The Food of Birds. 
155 
all but two on. the 29th of the month. The chief peculiarity 
of the month is the almost total disappearance of C'oleop- 
tera, which were represented only by a few small Harpa- 
lids and a single minute Ataenius. The Lepidoptera rise 
to thirty-seven per cent., chiefly through the abundance 
of the larvae of Prodenia lineatella, Harvey. The Orthop- 
tera make nearly half the food, the species differing from 
those of the preceding month mainly in the greater num- 
ber of red-legged grasshoppers. Spiders were only two 
per cent, of the food; and some unknown wild fruits 
formed seven per cent. It will be seen that a striking 
change in the food of this species attends that increase of 
the Orthoptera in numbers and activity which occurs in 
the late summer and early autumnal months, these in- 
sects being almost entirely substituted for Coleoptera, 
Hemiptera and Arachnida,. The Coleoptera of the six 
preceding months averaged twenty-seven per cent, of the 
food, while this order amounts to but three per cent, in 
August and September. The Orthoptera of the forego- 
ing months averaged but fourteen per cent., while those 
of the two months in question rise to fifty-four per cent. 
It is evident from the foregoing that Orthoptera and 
smooth caterpillars are the favorite autumnal food of 
this bird, and as the first of these remain abundant until 
frost, it is not likely that the food of October is much less 
favorable to the bird than that of September. The two 
specimens taken in the former month were well filled 
with winged ants. 
December. 
To learn the food of the bluebird in midwinter, I went 
to extreme southern Illinois in December, 1879, and shot 
a number of specimens, some from the heavy forests in 
the bottoms of the Ohio River, and others from the wood- 
ed and cultivated highlands in Pulaski county. The 
weather at this time was . sometimes above and sometimes 
below freezing, and bluebirds were abundant and very 
much at home. The principal food of the twelve speci- 
mens examined consisted chiefly of various wild fruits 
(eighty-four per cent.), of which the berries of the mis- 
tletoe (Phoradendron flavescens) were the most abun- 
