The Present Status of the Heath Hen 



By GEORGE W. FIELD 



Of the Massachusetts Fish and Game Commission 



With photographs liy the author 



FOR the details of legislation and of efforts to protect the Heath Hen, 

 and for the general facts in regard to its distribution and decline, the 

 reader is referred particularly to the summary of the results of pre- 

 vious obser\-ers which is given in Forbush's 'Game Birds, Wild Fowl and 

 Shore Birds,' pages 385-393, the writer's sketch on the Heath Hen in Bird- 

 Lore, Vol. IX, No. 6, 1907, and the reports of the Massachusetts Com- 

 missioners on Fisheries and Game. 



Six years' experience prove that the protected reservation is an efi&cient 

 method for increasing the numbers of this Grouse without artificial propa- 

 gation. Solely as a result of setting aside an extensive area adapted to the 

 feeding and nesting habits of the birds, with an efficient patrol, the develop- 

 ment of local public sentiment, and destruction of enemies through the efforts 

 of one game-keeper, a part of whose time has been used in developing and 

 increasing food crops for the birds, the estimated increase of the birds is as 

 follows: In May, 1907, careful observation disclosed only twenty-one birds; 

 and in January, 1908, between forty-five and sixty. In 1909, the number was 

 estimated at two hundred, and in 1910, at three hundred. The largest num- 

 ber in sight in one place at any one time has been over ninety. It is not 

 unusual to see flocks of twenty and thirty. 



HEATH HEN 'BOOMING' 



Enlarged and retouched 



(352) 



