But 100 years ago, birds were seen as the best cure for weeds and pests that threaten the nation's food supply and cost farmers hundreds of millions of dollars each year. And to determine the exact impact birds have had on agriculture, a field called economic ornithology was born. According to one of its leading practitioners, economic ornithology is „the study of birds in terms of dollars and cents, that is, the practical application of bird knowledge to matters of everyday life.“ That's what it means. And from the 1880s to the 1930s, birds were widely seen as economic agents working alongside farmers in the fight against insect swarms.
By the 1940s, economic ornithology had become discredited and outdated. Although effective and affordable insecticides have completely replaced the role of killing insects in birds, economic ornithologists have been unable to prove that their methods actually increased the number of birds they benefit. However, before the role of birds in agriculture was denied, there was a time when we believed that we depended on birds for food and even survival.
And the methods of economic ornithology are as follows:
In 1916, Gilbert Trafton summarized the main approaches used by economic ornithologists: „The practical value of birds to humans, whether helpful or harmful, depends primarily on their dietary habits.'' Birds are determined. ” Sometimes this was done by observing the bird's behavior in the field, but usually it meant dissecting the bird to see what was inside its stomach.
here complete substack, by Robert Francis.via philip wallach.