... The domestic cat; bird killer, mouser and destroyer of wild life; means of utilizing and controlling it (1916) (20803331778)

Title: ... The domestic cat; bird killer, mouser and destroyer of wild life; means of utilizing and controlling it
Identifier: domesticcatbirdk00forb (find matches)
Year: 1916 (1910s)
Authors: Forbush, Edward Howe, 1858-1929
Subjects: Cats
Publisher: Boston, Wright & Potter printing co. , state printers
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress



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39 large proportion of the cases that the cat is the cause of the dis- turbance. No cat can kill so many birds in a season as can a bird-hawk, but probably there are two hundred cats in Massa- chusetts to every such hawk. Mr. T. W. Burgess, editor for some years of " Good Housekeep- ing," states that although the dearest pet that he ever owned was a cat, he is beginning to see that the cherished pet is an agent more destructive than all others combined. He says that, one summer, weeks of watching and planning for photographs of birds at home came to naught through cats, as the nests of three pairs of robins, one of bluebirds, one of kingbirds and one of chipping spar- rows in the orchard were emptied of their young by cats. Miss M. Purdon of Milton writes that she had her cat killed as the sight of countless birds and squirrels, half eaten or in process of being eaten, became too sickening to contemplate. The tragedies were so frequent that even the cook pro- tested that they " made her feel sick." Mr. J. M. Van Huyck of Lee writes that he heard some robins screaming in the orchard, and when he rushed out four full-grown cats came out of the tree. They seemed to be strays, all after one robin's nest. Mr. Daniel Webster Spofford of Georgetown writes as follows: "They watch the nests that they cannot climb up to, and when the young birds get so they can tumble out of their nests, two or three cats stand ready to grab them, and run off with them, screaming, through the garden or street, and it is almost impossible to raise chickens or any kind of a bird without confining them in a close pen." Dr. C. H. Townsend, director of the New York Aquarium, writes from Greens Farms, Conn.: " Six nests of fledgling birds of various species were destroyed on our place last year by neighbors' cats, and they may have taken all there were."1 No one who has not witnessed the remarkable birdcatching feats of which a cat is capable has any idea of the imminence of this danger. My son, Lewis E. Forbush, last summer (1914) saw a large black cat approaching a young robin on the ground.
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All after one bird's nest. » Bird-Lore, July-August, 1913, p. 278.