82 The Passenger Pigeon 



Michigan nestings. Professional "pigeoners" did not 

 for an instant pretend to observe the law, and a lax and 

 indifferent public opinion permitted the illegal slaughter 

 to go on without let or hindrance, while itinerant 

 pigeon trappers from all parts of the United States, 

 grew rich at the expense of the commonwealth, and in 

 intentional violation of its laws. Each succeeding year 

 the news has been spread far and wide until it became 

 useless to conceal the fact that pigeon trapping was a 

 profitable business, the year of 1876 witnessing a magni- 

 tude in the traffic which exceeded anything heretofore 

 known in the country. 



In the early part of March last, a pigeon nesting 

 formed just north of Petoskey, Michigan. Not many 

 days had passed before information was conveyed to 

 the game protection clubs of East Saginaw and Bay 

 City, that enormous quantities of pigeons were being 

 killed in open and defiant violation of the law. On 

 reaching Petoskey we found the condition of affairs had 

 not been magnified; indeed, it exceeded our gravest 

 fears. Here, a few miles north, was a pigeon nesting 

 of irregular dimensions, estimated by those best quali- 

 fied to judge, to be forty (40) miles In length, by three 

 to ten in width, probably the largest nesting that has 

 ever existed in the United States, covering something 

 like 100,000 acres of land, and including not less than 

 150,000 acres within its limits. 



At the hotel we met one we were glad to see, in the 



