The Need and Value of Attracting Birds

THE reasons for attracting birds around our homes are twofold: first, the protection of the birds, and second, the resulting benefits that accrue to man, both on account of the great economic value of these birds to the farmer in his struggle with injurious insects, and also on account of the pleasure derived in helping and watching the birds.

During the winter season the opportunity offered for studying birds, at a time when Nature's activities are at their lowest ebb, is most welcome, and especially so because the birds may become so tame that they will feed from the window-sills while one is sitting just inside the window, thus affording opportunity to observe them at close range.

Destruction of Nesting-sites

With the rapid increase in population in our cities and large towns, and their corresponding growth countryward, roadside shrubbery, orchards, decaying trees, and other nesting-sites are steadily disappearing as the real-estate agent extends his operations and begins to " improve " the land.

In the suburbs of cities, birds that nest in cavities are forced to hunt very closely to find a nesting-site. One spring, on entering a little shed which had remained closed for several months, the author found inside two pairs of dead bluebirds, which had evidently entered a knot-hole on the side of the building in their quest for a nesting-place, and had not been able to find their way out again. Wood ducks, screech owls, and flickers have been found dead in stove-pipes leading from tile chimneys in summer cottages and workshops. Bluebirds have been found drowned in water-barrels in the country, having entered through holes in the conductors.

Even in the country, sometimes the farmer thinks he must clear up the shrubbery and the tangles by the roadside and along the fences, which, however, furnish one excellent means of inducing the birds to remain and nest, and thus aid the farmer in his struggle with the insects.

The excessive demand for wood, both for fuel and for building, is causing the rapid cutting of trees both in large forests and in small lots, as a result of which the birds which seek shelter or nesting-sites in the woods are each year finding it more difficult to secure the conditions necessary for their maintenance.