The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1895-02-27
Birds 10 BE Spared.

"No decent person who knows the
value of birds that sing, whether their
notes be harsh or sweet-vOiced, Will
ever kill single bird" said nutural-
ist. "rhousands of birds that are OF
inestimable value to the farmer, rs well
as to the town dweller who grows fruit
or keeps a garden, are slaughted ruth
lessly every year.
"The farmer, the gardener, and the
fruit grower should know more about
the birds that nest and sing about their
premises, for then they would defend
and protect them, and in time have
them back in something like their old
time numbers and variety. How often
nowadays does one see the saucy rich
voiced. nervous little wren? A few
wears ago it was seen and heard every
where, but it must be favored local
ity that it visits now. Yet the little
wren was a most ravenous deVourer OF
the pestiferous and destructive cut
worm of the gardens, and did great
work toward lessening the damage
done by the pest of the soil. The
bright little bluebird clears the air and
the ground of thousands of Goblin
moths and canker worms during the
season.
1.-The crow blackbird has no peace at
the hands of man, yet 4 flock of them
in a short time will clear a newly
planted field of all its hosts of des-
tructive larvae that the plough turns
up. The great American crow itself
would do the same thing if it wasn't
for the inevitable man with the gun
that Just wants the crow to try it once.
Neither the blackbird nor the crow
cares as much for corn as it does for
grubs, and if farmers would scatter
corn about their fields instead of put
ting up scarecroWs and the like, those
misunderstood birds would never pull
a hill of his planting. The chances
are, anyhow, that if the agriculturst
will take the trouble to examine hill
of Young corn that he charges the
crow with pulling up, he will find that
it was cut off by grub of some kind,
and that the crow was simply mining
for the grub, not the corn.
1.-The robin, it cannot be denied, is a
sore trial to the man who has fruit trees
and bushes, but if he could only bring
himself to stop and think how many
thousands of ravaging insects that are
the especial enemies of his trees and
bushes that the robin destroys, both
before the fruit has ripened and for
weeks after it is gone, he would not be-
grudge the bird the few quarts of cher
ries or berries that it levies on as par
tial satisfaction of the debt the grower
owes him. The same may be said OF
the other thrusheS-for the robin is a
thrush-the cherry birds, orioles, blue
Jays, and many other birds of that
class. These birds never levy tribute
on grain or seed, but they do the farm
er untold benefit.
"The climbing birds are the different
varieties of woodpeckers, and they are
constantly befriending growing things.
Whenever woodpecker is heard tap
ping on a tree it is the death knell OF
the larvae of some destructive insect.
Yet it is not all uncommon thing to
see the very person for whom this bird
is industriously at work following with
his gun the birds red head from tree
to tree until the opportunity comes for
him to send load of shot into the un.
suspecting feathered philanthropist.
1t is a pet belief among farmers that
the woodpecker kills the tree it works
on, and that he is working for that
very purpose. tits fact that the com.
mon little sapsucker does injure trees,
but the woodpecker never does. Quite
the contrary. The white-breasted nut.
hatch and the little gray creeper-so
generally confounded with the sap
sucker-live exclusively on tree in.
sects, yet the nuthatch is in bad repute
among many farmers, because they be,
lieve il kills their trees.
1.-THE meadow lark is another bird
that has little peace on any ones land
for there is a mistaken notion abroad
that he is d game bird. He is game in
the quality of being alert and hard to
get shot at, but is no more entitled to
be so classified than the flicker, ol
highholder, is. The meadow lark is q
constant feeder on underground larv;r
and whenever he is disturbed he is
simply driven away from active work
in ridding the ground of the worst
kind of farm pests. The bluejays may
be said to be indirectly an enemy tc
the farmer as we'll as friend, for il
has the bad habit of destroying tho
eggs of other birds that do only good
''If there is one bird that the farmer
loves to do all i'll his power to eXter:
inmate more than he does the crow
unless it may be the hawk, that bird is
the owl. He can't be brought to the
belief that if it were not for the owl.
and hawks his fields would be overruI
and burrowed by field mice to such ar
extent that his crops would be in per
petual danger that owls, while out
mousing, feed on myraids of night
flying moths and beetles, thus prevent
ing the laying of millions upon mil
lions of the eggs of these insects, and
that they not only keep the field mice
down, but lessru the number of do
mestic mice and rats about barns ant