Birds Useful and Birds
Harmful
SHERRATT & HUGHES
Publishers to the Victoria University of Manchester
Manchester: 34 Cross Street
London: 33 Soho Square, W.
[Illustration:
_See page 203._
THE BEARDED TIT.]
BIRDS USEFUL
and
BIRDS HARMFUL
BY
OTTO HERMAN
_Director of the Royal Hungarian Ornithological Bureau, Budapest_
AND
J. A. OWEN
_Author of the “Country Month by Month,” etc.,
and Editor of all signed “A Son of the Marshes.”_
Illustrated by T. Csörgey.
MANCHESTER
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS
1909
CONTENTS
PAGE
Preface 1
Chapter I. Useful or Harmful 7
Chapter II. The Structure of the Bird 15
Chapter III. Workers on the Ground 25
Barn or White Owl, Tawny or Wood Owl, Long-eared
Owl, Short-eared Owl, Little Owl, the
Rook, Hooded Crow, Carrion Crow, Raven,
Jackdaw, Jay, Magpie, Quail, Black-headed Gull,
Starling, Rose Starling, Waxwing.
Chapter IV. In the Air and on the Trees 105
Swallow, House Martin, Sand Martin, Swift,
Nightjar or Fern Owl, Green Woodpecker,
Greater Spotted Woodpecker, Lesser Spotted
Woodpecker, Tree-Creeper, Nuthatch, Crossbill.
Chapter V. The Farmer’s Summer Friends 139
Wryneck, Cuckoo, Hoopoe, Great Grey Shrike,
Lesser Grey Shrike, Red-backed Shrike, Lesser
Whitethroat, Blackcap, Nightingale, Redstart,
Tree-Pipit, Wagtails, Great Reed Warbler,
Willow Wren, Flycatchers, Wheatear, Stonechat,
Bearded Reedling or Titmouse, the Titmouse
Family.
Chapter VI. Workers all the year round 225
House Sparrow, Tree Sparrow, Hedge Sparrow,
Skylark, Kingfisher, Dipper, Song Thrush,
Blackbird, Oriole, Robin, Wren, Chaffinch,
Hawfinch, Bullfinch, Yellow Hammer, Turtle
Dove.
Chapter VII. Some Wildfowl 283
Lapwing, Common Curlew, Redshank, Green
Sandpipers, Herons, Bitterns, Moorhen, Tern,
Bean Goose, Wild Duck or Mallard, Pintail
Duck, Shoveler, Great Crested Grebe.
Chapter VIII. Some of the Falconidæ 333
Golden Eagle, Kite, Red-footed Falcon, Buzzard,
Sparrow Hawk, Goshawk, Hobby, Kestrel, Marsh
Harrier, Hen Harrier.
Chapter IX. The Rational Protection of Birds 369
Preface.
The systematic study of the economic value of birds in their relation to
agriculture has been carried out in Hungary of late years more
indefatigably than in most other parts of Europe. The natural resources
of the country are indeed so largely dependent on agriculture that this
is only what might have been expected.
The Royal Hungarian Minister, M. Darányi, who has proved himself so
thorough and so capable a Director of his country’s interests in the
direction of Agriculture--amongst other handbooks issued under his
orders for popular use--commissioned the well-known naturalist, M. Otto
Herman, to prepare the present work, which is intended to give to
landowners, farmers, fruit-growers and gardeners such a knowledge of the
action, beneficial and otherwise, of birds as would prevent the mistakes
which have ended in some districts in our own country, in the wholesale
destruction of some very useful species.
The book is enriched by the drawings of a talented artist, M. Titus
Csörgey, who, I need not say, is himself a skilled naturalist. These are
so executed as to render it easy to the most casual observer to identify
the various markings of the plumage as well as the mere form of the
bird.
The work makes no pretence at being scientific in the ordinary sense of
the word. It has been written with the view of providing a ready
handbook for the farmer, the gardener, the student, and bird-lovers
generally; and it embodies the result of exact data kept by
correspondents of M. Herman’s department in all parts of the country; so
that the observations on which its statements are grounded are the
results of personal investigation and dissection.
