CAGED BIRDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 70, 24 March 1933, Page 6

CAGED BIRDS.

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PICTURE (To the Editor.) Has "Wings to Fly" ever considered that the present-day canary knows no more of the "joys" of liberty than the modern fowl knows of the Indian jungle or the Pekingese remembers of its ancestor the wolf? Granted boredom and loneliness are menaces to the health of many cage birds, but let us glance at the other side of the picture. This can be studied by anyone who lias carelessly formed a collection of birds in an aviary and heedlessly includes in it certain species that are liable to injure others by reason of their superior physique or murderous propensities. This danger is ever present for birds "enjoying, , ; the advantages, as the sentimentalist* f av "of freedom in a state of nature. Another- thin" overlooked, in addition to dangers from.bhwer birds, not always birds of prey, either, is that birds "enjoying" liberty ar» constantly iii danger from rats, mice, cate, weasels" and hedgehogs, as well as slow death from star vation and exposure. Maybe there are a few cage birds whose lot might be improved' bv liberation, but 1 can take "Wings to Fly , to places in Auckland housing thousands of canaries which are in far better quarters thai! some humans. B. CUTLER, Sec, Auckland Canary and Cage Bird Club