160 The Ottawa Naturalist. [March 



tories had also been established for the study of questions regarding 

 the composition and characteristics of timber and the adapting of them 

 to various uses. 



F. W. H. J. 



NOTES. 



The Ottawa Humane Society held an exhibition during March at 

 the Carnegie Library of over a thousand bird houses made by school 

 children. Prizes were given to the exhibitor having the largest number 

 of houses and the one exhibiting the best bird house. Several hundred 

 bird houses were entered. There were many kinds, from little wren 

 cottages of one room to large martin apartment houses big enough for 

 twenty families. The houses were offered for sale and the proceeds, 

 over $75.00, were given to the Red Cross. The boys of forty years ago 

 robbed birds' nests, sometimes to make egg collections. Such exhibi- 

 tions and competitions as this will do much not only to cure boys of 

 robbing nests and to replace the collecting of eggs by the more valuable 

 observation and study of birds, but also to attract and increase a bird 

 population of great value to our food supply. The efforts of the 

 Ottawa Field-Naturalists' Club, which resulted in placing bird houses 

 at the Experimental Farm and in Rockcliffe Park, doubtless had an 

 influence towards this present interest in bird conservation. 



The reclamation of swamps is one of the most important problems 

 of the present time. Many of the best lands are still in swamp form, 

 and the sanitation produced if this land were reclaimed would more 

 than pay for the work necessary, by the increased healthfulness of the 

 country. The draining of the swamps is one of the best means of 

 destroying the breeding places of the mosquito, and the extermination 

 of the mosquito is one of the great issues of the day. It was this 

 extermination that made the Panama Canal possible, and has rendered 

 Havana a justly favored health resort. 



Miss M. Young of the Mines Branch recently gave a demonstra- 

 tion of pottery making in relation to Mr. J. Keele's work on Canadian 

 clays at the Red Cross meeting of the Women's Branch of the Civil 

 Service, Ottawa. Miss Young has been using designs from prehistoric 

 Canadian Indian pottery in the Museum of the Geological Survey, to 

 develop art pottery distinct from that of the old world or the orient 

 and appropriately Canadian. Some of the best English ware had its 

 birth in the private studio. There is an open field here in Canada for 

 the commerciallv interested and for the lover of beautv. 



