The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1885-01-26
SPARROWS' GRIMES.
The Imported British Bird solemnl9
Indicted as a Nuisance.
Painful and Revolving story OF EzlS
CrImes-A Plea for Mercy
Cats Worse Than
SparrOEs.
rNew York Times. /

4 committee of the American union OF
ornithologists has taken evidence against
the imported British sparrow and has in
dicted him as nuisance. The committee
reports that the sparrow is an impostor,
thief, and a murderer and recommends
that he be exterminated without further
delay.
The story of the sparrow's crimes is .
painful and revolving one. He was brought
here to destroy the measuring worm which
formerly infested the shade trees in our
cities. Not content with doing his duty
in point of worms, the sparrow deliber-
ately and wickedly devours grain, and
thus ruins the farmers most valuable
crops. Filled with hatred of all honest
birds, the sparrow makes war upon our
native song birds, and, according to the
testimony taken by the committee, he is
rapidly DISCRIMINATING them. Meanwhile
he pays no attention to worms, and thus
entirely ignores the contract under which
he was brought to this country. de Is
faithless, graminivorous, murderous thief,
and even the most hardened crow looks
upon him with contempt and disgust.
This is a terrible indictment, but until
the committee of ornithologists submits its
evidence against the sparrow to the public
1t will not do to assume that the indict-
ment Is Just one In behalf of the SPAR
row it may be urged that he did his full
duty In regard to the measuring worms,
and totally exterminated those pests in this
city. Is it fair to ignore this fact, and is
1t reasonable to complain that the sparrow
no longer feeds on measuring worms
when the simple truth is that there are no
more measuring worms for him to eat2 In
the absence of measuring worms the spar
row has contracted the habit OF eating
grain. This is also the habit of many OF
our native singing birds, whose threatened
determination by the sparrow Is beWalled
by the committee. In what respect is the
graminivorous sparrow worse than other
graminivorous birds2 OF course, if he Is
more numerous than other birds he will
eat more grain, but is it just to call him
criminal because he multiples more rap
idly than our native birds2
That the sparrow is DISCRIMINATING our
song-birds may be doubted. He does not
exterminate the English song-birds, and II
it be true that as soon as he reaches this
country he plunges into murder and other
crimes, we must make the hum Hating adj
mission that there is something democrat
ling to birds as well as to statesmen
in our political atmosphere. Doubtless
the sparrow fights occasionally with other
birds, and, owing to his skill and pluck,
he usually defeats them. There are, how
ever, good many singing birds still left,
and if they are in process of determination
one. 1t must be remembered that an in.
dictment is not conviction, and until the
sparrow has had fair trial-with the aid
Of able counsel-and been duly and legally
convicted we cannot treat him as con-
demned criminal.
But granting all that is said against the
sparrow, how is he to be eXterminated2 1e
is idle to talk of shooting him, for he is
too small to be hit by the average sports
OF a rrraofar dicfonoa fhoY fhraa Uar6c
Even the experienced German sportsmen
who go forth from this city to the wilds Of
Long Island, accompanied by Spitz dogs,
rarely succeed in hitting a sparrow.
Poison, too, is out of the question, for, as
one of the committee mournfully remarked,
the Australians have already tried to
poison their sparrows, and have in so
doing poisoned their chickens, a result as
unsatisfactory as it was unexpected
There remains but one means of ex.
terminating the sparrow. To the cat
alone can we look for efficient aid in carry
ing out the determination policy. When
sparrows are abundant an ACTIVE cat will
kill from three to four daily. There are
at the lowest estimate 900, 600 900 spar
that one cat can kill three sparrows in
twenty-four hour. It will therefore take
BOO, 000, 900 cats to exterminate the spar
rows In single day. 1t cannot, however,
be assumed that every cat will be ready to
kill its three sparrows, or that the spar
VOWS will so distribute themselves as to
place three of their number within
reach of every active cat AT least
half of the cats will prefer steal
ing milk or taking care Of their
families to killing sparrows, and at
least half of the sparrows will keep out
of the way of the cats In order, there
fore, to promptly exterminate 900, 900, 600
sparrows we must provide ourselves with
1900, 900, 900 cats, or say twenty-four cats
to every human inhabitant of this coun.
try. Even were this to be done we could
not trust the cats, who might at any mo.
ment refuse to touch the sparrows, and
prefer to become graminivorous and totally
destroy our crops
It viii be at once seen that TO supply
ourselves with twenty-four cats apiece
would be madness. Bad as the sparrows
may be, they are infinitely better than
cats. Let us accept the inevitable with
good grace, and cease to abuse the spar
row. We brought him here and here he
will remain. It is impossible to ex-
terminate him, and the sooner the ornith.
ologists recognize the fact the better.