In our country this study of the food of birds and the part they play in
the economy of nature has not received the attention it demands. Yet it
is one that affects the entire community. It is true that in journals
here and there valuable papers on this subject have appeared, but it is
felt that among the innumerable books on bird life which have been
published of late years there has been a lack which this little volume
may supply.
A few words as to myself and my present association with M. Herman. From
my earliest childhood I have had a passionate love for birds and
flowers. I remember looking with wondering delight on the velvety
upturned faces of the variously tinted pansies that bordered the paths
leading up to the door of a certain farmhouse where we stayed much in
the summer-time, when I was just four years old,--wonder because our
mother told us that God’s finger painted them and I used to think that
He did it whilst we slept. Our father gave us prizes for the one who
could collect the greatest number of wild flowers and knew most about
the trees. In the town I collected bird pictures, nursed an occasional
wounded sparrow, kept my eyes open generally, and read much of William
and Mary Howitt. Then came some years of school life--the last two of
these in Germany, where the study of natural history has always received
more attention than has hitherto been the case with us in England, and
these were followed by a few years at home on the moorlands of
Staffordshire. Later I had thirteen years of wandering in different
parts of the Pacific--New Zealand, Tahiti, Hawaii, California, all of
which strengthened my love of out-door life; and although my scientific
knowledge was small, my acquaintance with nature and my love of nature
have been ever growing.
As years advanced, and I was no longer able to go so far afield, it has
been a great pleasure to me to collaborate with other naturalists--more
than one of these--who, with greater opportunities for the practical
observation of birds have combined scientific research. I have been glad
to act as henchwoman to such--and to be, as it were, the little bird
that in its playful and circling way follows the flight of the greater
bird in the heavens.
And as I edited--with much gain to my own knowledge--the records of
observations of the working naturalist styled “A Son of the Marshes,” so
I am glad also to be able to present to our English readers these
chapters on the Man and the Bird, and their relative significance in the
great field of agriculture.
I visited M. and Madame Herman at their home in the beautiful Hungarian
valley of Lillafüred, where his summers are spent in the very heart of
nature; and I learned and saw much with him there. He had lived as a boy
among these mountains and valleys--his father having been the leading
physician in the district. There, he had scoured the woods over which
the Snake or Short-toed Eagle circled, climbed up to the Peregrine
Falcon’s nest, and boated on the lovely little lake, watching the
movements of the Osprey. But indeed his whole life has been devoted to
the study of nature, and the fauna of his Country, and his many
published writings have had a very large circulation there, as well as
in Germany.
M. Herman laments the constantly decreasing number of birds in his
native valley. In a spot where he once counted many a Flycatcher’s nest,
only two pairs now breed. The Nightingales, formerly plentiful, have
entirely forsaken this valley--the Titmice are lessening in numbers, and
so on. Yet the masses show no inclination to destroy useful,
insect-eating birds--although modern forestry, and gardening, which does
not tolerate old trees, and the absence of sheltering hedges over the
great Hungarian plains, render many birds--especially the migratory
species--homeless.
Numbers of interesting species nest in and visit this valley, however.
In winter that beautifully coloured, long-billed Rock-Creeper
(Tichodroma muraria)--with wings rose-red above, dashed with white
underneath, runs up the rock sides, as does the Tree Creeper on the tree
trunks--a blithe, busy creature. This species is found in the same
latitude, in rocky mountain ranges eastward, as far as Northern China.
The great slanting rocky spurs, that gleam with rosy light, or pale
blue, as the sun runs its daily course, this rock climber delights in.
The Rock Thrush breeds in the same ridges; the Long-tailed Tit has its
nest there; near the ground in the woods, are the breeding-places of the
familiar Coal-Tit; where fir-trees abound it is at home. The less
welcome Red-backed Shrike pursues his cruel little methods here,
lessening the numbers of more useful and more attractive birds.
Waterfalls abound, and among the brooks, from stone to stone, trips the
merry Dipper, showing his pretty breast and red underparts--building his
large house near the running water, in whose pools fine trout are in
plenty.
We have rested together in a little cove on the lake at Hamar, which is
overhung by luxuriant foliage; across the water, over the dense woods,
floats a solitary Eagle--that seeks his quarry in the shades below. Otto
Herman knew his breeding-place as a boy. Tradition says the nest is at
least a hundred years old, yet each year the young are still fed there.
