INTRODUCTION. 21 



ing Dove are only summer visitors in most of the state, but permanent resi- 

 dents in the southernmost counties. For present purposes we may almost 

 disregard the so-called permanent residents, merely remarking that although 

 several species, including Woodpeckers, Chickadees, Creepers, Grouse, and 

 Owls, may be w^ell represented throughout the year in any given locality, 

 we have little proof that the individuals representing these species are the 

 same, and there is every reason to believe that, wdth a few exceptions, every 

 species of jMichigan bird is more or less migratory in some part of its range. 

 Apparently the Ruffed Grouse and the Prairie Chicken are stationary in 

 Michigan wherever found, yet we know positively that in IMinnesota, Iowa, 

 and other trans-Mississippi states this last named species makes a well marked 

 though not very extensive southward migration in autumn, returning north- 

 ward, however, so gradually and quietly that it attracts Httle attention. 



In attempting to study migration as it occurs in this country the solitary 

 observer works at a great disadvantage. Even in the most favorable location 

 and with the best equipment in the way of education and time, such an 

 observer can do little more than record the observed facts and trust that the 

 opportunity may come sooner or later when he or some one else may combine 

 his observations with thousands of others and in this way accomplish some- 

 thing definite toward the solution of what must be considered one of the 

 greatest mysteries of nature. In 1896 the great British naturalist, Alfred 

 Newton, said of bird migration, " We are here brought face to face with the 

 greatest mystery which the whole animal kingdom presents, a mystery 

 which attracted the attention of the earliest writers and can in its chief point 

 be no more explained by the modern man of science than by the simple minded 

 savage, or the poet or prophet of antiquity. The flow and ebb of the mighty 

 feathered wave has been sung by poets and reasoned of by philosophers, 

 has given rise to proverbs and entered into popular superstitions, and yet 

 we may say of it still that our ignorance is immense." 



Fifteen years have added much to the total of our knowledge of birds, 

 yet the gain in that time has come also through subtraction, for we have 

 been compelled to unlearn much that was once considered fixed and sure. 

 The attempt today to sift the known from the unknown in this matter is a 

 task of such gigantic proportions that any scientist may well hesitate before 

 the undertaking. It is scarcely possible to exaggerate the mystery, super- 

 stition and absurd speculation which has been thrown about this subject. 

 Educated writers within the last hundred j^ears have seriously advanced 

 the theory that birds leave the earth entirely during winter and migrate to 

 the moon, also that swallows and some other species plunge into lakes and 

 streams and pass the winter buried like frogs beneath the mud. Hardly 

 less absurd are the claims that migrating birds are guided by an instinct or 

 by some unknown sense which enables them to travel safely and securely 

 both day and night over thousands of miles of land and sea and to arrive 

 at last with unerring certainty at the end of a journey, every step of which 

 was foreseen from the first. 



No doubt many species make long journeys safely and rapidl3^ but we 

 now know that a heavy percentage of loss of life goes with every movement. 

 Undoubtedly certain individual birds find their way back to their birth place 

 after a trip of hundreds of miles and an absence of many months; but it is 

 more than likely that where one individual succeeds in doing this many 

 more fail. Thanks to patient investigation and careful exploration we now 

 know pretty accurately where most of our migrants spend their winters, 

 and we have nuich relial^lc infoi'mation as to the general routes by which 



