SPARROWS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 5, 25 February 1871, Page 12

SPARROWS.

(TO the EDITOR OB THE NEW ZEALAND MAIL.) g IE) —“ A Corn Grower” sends a letter to the Independent, in which he expresses his friendship for sparrows, and talks about the wicked extermination of those useful birds by the ignorant farmers of the old country, and trusts that the sparrow, rook, &c, will be placed within the guardianship of the law. The question, I take it to be, is, not whether we should kill sparrows, but whether we should go to the trouble and expense of importing them, when other “ little birds,” quite as useful, more interesting, and much less mischievous, might be more appropriately introduced.- The writer fortifies his views by an extract from a recent English work, entitled “ Birds and Bird Life,” which, however, has very little to say in favor _ of either rooks or sparrows, hut a good deal in favor of thrushes, swallows, and wagtails, the former of which as a singing bird, as well as one of the znseetzvoras, I should myself like to see imported and protected by the law; The house sparrow like the barn door fowl, wilL eat grubs, but prefers grain; and the intelligent farmer would no more think of sending a flock of the one into his newly sown wheat field than he would of enclosing a number of. the other m his newly sown garden. The writer asks how sparrows live when it is not harvest time, as if there was no seed time, and no wheat stacks. Let us introduce as many little English birds as we can, but sparrows and rooks should not be included with them.—l am, &c. An English Farmer.