The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-05-24

sionary from whom every associate fin
 aIter fife must absorb a certain amount
 of teaching.
 great deal of good has been &C.,
 comphsned already by the investiga-
 tions Of the national and State gov ernments and by the Audubon socie.
 ties. such such investigations as a gem
 eral thing leach only limited num-
 Der Of busy everyday citzens. The in-
 terest in ornithology which the schools
 and colleges are taking seems more
 likely to bring Americans to a reali-
 zation Of the dollars-and-cents value
 to everyone of the most frivolous
 seeming little songster as well as his
 most scdate brother on wing. The
 birds kep in cheek inumberable men
 aces to mans welfare. whether by dis
 posing of carrion, destroying the
 swarming insect life that constantly
 threatens crops of all kinds. or pre-
 venting the spread Of noxious weeds.
 Their greatest service is in keeping
 down the insect pest. pr. Lintner.
 when he was State Entomologist of
 New York, estimated the number of
 different species of insects at a round
 million, and the number of individual
 insects is, of course. incomprehensible
 to the human mind. On single tree
 scientists. by an ingenious method of
 calculation, have counted twelve mil
 lion plant lice: 1t would take man
 eleven months. working ten hours a
 day, to count them aloud if he spoke
 as fast as he could. And of all crea-
 lures in the universe insects-which
 include carterpillars and the multitu-
 dlnous tribes of creeping things
 have most voracious appetites. Many
 carterpillars will eat twice their
 weight in leaves in a day, and there
 are somes who are such gourmands
 1, F~Ax A~~ kaK,
 thousand times their original size.
 Some of these creatures. too when they
 have lived their caterpillar lives pro-
 gross to a moth existence in which they continue for another period their work of destruction. But, fortunately, there Is scarcely an insect which is not considered a toothsome morsel by some bird or other.
 Whatever affects the food crop af- fects every American. obviously. be he the farmer who grows the grain. the miller who grinds it.. the grocer who sells it. or the city dweller who consumes 1t. So there is something almost startling in the figures com piled by Dr. c. L. Marlatt of the Bu- reau of Entomology of the national Department of Agriculture. who says that there are few years in which the | loss on the wheat crop caused by the 1 Hessian fly Is less than ten per cent, | estimating that on the crop of 1900 l the damage approached S100. .0o0, 900. | Dr. Marlatt's figures for 1904. for ex- | ample, but the loss caused by insects | at $S0.000.000 for the corn crop, &10,- l 900. 900 for the wheat crop. and $530,- | 900 for the hay crop. while the codling moth alone caused $20,000.000 loss on | the fruit crop. The total destruction of farm products by insects in that | year Dr. Marlatt estimated at $795,- 900 900.
 The Rocky Mountain locust, which | the Mississippi Valley States for long while, seems to be q die rect descendant of the Egyptian plague, for he has appeared fin such as to hide the sun. The cinch bug does millions of dollars damage every year; the havoc wrought by the cotton worm ranged from fifteen to fifty million dollars in every twelve months; and the boil weevil is doing his best. along with the gypsy moth, o break all records. The more land s brought under cultivation. the great er the insect pest. and the more the loss.
 It is no wonder that the movement O protect bird life has been gaining eadway very rapidly in recent years. The best way to accomplish its pur- ose Is to widen the acquaintance of eople with birds. increase it's intimacy. nd make 1t more discriminating. That 3 the aim of the work at Brown, in ddition to the more serious investiRa. ions of the department of biology in he field of ornithology. Very few of IS realize-very few of us who dwell 1 cities, particularly-how many dif- erent kinds of birds surround us, and ow much entertainment they can af- ord. pr. Herbert E. Walter. who con- uctS the courses in ornithology at rown, made extensive studies of the irds in the public parks of Chicago. 'hile he lived in that city. Altogeth- F he found at different times 176 dif- srent species. and at the height of ligration observed as many as sixty K species in a single morning. It takes no great equipment to be- ome an amateur ornithologist, and le pursuit of this pleasant science in- olves a little of the healthful exercise lat is the greatest need of the twen- eth century American. Dr. Walters ivice is to provide yourself with a mple handbook which gives descrip- ons of birds. go out into the suburbs into a public park at o'clock in e morning and spend two hours try 6 to see how many creatures you can hopping, flying creatures you can ,pot' It will surprise you to find at very little practice makes you ute expert. The process of idepti- ,ation is largely one of elimination to art with: certain sorts of birds will rely be seen except at certain places, IT some of them almost never fly ,ove the ground, some of them. on the her hand, never come very near the .rth, some of them make frequent Luses in the treess while some seem ,ver to ailght at all Before long you i'll know a bird as you would any her friend by his voice. his man IT of walking. of turning his head,
 eating his breakfast, or what not. nd, quite the reverse of the case with lman acquaintances, the more you e of your bird friends and the bet r you know them, the more you will ant to see and know them.