The Highland weekly news. [volume] (Hillsborough [Hillsboro], Highland County, Ohio) 1853-1886, 1869-05-13
7, Ohio, Thursday, May 13, 1869.
Spare the Birds.


Farmers and gardeners rarely appre-
ciate the value of birds. Hence the
frequent "shooting Matches" to kill
the greatest number of birds = kind
of emulation which betrays a frightful
ignorance, or, I am almost tempted to
say, very bad heart indeed, in all re-
spects without excuse. Birds, almost
without exception, are the farmers
best friends. If you would see your
fruit trees destroyed by borers and cat
erpillars, your cabbages ravaged by
cut-worm, your grain fields at the
mercy of army-worms,1 not only for
one season, but for successive years,
then kill your birds. The larvae of
injurious insects, destroyed by them,
would, but for this destruction, blight
your fields, lay waste your orchards,
beggar your granaries and add mil
lions to the expense of personal sup
port. Who thinks as he ought of the
little woodpecker feeding upon the
larvae of those injurious beetles which
make their habitation in the trunks
and limbs of trees, or of the legion of
insects destroyed by the swarms of
chimney swallows? The plaintive
wall of the whip poOr-will, which the
superstitious interpret as harbinger
of death, has caused the death of mil
lions of these little innocent friends of
the farmer. The brown thrushes,
blackbirds and robins destroy more
cut-worms twice over than are left
to damage fruit and sWard. So also of
the cedar bird, the wren and mOcking
bird. If 1 address intelligent fathers,
mothers, or kind-hearted boys, let
me entreat them to spare the little
birds and their eggs, especially if they
delight in green grass and trees, and
in beautiful shrubs and flowers. 1t
would seem as if their almost divine
melodies ought to secure birds from
harm, but, if not, then let this utiIi-
tartan age plead in their behalf for the
good they do mankind.
1t is curious to contemplate the
manner in which Providence has
ordered the wonderful arrangements
and achievements of birds. One tribe
feeds almost entirely upon Injurious
mammals, another destroys insects,
feeding upon vegetation and investing
the grass; another destroys larvae and
full grown insects found on the barks
and limbs of trees; another, those ad-
herring to the foliage, while others
some by day and some by night-cap-
ture flying insects near the earth, and
what all Others have left, the swallows,
from dawn to dark, fall upon and de-
your. The whole circle of the air and
sky belongs to the birds. It is their
home, and as if their delicious music
was not enough to tune our own hearts
to Sabbath-day'5 melody and praise,
they gather for us in our barns and
become friends, husbandmen, provi-
ders, and all without money and with
out price; and if these birds, at the
hands of a kind Providence, know how
TO give gifts to mankind, what ought
be our alteration to the GiYer of all
Good, and the measure of our mercy to
those who contribute so much to our
pleasure and profit? Owing to mans
folly, there is reason to fear that in
sectiverOus birds are diminishing from
year to year, and destructive reptiles
and insect life increasing in a cores
pOnding degree, thus more and more
destroying the perfect harmOnies of the
universe. 1t is our duty, therefore,
more and more to save what we can
and in this way your State Society, by
example and practice, may do a great
good to the country at large, and es-
pecially to its agricultural interests
rs. E. TODD, in N. Y. Times.