THE TREE SPARROW 
By F. E. L. BEAL 
The National Association of Audubon Societies 
Educational Leaflet No. 16 
Few persons are aware what hosts of birds spend the winter in the 
northern and colder States of the Union. The writer’s list of winter birds 
in Iowa included more than 40 species, and these were estimated to be 
fully as numerous in individuals as in summer. The reason for this is 
found in the wonderful supply of food that nature has provided and 
stored, and which is available in the winter, when insect-life is at an end, 
or is hidden from all birds except a few favored species that know just 
where to find it. Persons unacquainted with the fertility of the Missis- 
A TREE SPARROW AS A WINTER GUEST 
Photographed at Rutherford, New Jersey, by Clarence D. Brown 
sippi Valley can hardly conceive of the immense growth of weeds there 
every year, wherever they are undisturbed by cultivation or other hinder- 
ing causes. By the roadside, at the margin of the woods, along fences and 
in corners where the plow does not reach, and especially on uncultivated 
fields, the growth of this, Nature’s grain, is remarkable. Large as is the 
grain-crop of some of the Northwestern States, it is probable that the 
yearly unharvested crop of weed-seeds holds a close second. Moreover, 
these seeds are richer in fat-producing elements than are grains, being 
more oily and less starchy, particularly the seeds of the ragweed, one of 
the most abundant and troublesome of the list. 
A little before the first of October the guests for whom this banquet 
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