R. K. Murton - Man and Birds

COPYRIGHT Copyright Dedication Chapter 1: Men and Birds Chapter 2: Ecological Considerations Chapter 3: Some Predators and Their Prey Chapter 4: Birds and Forests Chapter 5: Birds on the Farm: The Community Chapter 6: Birds on the Farm: The Animal Feeders Chapter 7: Birds on the Farm: The Seed-Eaters Chapter 8: Birds on the Farm: The Grazers Chapter 9: Bird Problems in Horticulture Chapter 10: Birds and the Fisherman Chapter 11: Birds and Industrial Man Chapter 12: Wild Life Management Tables Footnotes Bibliography Index About the Publisher

William Collins

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF WilliamCollinsBooks.com

This eBook edition published by William Collins in 2018

© R. K Murton R. K. Murton asserts his moral rights to be identified as the author of this work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this eBook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers.

HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication .

Source ISBN 9780007308323

Ebook Edition © JANUARY 2019 ISBN: 9780007403691

Version: 2019-01-09

DEDICATION Dedication Chapter 1: Men and Birds Chapter 2: Ecological Considerations Chapter 3: Some Predators and Their Prey Chapter 4: Birds and Forests Chapter 5: Birds on the Farm: The Community Chapter 6: Birds on the Farm: The Animal Feeders Chapter 7: Birds on the Farm: The Seed-Eaters Chapter 8: Birds on the Farm: The Grazers Chapter 9: Bird Problems in Horticulture Chapter 10: Birds and the Fisherman Chapter 11: Birds and Industrial Man Chapter 12: Wild Life Management Tables Footnotes Bibliography Index About the Publisher

TO MY PARENTS

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright COPYRIGHT Copyright Dedication Chapter 1: Men and Birds Chapter 2: Ecological Considerations Chapter 3: Some Predators and Their Prey Chapter 4: Birds and Forests Chapter 5: Birds on the Farm: The Community Chapter 6: Birds on the Farm: The Animal Feeders Chapter 7: Birds on the Farm: The Seed-Eaters Chapter 8: Birds on the Farm: The Grazers Chapter 9: Bird Problems in Horticulture Chapter 10: Birds and the Fisherman Chapter 11: Birds and Industrial Man Chapter 12: Wild Life Management Tables Footnotes Bibliography Index About the Publisher William Collins An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF WilliamCollinsBooks.com This eBook edition published by William Collins in 2018 © R. K Murton R. K. Murton asserts his moral rights to be identified as the author of this work A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this eBook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins Publishers. HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication . Source ISBN 9780007308323 Ebook Edition © JANUARY 2019 ISBN: 9780007403691 Version: 2019-01-09

Dedication DEDICATION Dedication Chapter 1: Men and Birds Chapter 2: Ecological Considerations Chapter 3: Some Predators and Their Prey Chapter 4: Birds and Forests Chapter 5: Birds on the Farm: The Community Chapter 6: Birds on the Farm: The Animal Feeders Chapter 7: Birds on the Farm: The Seed-Eaters Chapter 8: Birds on the Farm: The Grazers Chapter 9: Bird Problems in Horticulture Chapter 10: Birds and the Fisherman Chapter 11: Birds and Industrial Man Chapter 12: Wild Life Management Tables Footnotes Bibliography Index About the Publisher TO MY PARENTS

Chapter 1: Men and Birds

Chapter 2: Ecological Considerations

Chapter 3: Some Predators and Their Prey

Chapter 4: Birds and Forests

Chapter 5: Birds on the Farm: The Community

Chapter 6: Birds on the Farm: The Animal Feeders

Chapter 7: Birds on the Farm: The Seed-Eaters

Chapter 8: Birds on the Farm: The Grazers

Chapter 9: Bird Problems in Horticulture

Chapter 10: Birds and the Fisherman

Chapter 11: Birds and Industrial Man

Chapter 12: Wild Life Management

Tables

Footnotes

Bibliography

Index

About the Publisher

CHAPTER 1

MEN AND BIRDS

WE can only speculate on the impact of the stone-age hunters of Europe on birds: they must have had some effect at least on those species which were easy to catch. Certainly the larger mammals seem to have felt the pressure of man the hunter as long ago as the Pleistocene. Using molar tooth remains, Soergel has calculated the ages of Pleistocene elephants found at sites where either Heidelberg or Neanderthal man was present and at comparable sites where no human remains were found. In each case the age structure of the elephant population is much lower where man abided, suggesting that he was cropping the populations sufficiently heavily to increase the need for a high rate of replacement by young animals. Some indication of the importance of birds to these ancient hunters may be gleaned from the cave drawings at Lascaux, France. Fisher and Peterson give good reason for believing that they depict a fauna existing in a warm inter-glacial, 100,000 years ago. Flamingo, spoonbill, geese, crane, eagle and raven are all shown, together with a dead hunter wearing a bird mask and sporting a hunting stick adorned with birds.

The earliest indications of man’s interest in cereal culture date back in the Near East to about 8,000 BC. Remains of sickles, pestle and mortar have been found in mesolithic caves of Palestine, and arable farming had reached an advanced stage in the Near East by 3000 BC. This later neolithic culture did not spread to Britain until around 2000 BC and throughout the early and middle bronze ages men were still very much hunters rather than pastoralists, living a semi-nomadic life. Settlement brought man a new relationship with birds, because instead of loose contacts during hunting expeditions, conditions now existed for confining wild creatures and breeding them in captivity, leading to selective breeding and domestication. It is probably no coincidence, as the late F. E. Zeuner points out, that all the important domesticated birds are seed-eaters (pigeons and fowl), grazers or vegetable-eaters (geese and ducks), which could have gained an early association with man through their croprobbing habits. Hence, the first use of birds was as a direct food substitute, their value as egg-producers and for pleasure and sport was not exploited until later. Nonetheless, as early as the Iron Age, in the Hallstatt culture which flourished on the Austrian shores of Lake Constance, there is evidence in the form of a crude carving that man had established a ritualistic link with what was probably a goose. The goose-herd survives as an important element in the rural economy of the Balkans today.