* * * * *
That Great Britain has still much to do in the direction of Bird
Protection is definitely shown in a leaflet just issued (December, 1908)
by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, of whose Council I
have the honour to be a member. Of the 370 or 380 species placed on the
list of “British birds,” scarcely 200 can now be justly termed British.
I may be allowed to give you here some idea of the principal agents in
this destruction of birds as set forth by our Society:--
“First, there are those who destroy for destruction’s sake; the boy who
ravages the hedgerows in spring and delights in catapults, air-guns, and
stones at all times; the lout with a gun; and the cockney sportsman.
They are responsible for a vast amount of cruelty, especially to
nesting birds and nestlings; for the killing of various home-birds and
migrants, and for the senseless shooting of sea-birds and occasionally
of rare visitants.
“Secondly, the bird-catcher, responsible for the decrease of all those
birds sought for caging, such as Goldfinch, Linnet, Siskin, Lark, etc.
This class, like the first-named, requires dealing with, chiefly because
of the intolerable amount of ill-treatment involved by the methods
employed in the catching, transit, and sale of wild birds. The
destruction of the useful Lapwing, and of the Skylark for the table, is
also a point in need of attention; and in the same category may be
placed the so-called sparrow-clubs, which encourage the indiscriminate
killing of many species of small birds.
“Thirdly, the gamekeeper, responsible for the extinction, or extreme
rarity of most of our large birds, especially predatory species and
uncommon visitors.
“Fourthly, the private collector with a craze for rare British-taken
birds and eggs, or, in the case of the humbler persecutor of beautiful
species, for something to put in a glass case.
“Fifthly, the trader and the feathered woman, jointly responsible for
the devastation wrought among the loveliest birds of all lands.”
We have included a few useful species here, which are only visitants to
our country, but which, with more protection, might remain for part of
the year with us regularly.
CHAPTER I.
USEFUL OR HARMFUL?
The Hungarian Central Office for Ornithology was instituted in 1804, in
accordance with a scheme submitted to the Ministry of Agriculture by Mr.
Otto Herman, then a member of the Hungarian Parliament.
The rapid progress of economical affairs in the nineteenth century,
particularly in its second half, had a perceptible influence upon the
position occupied by the bird and insect fauna, a change which was felt
in agriculture, and led to the formation of a new branch of
science--ornithologia oeconomica.
The Hungarian Central Office for Ornithology took the new branch in
hand, after its transfer from the sphere of the Ministry of Public
Instruction to that of the Ministry of Agriculture, where M. de Darányi
assigned an important place to practical experimental methods as a
complement to strict science.
In the meantime Baron Hans von Berlepsch of Seebach developed his system
for the protection and propagation of the most useful birds, the main
points of which were the feeding and providing with nesting
opportunities of such birds. Thereby bird protection was diverted into a
rational direction, which met with hearty sympathy on the part of M. de
Darányi; consequently the Hungarian Central Office for Ornithology
included this branch of ornithology in the work it set itself to do.
The course followed by rational bird-protection in Hungary is as
follows. It starts with the idea that nature itself knows neither
useful nor noxious birds, but only necessary ones, which have developed
according to the laws of nature, and on the basis of their development
are performing in the world of nature the work which is appropriate to
their organism.
The manifold character of the work performed by birds is in harmony with
the variety of these organisms.
The question of the usefulness and noxiousness of birds during the whole
of the nineteenth century was treated only approximately, upon the
assertions of authorities. When, later on, Congresses began to embrace
the cause of bird-protection, and the question of the usefulness or
noxiousness of each species assumed a rôle of the first importance, it
turned out that there was no firm basis upon which to rely, in passing
judgment. Eminent ornithologists were often at variance with regard to
the usefulness or noxiousness of a particular species.
Where Nature is intact, the number of birds is automatically regulated
in accordance with the natural development of their surroundings.
The conceptions of “useful” and “noxious” are merely human ones; and man
can, by cultivation or the contrary, alter the normal conditions; and
may, consequently, modify the character and habits of birds also.
