BIRDS, AND THE SERVICES THEY RENDER.
One morning in September, hearing shots fired repeatedly at the further
end of my grounds, and proceeding thither to ascertain the cause, I
discovered three great, overgrown boobies, with guns in their hands,
trampling down my strawberries, and shooting bluebirds and robins. On
inquiring where they belonged, they answered in the next township. I
suggested to them that I thought their own township was quite large
enough to keep its own loafers, without sending them to depredate on me,
warned them never to show themselves on my premises again, and then
drove them out. This happened to be the only occasion on which I was
invaded by any of the worthless, loafing tribe of gunners, who roam over
some neighborhoods, engaged in the manly occupation of killing tomtits
and catbirds.
For all such my aversion was as decided as my partiality for the birds
was strong. One of the little amusements I indulged in immediately on
taking possession of my farm, was to put up at least twenty little rough
contrivances about the premises, in which the birds might build. Knowing
their value as destroyers of insects, I was determined to protect them;
and thus, around the dwelling-house, in the garden-trees, and upon the
sides of the barn, as well as in other places which promised to be
popular, I placed boxes, calabashes, and squashes for them to occupy.
The wrens and bluebirds took to them with gratifying readiness, built,
and reared their families. But I observed that the wren quickly took
possession of every one in which the hole was just large enough to admit
himself, and too small to allow the bluebird to enter; while in those
large enough to admit a bluebird no wren would build. This was because
the bluebird has a standing spite against the wrens, which leads him to
enter the nests of the latter, whenever possible, and destroy their
eggs. Almost any number of wrens may thus be attracted round the house
and garden, where they act as vigilant destroyers of insects.
These interesting creatures soon hatched out large broods of young, to
provide food for which they were incessantly on the wing. They became
surprisingly tame and familiar, those especially which were nearest the
house, and in trees beneath which the family were constantly passing. We
watched their movements through the season with increasing interest. No
cat was permitted even to approach their nests, no tree on which a
family was domiciled was ever jarred or shaken; and the young children,
instead of regarding them as game to be frightened off, or hunted,
caught, and killed, were educated to admire and love them. Indeed, so
carefully did we observe their looks and motions, that many times I felt
almost sure that I could identify and recognize the tenants of
particular boxes. They ranged over the whole extent of my ten acres,
clearing the bushes and vegetables of insects and worms; while the
garden, in which they sang and chattered from daybreak until sunset, was
kept entirely clear of the destroyers. I encountered them at the
furthest extremity of my domain, peering under the peach-leaves,
flitting from one tomato-vine to another, almost as tame as those at
home. They must have known me, and felt safe from harm. I am persuaded
that I recognized them. Yet it was at this class of useful birds that
the boobies calling themselves sportsmen were aiming their weapons, when
I routed them from the premises, and forbid the murderous foray.
Insects are, occasionally, one of the farmer’s greatest pests. But high,
thorough farming is a potent destroyer. It is claimed by British writers
to be a sure one. When the average produce of wheat in England was only
twenty bushels per acre, the ravages of the insect tribe were far more
general and destructive than they have been since the average has risen
to forty bushels per acre. Why may not the cultivation of domestic birds
like these, that nestle round the house and garden, where insects mostly
congregate, be considered an important feature in any system of thorough
farming?
Besides the wrens and bluebirds, the robins built under the eaves of the
wood-shed, and became exceedingly tame. The more social swallow took
possession of every convenient nestling-place about the barn, while
troops of little sparrows came confidingly to the kitchen door to pick
up the crumbs of bread which the children scattered on the pavement as
soon as they discovered that these innocent little creatures were fond
of them. Thus my premises became a sort of open aviary, in which a
multitude of birds were cultivated with assiduous care, and where they
shall be even more assiduously domesticated, as long as I continue to be
lord of the manor. I pity the man who can look on these things, who can
listen to the song of wrens, the loud, inspiring carol of the robin on
the tree-top, as the setting sun gilds its utmost extremities, listening
to these vocal evidences of animal comfort and enjoyment, without
feeling any augmentation of his own pleasures, and that the lonesome
blank which sometimes hangs around a rural residence is thus gratefully
filled.
One morning, hearing a great clamor and turmoil in a thicket in the
garden, where a nest of orioles had been filled with young birds, I
cautiously approached to discover the cause. A dozen orioles were
hovering about in great excitement, and for some time it was impossible
to discover the meaning of the trouble. But remaining perfectly quiet,
so as not to increase the disturbance, I at length discovered an oriole,
whose wing had become so entangled in one end of a long string which
formed part of the nest that she could not escape. The other birds had
also discovered her condition, and hence their lamentation over a
misfortune they were unable to remedy. But they did all they could, and
were assiduously bringing food to a nest full of voracious young ones,
as well as feeding the imprisoned parent. I was so struck with the
interesting spectacle that my family were called out to witness it;
then, having gazed upon it a few moments, I cautiously approached the
prisoner, took her in my hands, carefully untied and then cut away the
treacherous string, and let the frightened warbler go free. She
instantly flew up into her nest, as if to see that all her callow brood
were safe, gave us a song of thanks, and immediately the crowd of
sympathizing birds, as if conscious that the difficulty no longer
existed, flew away to their respective nests.
It takes mankind a great while to learn the ways of Providence, and to
understand that things are better contrived for him than he can contrive
them for himself. Of late, the people are beginning to learn that they
have mistaken the character of most of the little birds, and have not
understood the object of the Almighty in creating them. They are the
friends of those who plant, and sow, and reap. It has been seen that
they live mostly on insects, which are among the worst enemies of the
agriculturist; and that if they take now and then a grain of wheat, a
grape, a cherry, or a strawberry, they levy but a small tax for the
immense services rendered. In this altered state of things, legislatures
are passing laws for the protection of little birds, and increasing the
penalties to be enforced upon the bird-killers.
