LIVING BIRDS.

Waikato Times, Volume 97, Issue 15981, 8 May 1924, Page 8

LIVING BIRDS.

THEIR CASH VALUES. Mr Inness Hartley, in bis work, “The Importance of Bird Life,” states: — It is difficult to arrive at any close estimation of the cash value of birds to agriculture. Many such calculations have been attempted, but most of them have a wide margin for argument. Probably the most equitable comes from Mr M'Atee, of the Biological Survey at Washington. He figures that each bird will destroy each year insects to the value of ten cents. With a population of more than four billion birds breeding in the United States, their annual savings to agriculture would then amount lo at least four hundred million dollars. As insects annually damage agricultural crops in the United States to the tune of more than one billion dollars, it can be seen that birds have an appreciable cash value. Added to this is the value rendered in the destruction of weeds and rodents. The daily consumption of weed seeds alone amounts to thousands of tons. The value of weeds, however, can only be measured by the amount of labour and time it takes the farmer to eradicate them. The cash thus saved must amount to a large total. Usefud birds of prey average about two noxious rodents a day as food. If a field mouse is capable of inflicting only one cent’s worth of damage upon farm crops, every mouse-eating bird will consume about seven dollars’ worth of mice a year. Allowing to a hawk a life span of ten years, then each such bird must potentially be worth seventy dollars to the United States. In the north-eastern states there are at a low estimate two birds residing on every acre of land. We shall call forty acres the average farm thus allowing eighty birds to each farmer. Every bird, if it lives for five years, is worth, according to Mr M'Atec’s figures, fifty cents as a destroyer of insects. As a consumer of weed insects let us suppose it is valued at half that. This will give the birds an average value of seventyfive cents apiece, or a total of sixty dollars for the farm. On every two farms there should ne at least one beneficial bird of prey, a hawk or an owl, whose value alone is seventy dollars, or thirty-live dollars to one farm. Added to the above, this gives us a total of ninety-five dollars for every forty acres. In other words the presence of birds enhances the value of land for the agriculturist by nearly two dollars and a half an acre!

Bird Protection in New Zealand. Australian visiters to New Zealand have frequently remarked on the relatively small number of native birds to be observed there, and on the manner in which imported birds arc gelling a grip on the country. I printed some notes a few months ago on this point from Professor Richards, of Queensland, who looked hi vain for the number of birds that he is accustomed to sc when on geological trips trips in his own StaLc. It is cheering, therefore, to receive circulars indicating that public opinion in the Dominion is being aroused in the matter, and that the efforts of the recently formed New Zealand Native Bird Prolection Society are meeting with success. One circular notes that “when the vital necessity of these birds in relation to our forests, agriculture, etc, is better realised, no doubt all will be in a hurry to right matters, set aside sanctuaries, and the whole thing under sensible administrative control.” This establishment of sanctuaries is rightly regarded in New Zealand as being of first-rate importance. If, however, guidance is taken from Australian experience, it will be ensured that sanctuaries arc not made too large, and that they arc properly controlled. It is neglect of these points that has made New South Wales a laughing stock in natural history circles.—Sydney Daily Telegraph.