The Bird Policeman
The crow is both a pest and a useful citizen. He is not nearly as popular with the average farmer as he ought to be. It is the old story of the roughneck’s total contempt for the opinion of his neighbors, human or otherwise. The crow’s attitude is in general as follows: “You can’t put anything over on me.” He is an ardent believer in “collective bargaining” and when it is desirable to raid a field of ripe corn, the entire crow colony is carefully organized for the purpose. Pickets will be established to warn of the approach of any man with a gun.
But, however sardonic may be the attitude of Mr. Crow toward the poor, plodding human farmers, he is quick to recognize his master, the kingbird.
In a certain farmyard the crows and hawks had established a reign of terror among the hens and chickens. Broods of chickens would be depleted one by one until there were few survivors and the women of the household became thoroughly exasperated. This went on to a greater or less extent for several years. One bright June morning a certain Mr. and Mrs. Kingbird arrived from a more southern clime and looked the premises over. They decided that there was an excellent opportunity to establish a home in one of the shade trees. They had hardly got at work, however, before the male bird found it necessary to take up a certain line of police duties. He discovered that the crows and hawks had been making themselves very much at home in that immediate neighborhood.
Within twenty-four hours the word had gone around to all the marauders, and for years thereafter they never came near those premises again. Each season the kingbird and his wife would come back. That was sufficient protection for the young chickens who could scratch about within the limits of their enclosure with perfect safety. It can be taken for granted that everything was done by the owners of the farm to make it pleasant for the bird policeman, who by his extraordinary activities and fearlessness strikes terror to the heart of the swiftest hawk, lest he be blinded by one of the lightning dashes of the kingbird who always aims for the eyes.