ll to justify any one
in destroying this species.

In view of the prevalence of insect pests in the state of New York, I
have spent hours in trying to devise a practical plan for making
woodpeckers about ten times more numerous than they now are.
Contributions to this problem will be thankfully received. Yes; we _do_
put out pork fat and suet in winter, quantities of it; but I grieve to
say that to-day in the Zoological Park there is not more than one
woodpecker for every ten that were there twelve years ago. Where have
they gone? Only one answer is possible. They have been shot and eaten,
by the guerrillas of destruction.

[Illustration: GOLDEN-WINGED WOODPECKER
A Bird of Great Value to Orchards and Forests, now
Rapidly Disappearing, Undoubtedly Through Slaughter as "Food"]

Surely no man of intelligence needs to be told to protect woodpeckers to
the utmost, and to _feed them in winter_. Nail up fat pork, or large
chunks of suet, on the south sides of conspicuous trees, and encourage
the woodpeckers, nuthatches, chickadees and titmice to remain in your
woods through the long and dreary winter.

THE ENGLISH SPARROW is a nuisance and a pest, because it drives away
from the house and the orchard the house wren, bluebird, phoebe, purple
martin and swallow, any one of which is more valuable to man than a
thousand English sparrows. I never yet have seen one of the pest
sparrows catch an insect, but Chief Forester Merkel says that he has
seen one catching and eating small moths.

There is one place in the country where English sparrows have not yet
come; and whenever they do appear there, they will meet a hostile
reception. I shall kill every one that comes,--for the sake of retaining
the wrens, catbirds, phoebes and thrushes that now literally make home
happy for my family. A good way to discourage sparrows is to shoot them
en masse when they are feeding on road refuse, such as the
white-throated, white-crowned and other sparrows never touch. Persistent
destruction of their nests will check the nuisance.

THE SHORE BIRDS.--Who is there who thinks of the shore-birds as being
directly beneficial to man by reason of their food habits? I warrant not
more than one man in every ten thousand! We think of them only as
possible "food." The amount of actual cash value benefit that the
shore-birds confer upon man through the destruction of bad things is, in
comparison with the number of birds, enormous.

The Department of Agri