of Sawbridge worth, states that on 17th July he 

 noticed a chaffinch fly to the ground with a plum leaf covered 

 on the underside with aphides (Hyalopterus pruni) and found 

 other leaves from which the bird had already pecked the aphides. 

 The chaffinch also eats corn. 



Hawfinch. — This bird is not common but is considered to be 

 increasing. It attacks peas severely, also cherries and nuts. 

 A Herefordshire grower wrote : — " They attack plum and pear 

 buds to a very considerable extent." 



Rook. — This bird eats large quantities of leather jackets, 

 chafer larvae, wireworms and other grubs, and occasionally the 

 caterpillars of the winter moth and of the Oak tortrix moth, 

 also slugs, young field voles, sometimes fowls' eggs and young 

 chickens, partridge eggs, and young. It is generally agreed 

 that it is a useful bird if not too numerous, and is specially 

 beneficial on grass land. In many parts it is too numerous, 

 when it becomes destructive to freshly sown fields of corn, 

 peas, and beans. A correspondent in Hants wrote " that for 

 three years rooks spoilt quite two-thirds of the potato crop, 

 boring down to the tubers." They do not venture as a rule 

 into ordinary gardens, preferring the fields, but will attack 

 cherries, walnuts, nuts and gooseberries, and will take straw- 

 berries quite green from the field if let alone, but they are 

 easily scared. 



Jackdaw. — The jackdaw eats cockchafer grubs, wireworms, 

 and leather jackets, like the rook it will strip trees of walnuts, 

 and where numerous is destructive to peas and grain crops. 

 It is a very destructive bird to game eggs, poultry, and their 

 young, and will completely clear nests of small birds of their 

 eggs and young. In Kent the jackdaw seems to be some- 

 what rare, but in some counties, such as Hereford, it is common. 

 A correspondent writes that " on examining a jackdaw which 

 had been shot it was found to have in its beak 13 wireworms, 

 4 grubs, and a few other insects. This bird was a male and 

 had come to feed its mate which was sitting on the nest." 



Jay. — This bird is useful in destroying blackbirds' eggs, • 

 also young mice, and, like the magpie, it will eat almost any 

 variety of young birds. It is mentioned as eating ripe straw- 

 berries, apples, plums, and nuts. Of insect food it eats^chafers 



