File:Birds in their relations to man; a manual of economic ornithology for the United States and Canada (1903) (14771463833).jpg

Identifier: birdsintheirrela00wee (find matches)
Title: Birds in their relations to man; a manual of economic ornithology for the United States and Canada
Year: 1903 (1900s)
Authors: Weed, Clarence Moores, 1864-1947 Dearborn, Ned, 1865-
Subjects: Birds
Publisher: Philadelphia, London, J. B. Lippincott Company
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries

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n example, feed upon vegetable matter,and are occasionally destructive to strawberries by eating thepulp of the fruit. Others are predaceous; but very little isknown precisely concerning the food habits of these; conse-quently their economic status is ill defined. From their gen-eral habits we are led to think that their value may easily beover-estimated and that we need not regret their occasionaldestruction by birds. In addition to insects and their allies, birds feed upon manyhigher animals. Fishes are taken habitually by kingfishers,ospreys, the wading birds, and some of the owls. Frogs,lizards, and snakes are eagerly devoured by hawks, owls, andother raptorial birds, as well as by some of the waders andvarious other species. The mice, moles, shrews, gophers,ground-squirrels, and other small rodents also form a largepart of the food of the birds of prey as well as of many otherspecies, while the smaller birds themselves furnish consider-able subsistence for their larger relatives.
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Photographed from life by l>r. B. W. Bhufddt. AMERICAN LONG-EARED OWL. CHAPTER V. THE AMOUNT OF FOOD CONSUMED BY BIRDS. Birds as a class are the most active members of the ani-mal kingdom. They have rapid circulation and respiration:are constantly on the alert during all seasons of the year;travel long distances in migrating or searching for food ; rearlarge families, often two or more broods in a summer ; and, inshort, perform for their size a prodigious amount of work.Because of this, one would expect them to require a largeamount of food to keep up the energy they are so constantlyexpending, and the studies that have so far been made showthat such is emphatically the case. Unfortunately, the problem of ascertaining just how muchfood wild birds need presents many difficulties in the way ofits solution. So long as birds are at liberty, evidence mustalways be fragmentary and often uncertain. When they arekept in captivity, natural conditions are upset : the worry ofconfinement, the

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