Aug. i8, 1906.] 
•FOREST AND STREAM 
253 
SPARROW HAWK FEEDING ON TOP OF FENCE POST. 
Photo by Bohlman and Finley. 
cent, in favor of the red-tail. This is a fact that 
every gunfi'er should remember, since the hawks 
destroy so many injurious rodents they should 
never be shot unless in the act of stealing 
chickens. 
The sparrow hawk is perhaps the best known 
of our birds of prey, as it ranges through the en¬ 
tire country. Contrary to what the name might 
signify, this bird lives almost exclusively on in¬ 
sects, except where such food is difficult to ob¬ 
tain. Along the treeless plains and hills 
throughout the West, it is a common sight to 
see these little falcons beating along over the 
waste, frequently swerving upward in flight and 
coming to a dead stop, as they hang suspended 
in the air with rapid wing beats looking for 
prey. In localities where grasshoppers are 
abundant, these hawks will congregate and 
gorge themselves continually. 
During the winter about the San Francisco 
Bay region where the English sparrows are 
plentiful, the sparrow hawks often come down 
into the more settled portions and catch spar¬ 
rows. One day I saw one of these hawks dive 
into a flock of English sparrows in the yard 
by my window. Englishers scattered like frag¬ 
ments in an explosion, but the hawk nabbed one 
just at the trellis over the porch. He caved in 
his skull with a couple of blows and sat on the 
post at the corner of the tennis court and de¬ 
voured his prey. I saw the same hawk about 
the locality several times, and often wished that 
I could have kept a whole flock about the yard 
just to clean out a lot of those pestiferous, 
sputtering sparrows. 
The golden eagle is our noblest bird of prey. 
He is found throughout the wild, mountainous 
regions of the West. The eagle is more than a 
match for any animal of his own size. Not a 
beast of the field nor a fowl of the air can dis¬ 
possess him; he stands intrepid before every 
earthly power except the hand of man. He is 
shy and wary at all times, clean and handsome, 
swift in flight and strong in body. An experi¬ 
ence gained in the fiercest of schools makes the 
eagle as formidable as any creature of the 
wild. 
In a careful study of the home life of a golden 
eagle made in the mountains of California, we 
ascertain the following facts: The same aery 
had been used for years. During the month of 
February, it was recarpeted with small twigs 
and dry leaves, for the eaglets of the preceding 
summer had worn it down to a rough platform 
of large sticks. A hollow was made in the mid¬ 
dle of soft material for the eggs. Two dull, 
white eggs, shell-marked with brown, were laid 
the first week of March. The period of incuba¬ 
tion lasted almost a month, for the eggs were 
not hatched till the third of April. The eaglets 
were covered with soft white down soon after 
hatching. White is not the color for a hunter, 
but these snowy garments lasted for a full 
month, during which the youngsters grew from 
the egg to the size and weight of a large hen. 
The first week in May, black pin-feathers be¬ 
gan to push up through the down, first appear¬ 
ing on the wings and back. Week after week 
the stiff black feathers grew, but they came 
slowly, covering the back, wings, head and neck, 
until, by the first week in June, the eaglets were 
fairly clothed except a small white shirt front. 
The wings and feet were still weak. It required 
over three weeks longer for the wing feathers to 
gain strength to handle their heavy bodies. So 
it required a good four months of the year for 
the eagle to rear its family. 
We found the golden eagle a valuable inhabi¬ 
tant of any cattle range or farming community. 
His food consisted almost entirely of the ground 
squirrels that are so abundant through the Cali¬ 
fornia hills and cause such damage to the grain 
fields. On our second trip to the nest, we found 
the bodies of four ground squirrels lying at the 
edge. At each visit we examined the food re¬ 
mains and the pellets about the nest, and I am 
sure a very large proportion of the eagle’s food 
supply consisted of squirrels, with an occasional 
rabbit and quail. The hills, in many places, were 
perforated with the burrows of squirrels, and 
the eagles seemed to have regular watch towers 
on the high rocks, from where they swooped 
down on their quarry. If it were not for the 
birds of prey about these hilly districts, the 
places would soon be overrun with harmful 
rodents. Nature has provided this check for 
the squirrel. 
I am satisfied that this family of eagles easily 
consumed an average of six ground squirrels a 
day during the period of nesting, and very likely 
more than that. Those young, growing eagles 
surely required a fair amount of nourishment 
each day for about three months, and they were 
well supplied, to say nothing of what the old 
birds consumed. But even this low estimate 
would mean the destruction of 540 squirrels, in 
about three months’ time. This is the perma¬ 
nent home of the eagles, what would be the es¬ 
timate for the entire year, and what for all the 
other families of hawks and owls that live along 
the hills and canons? 
Portland, Oregon.* 
NEST AND DOWNY YOUNG OF GOLDEN EAGLE. 
Taken with telephoto lens from top of adjoining tree. Photo by Bohlman and Finley. 
