Of course you have heard of the worrybird, who flies backward because he doesn’t give a darn where he is going; he’s only interested in where he has been. I think that there are a few people that we could classify as worrybirds, always saying, "When I was young it was so much better than it is now." Since these people don’t really build for the future, living only in the past, they contribute very little to society.

Eagles and hawks are the day shift of our police force. They are beneficial and they consume a lot of harmful rodents. If it were not for the birds of prey our farms would be overrun with animals that eat our crops. The eagle is the largest and the sparrow hawk the smallest of our hawk family. Also, owls that are out at night catching mice and nocturnal insects, help make farming more profitable.

Many people have the idea that birds of prey are harmful to farmers. In fact, certain hawks are called chicken hawks. Generally the name chicken hawk is ascribed to the red-tailed which is a high-flying bird that soars over the fields. When he spots a rabbit or rodent he will dart down and catch his prey.

Of course we will have to admit that is a hawk nests near a farmstead where young chicks are out in the open she’ll catch food for her young where it is easiest to get. That bird will naturally have to be regarded as harmful and be destroyed. But to use such an incident to justify killing all hawks one can find in the woods is as unfair as it would be for a teacher to round up all students for a sound spanking after she caught one naughty child. And how many people today still have their chickens out in the open? Certainly one has no excuse to go out and shoot hawks when all the hens are safely penned up in a large barn.