han the birds could possibly
have done. The people are now very poor and just manage to live from one
harvest to another.

Now let us learn a little about our own birds and what they are doing
for us. We ought to know the habits of all the common birds that
frequent our gardens and be able to tell each by its note. This would
add greatly to our pleasure when out of doors and make us appreciate the
services they are rendering.

Go where you will through the open fields or among the trees and bushes,
you will find different kinds of birds and all of them busily engaged.
They are searching over every bit of ground as well as over the trunks,
branches, and leaves of the trees. Some are after the seeds of different
kinds of weeds. Others are getting the worms and insects that infest the
trees. Watch a flock of the little titmice going carefully over all the
leaves and branches of an oak tree. When they have finished, there are
few insects or their eggs left upon it.

How anxious are some of our farmers as well as the sportsmen to have the
meadow lark classed as a pest or as a game bird. Would that the farmers
knew how much good this bird does them! The stomachs of many of these
larks have been carefully examined in order to find out what they
really do eat. The contents show that more than half of the food of the
meadow lark is made up of harmful insects, including beetles,
grasshoppers, crickets, Jerusalem crickets, cutworms, caterpillars,
wireworms, bugs, bees, ants, wasps, flies, spiders, and many others.
These birds also eat large quantities of the seeds of weeds and at times
damage the grain fields. The good that they do, however, far outweighs
the evil.

[Illustration: _Finley & Bohlman_
A young meadow lark.]

Woodpeckers belong to another class of birds that are very useful to us.
How often have we heard them hammering upon a dead tree as they drill
holes in search of the worms and beetles that are hidden under the bark
or in the heart of the wood. It has long been the habit of hunters to
shoot woodpeckers just for sport, although no one eats them nor are they
known to do any harm. With a decrease in their numbers there has been an
increase in insect pests which are now destroying so many trees in all
parts of our country. The woodpeckers in the Sierra Nevada Mountains are
worth almost their weight in gold, for they destroy millions of beetles
that are killing the great sugar pines and yellow pines. Here and