34 
The Red-Shouldered Hawk 
Economic 
Status 
good or evil that hawks do is to consider the results of a thorough and 
scientific investigation of the food of a large number of them collected 
from widely separated sections of the country and at all seasons of the 
year. Under certain conditions an individual hawk may be guilty 
of doing harm owing to his peculiar surroundings, but that is no reason 
for condemning all hawks, any more than it would be for charging with 
crime every citizen in a village because one misguided man was caught 
robbing the bank. 
The subject of the economic status of hawks is one of great import- 
ance, and the agriculturist who is not willing to examine carefully all 
of the evidence presented certainly is not living up 
to the advanced ideas of the twentieth century, but 
is still groping in darkness. The wideawake farmer 
investigates every problem that will enable him to increase his products. 
If it can be proved that hawks destroy enormous quantities of insects and 
vermin that are known to be a serious menace to agriculture, should 
they not be protected as valuable auxiliaries to this industry, which is 
by far the most important and valuable of all that engage the attention 
of man? 
The following evidence regarding Red-shouldered Hawks is taken 
from the report of the Ornithologist of the State Board of Agriculture 
of Pennsylvania for 1890: 
“ In my examination of 57 of these hawks which have been captured 
in Pennsylvania 43 had been eating field-mice, some few other small 
quadrupeds, grasshoppers and insects, mostly beetles; 
nine revealed frogs and insects; two, small birds, re- 
mains of small mammals, and a few beetles ; two, 
snakes, and portions of frogs. The gizzard of one bird contained a few 
hairs of a field-mouse, and some long black hair which appeared very 
much like that of a skunk, and the bird on dissection gave a very de- 
cided odor of skunk. In two of these hawks, shot in Florida, I found 
in one portions of a small catfish, and in the other remains of a small 
mammal and some few coleopterous insects (beetles).” 
In 1893 the United States Department of Agriculture presented the 
results of stomach examinations made by Dr. A. K. Fisher, which showed 
that mice was the staple food, that almost every sort of small animal and 
large insect was eaten, and that only about XYz per cent, of 220 examined 
contained evidence of poultry. To sum up, the food 
Evidence G f this hawk consists of at least 65 per cent, of small 
°£ Diet rodents, which are very injurious to the farmer, and 
less than 2 per cent, of poultry. It seems hardly necessary to more 
than mention this fact to an intelligent person to convince him of the 
folly and shortsightedness of destroying this valuable bird, and of the 
necessity of fostering and protecting it in the farm lands and orchards. 
Dryden says : “The field-mouse builds her garner under ground,” but 
he does not explain that the stores with which it is filled are stolen from 
the farmers’ crops. Every farmer knows the enormous number of these 
Food in 
Pennsylvania 