A farmer in my neighborhood came one day to borrow a gun for the purpose
of killing some yellow-birds in his field of wheat, which he said were
eating up the grain. I declined to loan the gun. In order, however, to
gratify his curiosity, I shot one of them, opened its crop, and found in
it two hundred weevils, and but four grains of wheat, and in these four
grains the weevil had burrowed! This was a most instructive lesson, and
worth the life of the poor bird, valuable as it was. This bird resembles
the canary, and sings finely. One fact like this affords an eloquent
text for sermonizing, for the benefit of the farmers and others who may
look upon little birds as inimical to their interests. Every hunter and
farmer ought to know that there is hardly a bird that flies that is not
a friend of the farmer and gardener.
Some genial spirits have given the most elaborate attention to the
question of the value of birds. One gentleman took his position some
fifteen feet from the nest of an oriole, in the top of a peach-tree, to
observe his habits. The nest contained four young ones, well fledged,
which every now and then would stand upon the edge of the nest to try
their wings. They were, therefore, at an age which required the largest
supply of food. This the parents furnished at intervals of two to six
minutes, throughout the day. They lighted on the trees, the vines, the
grass, and other shrubbery, clinging at times to the most extreme and
delicate points of the leaves, in search of insects. Nothing seemed to
come amiss to these sharp-eyed foragers--grasshoppers, caterpillars,
worms, and the smaller flies. Sometimes one, and sometimes as many as
six, were plainly fed to the young ones at once. They would also carry
away the refuse litter from the nest, and drop it many yards off. A
little figuring gives the result of this incessant warfare against the
insects. For only eight working hours it will be 1000 worms destroyed by
a single pair of birds. But if a hundred pairs be domesticated on the
premises, the destruction will amount to 100,000 daily, or 3,000,000 a
month!
This may seem to be a mere paper calculation, but the annals of
ornithology are crowded with confirmatory facts. The robin is accused of
appropriating the fruit which he has protected during the growing season
from a cloud of enemies. But his principal food is spiders, beetles,
caterpillars, worms, and larvæ. Nearly 200 larvæ have been taken from
the gizzard of a single bird. He feeds voraciously on those of the
destructive worm. In July he takes a few strawberries, cherries, and
pulpy fruits generally, more as a dessert than any thing else, because
it is invariably found to be largely intermixed with insects. Robins
killed in the country, at a distance from gardens and fruit-trees, are
found to contain less stone-fruit than those near villages; showing that
this bird is not an extensive forager. If our choicest fruits are near
at hand, he takes a small toll of them, but a small one only. In
reality, a very considerable part of every crop of grain and fruit is
planted, not for the mouths of our children, but for the fly, the
curculio, and the canker-worm, or some other of these pests of
husbandry. Science has done something, and will no doubt do more, to
alleviate the plague. It has already taught us not to wage equal war on
the wheat-fly and the parasite which preys upon it; and it will,
perhaps, eventually persuade those who need the lesson, that a few peas
and cherries are well bestowed by way of dessert on the cheerful little
warblers, who turn our gardens into concert-rooms, and do so much to aid
us in the warfare against the grubs and caterpillars, which form their
principal meal.
But if the subject of the value of insect-destroying birds has been so
much overlooked in this country, it is not so in Europe. It has been
brought formally before the French Senate, and is now before the French
government. Learned commissioners have reported upon it, and it is by no
means improbable that special legislation will presently follow. The
inquiry has been conducted with an elaborate accuracy characteristic of
French legislation. Insects and birds have been carefully classified
according to their several species; their habits of feeding have been
closely observed, and the results ascertained and computed. It has been
concluded that by no agency, save that of little birds, can the ravages
of insects be kept down. There are some birds which live exclusively
upon insects and grubs, and the quantity which they destroy is enormous.
There are others which live partly on grubs, and partly on grain, doing
some damage, but providing an abundant compensation. A third class--the
Birds of Prey--are excepted from the category of benefactors, and are
pronounced, too precipitately we think, to be noxious, inasmuch as they
live mostly upon the smaller birds. One class is a match for the other.
A certain insect was found to lay 2,000 eggs, but a single tom-tit was
found to eat 200,000 eggs a year. A swallow devours about 543 insects a
day, eggs and all. A sparrow’s nest, in the city of Paris, was found to
contain 700 pair of the upper wings of cockchafers, though, of course,
in such a place food of other kinds was procurable in abundance. It will
easily be seen, therefore, what an excess of insect life is produced
when a counterpoise like this is withdrawn; and the statistics before us
show clearly to what an extent the balance of nature has been disturbed.
A third, and wholly artificial class of destroyers has been introduced.
Every _chasseur_, during the season, kills, it is said, from 100 to 200
birds daily. A single child has been known to come home at night with
100 birds’ eggs, and it has been calculated and reported that the number
of birds’ eggs destroyed annually in France is between 80,000,000 and
100,000,000. The result is, that little birds in that country are
actually dying out; some species have already disappeared, and others
are rapidly diminishing. But there is another consequence. The French
crops have suffered terribly from the superabundance of insect vermin.
Not only the various kinds of grain, but the vines, the olives, and even
forest trees, tell the same tale of mischief, till at length the alarm
has become serious. Birds are now likely to be protected; indeed their
rise in public estimation has been signally rapid. Some philosopher has
declared, and the report quotes the saying as a profound one, that “the
birds can live without man, but man cannot live without the birds.”
The same results are being experienced in this country, and our whole
agricultural press, as well as the experience of every fruit-grower and
gardener, testifies to the fact that our fruit is disappearing as the
birds upon our premises are permitted to perish. Every humane and
prudent man will therefore do his utmost to preserve them.