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The Bobolink 
At this season of the year, the Bobolink is a most desirable citizen 
from every point of view. He pleases the eye, charms the ear, and 
wins our approval through his destruction of noxious insects. Grass- 
hoppers, caterpillars, army-worms, weevils, are all on 
Food the Bobolink’s bill-of-fare while nesting; and, if our 
estimate of the bird’s economic value were to be based 
on its food-habits at this season alone, one might declare the Bobolink 
to be as useful as he is beautiful. But, unfortunately, there is a debit 
side to his account with man, which is thought by some to overbalance 
the items to his credit. 
Whatever may have been his habits before man appeared, certain 
it is that now, with unfailing regularity, as a “Ricebird,” he visits in 
vast numbers the rice-fields of our Southern States in late August and j 
September. The rice is now in the milky stage, and the birds devour 
great quantities of it. So great, indeed, is the damage done that it 
more than offsets the good accomplished by the bird during the summer. 
Possibly^ therefore, on broad, economic principles, the Bobolink might 
be condemned on the ground that it is more injurious than beneficial 
to the material interests of man. The rice-growers 
Service of our Southern States would no doubt welcome this 
verdict with enthusiasm ; but we imagine that, if sen- 
tence should actually be passed, Bobolink’s friends at the North would 
gladly raise a sufficient sum to purchase the freedom of this minstrel 
of our June meadows. 
But lovers of the Bobolink should not wait for so great a crisis. If 
the bird’s western range is increasing, its eastern one is as surely decreas- 
ing. Thirty years ago it was an abundant summer resident in northern 
New Jersey and in the region about New York City, where now it is 
either entirely absent or rare and local. Trapping in the nesting season, 
and shooting in the fall, are possibly, in part, responsible for this decrease. 
The trapping has been stopped; and certainly we now have reached a 
stage in our appreciation of birds when we should no longer rank 
song-birds as game. 
Classification and Distribution 
The Bobolink belongs to the Order Passeres, and to the Family Icteridce 
(Blackbirds, Orioles, etc.). Its scientific name is Dolichonyx oryzivorus. It breeds 
from southeastern British Columbia, the Saskatchewan Valley, central Ontario 
and Nova Scotia, in Canada, southward to Utah in the West, and to the Ohio 
Valley and New Jersey in the East; and it winters in tropical America. 
This and other Educational Leaflets are for sale, at 3 cents each, by the National Association of 
Audubon Societies, 1974 Broadway, New York City. Lists given on request. 