Agriculture on a large scale, modern forestry, the draining of
territory--all these things alter the fundamental conditions of animal
life, and in consequence of bird-life also; and if these modifications
in respect of birds are injurious to man, it is in the interests of man
to adapt them artificially for the benefit of birds; and if by
cultivation man deprives useful birds of their natural nesting
facilities, he ought to provide them with artificial ones. This is the
principle on which Baron von Berlepsch founded his system, which was
accepted and applied in Hungary, together with the modifications
required by special circumstances, or such as were introduced as the
result of experience.
These principles apply chiefly to those species which remain with us
during summer and winter alike, and which are useful to agriculture. But
the international protection of birds is important as regards those
useful species that are migratory, and, as they migrate, pass through
countries where--as is the case in Italy--the birds are caught _en
masse_, and where bird-catching is carried on as a trade.
The third international Ornithological Congress, held in Paris in 1900,
decided that the Governments of the various European States should be
called upon to have the food of birds made the object of special
investigations, and to report the result, within a space of five years.
When the fourth International Congress met, however, only Hungary and
Belgium were able to report on the subject.
The publications of the Hungarian Ornithological Centre are founded upon
the collection of data, divided into two main groups:--1. The Migration
data, so-called historical, up to 1891, and again from that to the
present day. 2. Foreign data, partly taken from literature, and Special
data relating to one species, from the whole area of its habitation--the
Cuckoo for instance.
The investigation of the economic rôle played by the Rook (Corvus
frugilegus L.), which English landowners and farmers are beginning to
feel is a matter of great importance, was begun by the Central Bureau in
1893; it is still going on. According to the results hitherto attained,
this bird does more good by destroying insects, and in particular the
larvæ of insects living underground, than it does harm to the crops.
It is our endeavour in this little volume which we now offer to English
readers, to give a faithful presentment of the good and the harm that
the birds are known to do, from the agriculturist’s standpoint. But in
this all depends on the attitude which the gardener and the farmer adopt
towards the birds.
By throwing a single stone a lad can scare away a whole flock of rooks;
and when these birds alight on a field where they do harm to grain, a
man must not grudge a little labour in keeping them off; considering
that the same bird that works harm at one season, will be a valuable
ally at another, as well as a source of pleasure and interest.
The rook, the crow, and even the mischievous magpie, follow the plough
as it turns up the brown furrows, with sharp eyes spying worms, larvæ
and cockchafer grubs. Nothing escapes the attention of the bird. He
picks here and there, and fills his crop with the worst enemies of the
tiller of the fields--the various forms of insect life that lie dormant
in the earth until the time arrives for each one to come forth and
fulfil its life’s mission--much of which means injury to the fruit of
man’s labour.
Starlings rise in flocks--a perfect cloud of them--to disperse, and
again to assemble before settling on the pastures, where they will be
busy all the day, for that part of the year when man needs their
services most.
Later, in the cherry trees and among our own vines the starlings would
do mischief enough. The rifled branches and stripped grape stems are a
sorry sight for the owner, who finds it hard to remember that God cares
even for the sparrows. He tries to drive the thieves away, but they care
little for the cries of the lads set to scare them. Little do they heed
the rattles, feathers, rows of sticks with lines of thread--all the
various flimsy inventions are useless; a gun will disperse them for the
moment, but the cloud of pilferers is soon back again, and as busy as
ever. At this juncture severe measures are justified. Even the most
ardent bird-lover will not be foolish enough to protect every bird at
all times and seasons. Yet it is only for a short season of the year
that starlings are harmful, and for the greater part they are useful, in
garden, field and meadow, from early morning until late evening,
protecting growing blades of grass and coming seed and roots for the
farmer, with unceasing labour. This is in the early spring; later they
betake themselves to the pasture lands, where, on bright sunny mornings,
they walk nimbly among the browsing cattle seeking their food in the
form of crane fly and daddy-long-legs, in the shadow of the patient
creatures. The gadflies, too, buzz about the bodies of the beasts, lay
their eggs under the hide, boring into the flesh, tormenting and
maddening the helpless cattle. The Hungarian herdsman is glad when he
sees the starlings settle on his wide pastures.
When the eggs have developed into maggots the birds alight on the backs
of the beasts, to rid them of gadflies and batflies; and the cattle and
sheep suffer their services gladly, knowing well that these good
feathered friends will effectually extract their torturers without
further irritation to the infested parts. A horse has been known to die
from the exhaustion caused by the continuous action of parasitic
creatures.
