The Audubon Societies 



347 



desirous of saving from indiscriminate 

 slaughter and of insuring the preservation 

 of such migratory birds as are either use- 

 ful to man or are harmless, have resolved 

 to adopt some uniform system of protec- 

 tion which shall effectively accomplish 

 such objects, and to the end of concluding 

 a convention for this purpose have 

 appointed as their respective plenipoten- 

 tiaries: 



The President of the United States of 

 America, Robert Lansing, Secretary of 

 State of the United States; and 



His Britannic Majesty, the Right 

 Honorable Sir Cecil Arthur Spring Rice, 

 G. V. C. O., K. C. M. G., etc., His Ma- 

 jesty's ambassador extraordinary and 

 plenipotentiary at Washington; 



Who, after having communicated to 

 each other their respective full powers, 

 which were found to be in due and proper 

 form, have agreed to and adopted the 

 following articles: 



Article i. The High Contracting 

 Powers declare that the migratory birds 

 included in the terms of this Convention 

 shall be as follows: 



1. Migratory Game Birds: 



(a) Anatidae or waterfowl, including 

 brant, wild ducks, geese, and swans. 



{b) Gruidse or cranes, including little 

 brown, sandhill, and whooping cranes. 



(c) Rallidae or rails, including coots, 

 gallinules, and sora or other rails. 



{d) Limicolae or shore-birds, including 

 avocets, curlew, dowitchers, godwits, 

 knots, oyster catchers, phalaropes, plovers, 

 sandpipers, snipe, stilts, surf birds, turn- 

 stones, willet, woodcock, and yellowlegs. 



(e) Columbidae or pigeons, including 

 doves and wild pigeons. 



2. Migratory Insectivorous Birds: Bob- 

 olinks, catbirds, chickadees, cuckoos, 

 flickers, flycatchers, grosbeaks, humming 

 birds, kinglets, martins, meadowlarks, 

 nighthawks or buUbats, nut-hatches, 

 orioles, robins, shrikes, swallows, swifts, 

 tanagers, titmice, thrushes, vireos, warblers, 

 wax-wings, whippoorwills, woodpeckers, 

 and wrens, and all other perching birds 

 which feed entirely or chiefly on insects. 



3. Other Migratory Non-game Birds: 

 Auks, auklets, bitterns, fulmaks, gannets, 

 grebes, guillemots, gulls, herons, jsegers, 

 loons, murres, petrels, puffins, shear- 

 waters, and terns. 



Article II. The High Contracting 

 Powers agree that, as an effective means 

 of preserving migratory birds there shall 

 be established the following close seasons 

 during which no hunting shall be done 

 except for scientific or propagating pur- 

 poses under permits issued by proper 

 authorities. 



1. The close season on migratory birds 

 shall be between March 10 and Septem- 

 ber I, except that the close season on the 

 Limicolae or shorebirds in the Maritime 

 Provinces of Canada and in those States 

 of the United States bordering on the 

 Atlantic Ocean which are situated wholly 

 or in part north of Chesapeake Bay shall 

 be between February i and August 15, 

 and that Indians may take at any time 

 scoters for food but not for sale. The 

 season for hunting shall be further re- 

 stricted to such period not exceeding three 

 and one-half months as the High Con- 

 tracting Powers may severally deem ap- 

 propriate and define by law or regulation. 



2. The close season on migratory 

 insectivorous birds shall continue through- 

 out the year. 



3. The close season on other migratory 

 non-game birds shall continue throughout 

 the year, except that Eskimos and Indians 

 may take at any season auks, auklets, 

 guillemots, murres and puffins, and their 

 eggs, for food and their skins for clothing, 

 but the birds and eggs so taken shall not 

 be sold or offered for sale. 



Article III. The High Contracting 

 Powers agree that during the period of 

 ten years next following the going into 

 effect of this Convention, there shall be a 

 continuous close season on the following 

 migratory birds, to- wit: 



Band-tailed pigeons, sandhill and 

 whooping cranes, swans, curlew, and all 

 shore-birds (except the black-breasted and 

 golden plover, Wilson or jack snipe, wood- 

 cock, and the greater and lesser yellow- 



