11 
Some Common Birds Useful to the Farmer 
sparrow, 33 the song sparrow, the field sparrow, and several others; so that all 
over the land a vast number of these seed eaters are at work during the colder 
months reducing next year’s crop of worse than useless plants. 
HOUSE FINCH 
Of all the sparrow groups, there is probably no member, unless it be the 
exotic form known as the English sparrow, 84 that has by reason of its food 
habits called down so many maledictions upon its head as the house finch, 35 
red head, or linnet, as it is variously called. This bird, like the other mem¬ 
bers of its family, is by nature a seed eater, and before the beginning of fruit 
raising in California probably subsisted upon the seeds of weeds, with an occa¬ 
sional taste of some wild berry. Now, however, when orchards have extended 
throughout the length and breadth of the State and every month from May to 
December sees some ripening fruit, the linnets take their share. As their 
number is legion, the sum total of the fruit that they destroy is more than the 
fruit raiser can well spare. As the bird has a stout beak, it has no difficulty 
in breaking the skin of the hardest fruit and feasting upon the pulp, thereby 
spoiling the fruit and giving weaker-billed birds a chance to sample and acquire 
a taste for what they might not otherwise have molested. Complaints against 
this bird have been many and loud, more especially in the years when fruit 
crops first came to be an important factor in the prosperity of the Pacific coast. 
At that time the various fruits afforded the linnets a new and easily obtained 
food, while cultivation had reduced their formerly abundant supply of weed 
seed. When the early fruit growers saw their expected golden harvest sud¬ 
denly snatched away or at least much reduced in value by the little marauders, 
it is no wonder that they were exasperated and wished to destroy the authors 
of the mischief. 
In order to test the matter thoroughly and ascertain whether these birds 
ate any other kind of food that might to some extent offset the damage inflicted 
upon the fruit, the horticulturists and ornithologists of California were re¬ 
quested to secure a number of the stomachs of these birds and send them to the 
Biological Survey. An agent was also sent to the fruit-raising sections, who 
watched the birds in the orchards and collected a number of them. In this 
way 1.206 stomachs were obtained and carefully examined, and the result shows 
that animal food (insects) constituted 2.44 per cent and vegetable food 97.56 
per cent of the stomach contents, not counting gravel. 
So small a proportion of animal food can not, of course, mean a great 
destruction of insects. As these stomachs were collected in every month, with 
the greater number taken during the summer, it is evident that whatever good 
one may expect from the linnet must not be looked for in this direction. 
Unlike most of the sparrow family, the linnet does not feed its young upon 
insects to any great extent. The contents of the stomachs of a number of 
nestlings were carefully examined, and the only animal food was found to 
consist of wooly plant lice. These also constituted the great bulk of the 
animal food eaten by adults. 
The vegetable food of the species consists of three principal items—grain, 
fruit, and weed seeds. Grain amounts to less than per cent in August, which 
is the month of greatest consumption, and the average for the year is a trifle 
more than one-fourth of 1 per cent. Fruit attains its maximum in September, 
when it amounts to 27 per cent of the whole food, but the average for the year 
is only 10 per cent. The seeds of weeds constitute the bulk of the diet of the 
linnet, and in August, the month of least consumption, amount to about 64 
per cent of the food. The average for the year is 86 per cent. 
From the foregoing it is evident that whatever the linnet’s sins may be, 
grain eating is not one of them. In view of the great complaint made against 
its fruit-eating habits, the small quantity found in the stomachs taken is some¬ 
what of a surprise. But it must be remembered that the stomach contents do 
not tell the whole story. When a bird takes a single peck from a cherry or an 
apricot, it spoils the whole fruit, and in this way may ruin half a dozen in 
taking a single meal. It is safe to say that the fruit pulp found in the stomach 
does not represent more than one-fifth of what is actually destroyed. That 
the linnets are persistent and voracious eaters of early fruits, especially cherries 
and apricots, every fruit raiser in California will bear testimony. That the 
88 Passer ell a iliaca. 34 Passer dom-estieus. 
36 Carpodacu* mexicanus frontalis. 
