DISTRIBUTION AND MIGRATION OF NORTH AMERICAN 

 DUCKS, GEESE, AND SWANS. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Wild fowl are distributed over the whole world. From time imme- 

 morial ducks, geese, and swans have been held in high esteem by 

 mankind, and everywhere they have been eagerly pursued for sport 

 or for food. 



Passing by the purely esthetic value of the birds as beautiful and 

 welcome denizens of our waters and as lending the charm of life and 

 animation to our otherwise desolate ponds and lakes; passing b}', too, 

 their importance to thousands of men who are lured from business 

 cares to pursue them and who derive from their pursuit both health 

 and pleasure, their economic value and importance as food are very 

 great. The flesh not only is palatable and nutritious, but is so different 

 from that of domestic fowls as to form a most welcome addition to the 

 tal)le both of the rich and the poor. 



The flesh of wild fowl constituted an important item in the larder of 

 the aborigines of this country, who, by means of the bow and arrow 

 and by the use of various devices in the shape of nets and traps, 

 succeeded in obtaining them in considerable numbers, especially when 

 young and unable to fly. The Eskimo and northern Indians, indeed, 

 would fare badly but for the vast numbers of waterfowl that visit 

 their country to breed, and everywhere the aborigines seek their 

 eggs with avidity. Waterfowl as an addition to the larder became 

 almost as essential to the first settlers as they had been to the Indians, 

 and, so far as game was concerned, the fowling piece soon became a 

 more important part of the settler's equipment than the rifle. 



Neither the aborigines nor the early settlers appreciabl}^ reduced the 

 numbers of the hordes of ducks and geese that periodically covered 

 the lakes, ponds, rivers, and marshes of this favored country. It 

 was not until comparatively recent times, indeed, that the tremendous 

 increase of population and the constantly increasing number both of 

 sportsmen and of market gunners, together with the invention of that 

 potent engine of destruction, the breech-loading gun, have had their 

 logical ofl'oct in greatly diminishing their numbers and in practically 



exterminating not a few species. 



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