The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1912-09-18
PROTECT TIE BIRDS
FARMERS PAY BIG TOLL YEARLY
TO sPoRTsMEN.
Through the Extirpation OF Bird
Foes of Insects and Other Creep
ing or Flying Creatures.

Did you know that bugs, worms
caterpillars, moths and other smaii
creeping or flying creatures stole
S420,100,000 last year from agrlcul-
turists throughout the country-more
than all the absconding bank cashiers
put together have stolen?
That if the United States had Its
normal supply Of migratory and 9th
er birds, or even as many as 1t had
sixty years ago, it would have meant
a saving of more than s250,000,O00?
This is what DR.. William T. Hor-
naday, director of the New York Zoo
logical Park, will say at the National
Conservation Congress to meet in In
dianapolis Oct. /. AS chairman OF
the committee on wild life protection
he will endeavor to arouse sentiment
Cor protecting our winged warblers,
chirpers and trillers, to say nothing
of our sheepers and Tapes and Whis-
tiers from the guns of the pothunte1
and the game hog.
Said DR.. Hornaday to a reporter
for The World: "The American pub
tic must face that of direct, material
loss suffered annsally though the de-
struction Of our migratory birds
Preyed upon by their enemy, the
sportsman, they are being so rapidly
thinned out that only imagination
can now estimate the possible agri'
cultural losses their absence will
mean in another sixty years.
"In the last sixty years our bird life
in this country has dwindled Is pei
cent. In that same period thirteer
species of migratory birds have beer
completely exterminated, and thirty
more are on the road to total extinc
ton, dozens being even now so scarce
as to be almost extinct. At this rate
in twenty-five years there will be prac
tically o so-called game birds, ex
cept, possibly, in the preserves.
ION the other hand, with univer
sal protection, within five years tht
| forests ad fields would abound witt
birds, and it would not be long be
fore the whole continent wohld teen
with bird life as it did years ago.
"And the birds would know with
lin a month if they were given pro
lection, and next season birds nov
wild and driven to safe retreat ii
the woods would be beneath our win
dows.
Universal protection is the onl!
means by which the birds can b.
brought back to help the farmer saw
his crops from insects and weeds
Protection should be Federal. / meal
to go to the Conservation Congress
primed to fight for the passage o
Government legislation aong the line
of the Mclean bi, submitted to tn
lsixty- second Congress, which calls TO
the universal protection Of all migra
tory birds from Jan. 10 to Aug. /!
each year.
"The sportsmen have made nine
tenth of the game laws and hav
made them to suit their sport. Tn
lsportsmen represent not more than
| per cent of the population, and th
95 per cent. should OF be forced t
incur loss to provide the very small
minority with sport
"The farmers themselves, tn
heaviest losers through the depletion
of the bird numbers, do not seem t
appreciate the birds for their thu
worth. The birds are the farmer
best friends. They eat the wee
seeds and the insects in great mum
bers.
| There are 154 species of the so
called game birds, nearly al migra
tory except the grouse birds, and al
most every one invaluable to the ag
riculturist. Thirty-eight sspecies o
birds eat the cotton boll-weevil
which destroys s20,000,000 worth o
cotton each year. These are princi
Ipally orioles, swallows and night
hawks.
insects form 73 per cent. of th
diet of the meadow lark, 40 per cen
of the robins, SO per cent of the ori
oles, so to "a per cent. of the wood
peckers, according to species, and o
the warblers to an extent second on
ly to the woodpeckers.
| Among the eaters o tweed seed
the American gold-finch leads, al
though the dove is a grea tseed eat
er, weed seeds forming 64 per cent
of it's diet. The stomach of one dow
was found to contain 5000 seeds
principally those Of weeds injuriou
to agricultural crops.
Despite these facts doves are sho
as game in twenty-six states, robin
in six States, blackbirds in five State
cranes in five States, and cedar bird
and meadowlarks in one State. AL
these birds are the friends of agri
culture, and all would be protected
under proper Federal enactment"
| Some Good News.