34 
OHIO EXPERIMENT STATION: BULLETIN 250 
less so in the northern part, in winter. The preferred habitat is low, 
moist ground, among briars and weeds, in the vicinity of water, but 
frequently it is found on the more 
elevated ground along fence rows, 
roadside banks, or about the home 
grounds. 
Its food is much the same as 
that taken by others of the family, 
except that a greater percent of 
the seeds and insects taken are 
those found on low, moist ground. 
Thirty-four percent of its food is 
animal matter, chiefly insects. As 
a destroyer of smart-weed seeds, 
it is unsurpassed. Dock and sheep 
sorrel, eaten by but few species, 
are taken in quantity. Of the fruit 
and grain taken, a very little, 6 
percent, is all that could be of use 
to man, and of the animal food, only 2 percent of beneficial insects 
could be considered as loss. The benefit resulting from the destruc¬ 
tion of vast quantities of weed seeds as well as of injurious insects 
entitles it to protection. 
ENGLISH OR HOUSE SPARROW, Passer domesticus 
Without exception, all of our native Sparrows are of great 
service to man, but the reverse is true of the introduced House 
Sparrow. Its introduction took 
place at Brooklyn, N. Y., in 1851 
and 1852, and since then it has 
spread over the greater part of the 
United States and Canada. In 1886, 
it added more than half a million 
square miles to the territory previ¬ 
ously occupied by it. The first 
importation into Ohio, direct from 
Europe, was in 1869, when twenty 
pairs were sent to Cleveland. The 
same year thirty-three pairs were 
sent from New York to Cincinnati, 
Ohio and to Warren, Ohio;1870, into Fig. 10. Food of the English 
Marietta; 1874, Coshocton and Sparrow, graphically shown. 
Portsmouth; 1880 or 1881, Steubenville; 1882, Wapakoneta, which 
seems to have been the last importation. (Jones.) 
Fig. 9. Food of the Song Sparrow 
graphically shown. The relative size 
of the segments of the circle show 
the comparative amounts eaten of 
various foodstuffs. 