Then, as regards the owl--that bird of the night, who shuns the light of
the life-giving sun; for which reason man distrusts and persecutes him.
The other birds also regard him with disfavour, and mob him when he
ventures forth from his holes by day, big birds and little ones, in
common dislike of the uncanny creature. They know full well that this is
the nocturnal disturber of woods and fields, and they resent his ways
and his manners.
When the twilight is over all and the birds of day have betaken
themselves to rest, then most of the owls go forth to hunt for quarry.
Noiselessly they flit over the quiet meadows and fields; with those eyes
which shun the light they can detect through the dimness of evening the
nest where small birds are, and this they rifle. And so in that respect
they are harmful. The Short-eared owl will take birds from the size of a
lark to that of a plover.
On the other hand, when mice have got the upper hand in house and barn,
devouring and spoiling man’s provision, then every species of owl is
welcome, even he the superstitious countryman calls the Death-bird. And,
again, when the weather favours that pest the field-mouse, and the
voles, and they swarm in meadows, cornlands and everywhere, so that the
land is full of mouse-runs; from all sides comes that gentle singing
from tiny throats and the farmer is at his wits’ end to know how to be
rid of the plague. Then in Hungary the mouse buzzards circle by day over
the pastures and fields, making war on the gnawing little beasts; and
the whole night long the owls take up the same useful work. They fill
their crops, each of them, with from twenty to thirty mice, fly to their
several trees to digest the meal, and you will find the pellets formed
by the birds of the indigestible portions--bones and fur--in and about
their nesting-holes. Harmful moths and beetles they also kill.
And so the Owls--barn, the tawny or wood-owl, the long and the
short-eared--which in England are the only common species, are
undoubtedly the agriculturalists’ good friends, and indeed friends of
the whole human race; and many landowners now prohibit the use of the
cruel pole-trap in their destruction. Richard Jefferies tells how 200
owls were taken in one pole-trap in a plantation of young fir in his
time. Dr. Altum, a great mover in the cause of bird-protection, examined
210 of the wood-owl’s pellets and found in these the remains of 6 rats,
42 mice, 296 voles, 33 shrews, 48 moles, 18 birds and 48 beetles,
besides a countless number of cockchafers.
And what can you find to say in favour of the Sparrow? I fancy I hear
many a reader ask,--that ubiquitous bird whose impudence is everywhere
proverbial. When sparrows in hosts settle down on the corn waiting to be
harvested, not only filling their crops but uselessly beating the grain
out of the ears, the case is bad, and it is hard then to recall all the
good the same birds had done in devouring the seeds of harmful weeds,
such as wild mustard, etc.--also to think of the cockchafers in the grub
as well as winged--daddy-longlegs, caterpillars, turnip-moth, grubs of
cabbage-moth and butterfly, and the moths of both currant and
gooseberry. In towns, too, the sparrow is invaluable as a street
scavenger. House-flies, those plagues indoors, maggots of fleas, eggs of
cockroaches, spiders, centipedes,--all, and many other “small deer” that
infest stables, poultry-yards and other precincts of our homesteads the
sparrow diligently seeks for.
It is true that the common sparrows multiply too fast and their numbers
must be thinned down. This, many a bird-loving landowner and farmer does
in various ways. The late Lord Lilford declared the most humane way was
to pull down all the nests within man’s reach. There would still be
plenty left, in inaccessible places. A humane farmer, the present writer
knows in Hampshire, a great wheat-grower, gives the lads round
threepence a score for all the sparrows’ eggs they can bring to him.
Sparrow-clubs--save the mark!--are schools for cruelty. In one
Lancashire parish which I know the vicar encourages the Jackdaw,
allowing it to build even in his church steeple, because wherever that
bird is, sparrows become more scarce, their young suiting that bird’s
palate well. Man has foolishly upset the balance of nature by destroying
the natural enemies of the sparrow. Take two neighbouring estates we
know in Yorkshire; on the one sparrows, blackbirds, bullfinches and
other birds are remorselessly shot during the fruit season; on the other
the use of the gun is forbidden. In the garden and orchard of the latter
there is always a far greater allowance of fruit than in those of the
former.
Only where their natural enemies have become scarce ought man to set his
wits to work to compass the destruction of a species.