II 
THE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE 
31 
American naturalist, Alexander Wilson, will be read with 
interest:— 
“ Not far from Shelbyville, in the State of Kentucky, 
about five years ago, there was one of these breeding places, 
which stretched through the woods in nearly a north and 
south direction, was several miles in breadth, and was said to 
be upwards of 40 miles in extent. In this tract almost 
every tree was furnished with nests wherever the branches 
could accommodate them. The pigeons made their first 
appearance there about the 10th of April, and left it 
altogether with their young before the 25th of May. As 
soon as the young were fully grown and before they left the 
nests, numerous parties of the inhabitants from all parts of 
the adjacent country came with waggons, axes, beds, cooking 
utensils, many of them accompanied by the greater part of 
their families, and encamped for several days at this immense 
nursery. Several of them informed me that the noise was 
so great as to terrify their horses, and that it was difficult for 
one person to hear another without bawling in his ear. The 
ground was strewed with broken limbs of trees, eggs, and 
young squab pigeons, which had been precipitated from above, 
and on which herds of hogs were fattening. Hawks, buzzards, 
and eagles were sailing about in great numbers, and seizing 
the squabs from the nests at pleasure; while, from 20 feet 
upwards to the top of the trees, the view through the woods 
presented a perpetual tumult of crowding and fluttering 
multitudes of pigeons, their wings roaring like thunder, 
mingled with the frequent crash of falling timber; for now 
the axemen were at work cutting down those trees that seemed 
most crowded with nests, and contrived to fell them in such 
a manner, that in their descent they might bring down several 
others; by which means the falling of one large tree some¬ 
times produced 200 squabs little inferior in size to the old 
birds, and almost one heap of fat. On some single trees 
upwards of a hundred nests were found, each containing one 
squab oidy ; a circumstance in the history of the bird not 
generally known to naturalists. 1 It was dangerous to w r alk 
1 Later observers have proved that two eggs are laid and usually two 
young produced, but it may be that in most cases only one of these conies to 
maturity. 
