BIRD MONTH.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 219, 14 August 1940, Page 6

BIRD MONTH.

August is being observed throughout the Dominion as bird month—an occasion when the welfare of New Zealand’s feathered life receives closer attention and interest. In a country in which the majority of its people are in nodding acquaintance with Nature it is fitting that such an observance should be instituted. Arbor Day has in many districts been celebrated and remembrance of the debt owed the bird community is not misplaced. Its part in the scheme of things ranks high; as agents in mitigating the evils of insect pests, and in other directions birds play a not unimportant part in the cycle of agriculture. In the aesthetic sphere their contribution is scarcely less acceptable. Palmerston North’s rich endowment of parks and gardens kindles a consciousness of these feathered creatures, whose unobtrusive contribution -of song and colour, however, scarcely receives the appreciation it warrants. Within a comparatively short distance of the city acres of bushlands abound, alive with bird life, both native and otherwise, and ornithology need be no dull preoccupation under such conditions. On hill and valley, and by rivers and streams, these gifts of Nature’s bounty play their role — fant'ails, thrushes, goldfinches, yellowliammers, minahs, starlings, and the common sparrow (and a remarkable variety of others). Native birds, like native bush, deserve closer . attention if they are to continue to flourish. Without them the community would be poorer in gratuitous pleasures and agricultural economy badly unbalanced.