. Birds in their relations to man; a manual of economic ornithology for the United States and Canada . cts at onestage of their existence are aerial: by day the butterflies, thebeetles, some of the moths, the grasshoppers, the hosts oftwo-winged flies, and many others are upon the wing; whileby night an even greater host of moths, fire-flies and otherbeetles, bugs, and many other insects are abroad. To keepin check these hordes of flying things there are certain well-marked groups of birds :by day the swallows ofmany species and the chim-ney-swifts are constantlypatrolling the larger spacesof
. Birds in their relations to man; a manual of economic ornithology for the United States and Canada . cts at onestage of their existence are aerial: by day the butterflies, thebeetles, some of the moths, the grasshoppers, the hosts oftwo-winged flies, and many others are upon the wing; whileby night an even greater host of moths, fire-flies and otherbeetles, bugs, and many other insects are abroad. To keepin check these hordes of flying things there are certain well-marked groups of birds :by day the swallows ofmany species and the chim-ney-swifts are constantlypatrolling the larger spacesof the air, over both landand water, capturing mil-lions of these aerial insects;the kingbird, pewee, andother fly-catchers, as wellas to a more limited de-gree the cedar-bird andbluebird, capture the in-sects that pass within theirrange of vision as theyperch upon fence or stumpor tree; the warblers andvireos catch those insects flying in the immediate vicinity of the green-leaved trees,while the redstarts have well been named the fly-catchersof the inner tree-tops; by night the nighthawks and whip-. THE KINGBIRD. BIRDS IX THEIR RELATIONS TO MAN. pooi-wills are rushing everywhere through the air catching intheir capacious maws insects of all sorts and sizes. With allthese birds to devour them, it is evident that the insects of the air are well providedagainst, if we will only en-courage our aerial friendsas they deserve. But insects are not theonly pests troublesomeupon our farms. In andabout the barns and out-buildings mice and rats doninch damage to grains,eggs, and poultry; in thegrass-fields moles andmeadow-mice are some-times injurious; in the or-chards rabbits often girdleyoung trees by gnawingthe bark. Against thesealso the birds help us : thehawks and owls feed largely upon all these rodents, and per-form a great though little appreciated service in keeping themin check. After many years of study, in New Hampshire as well asmany other Slates, of these relations of birds t
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectbirds, bookyear1903
