Bird Notes and News 



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obtained penalties for the killing and selling 

 of insectivorous birds, and the Societe des 

 Agriculteurs de France held in 1914 a congress 

 to stimulate their protection. But it is to 

 the Ligue Francaise pour la Protection des 

 Oiseaux, that France owes the most valiant 

 efforts on behalf of birds at home and in her 

 colonies. Its work in the schools, interrupted 

 by the war, has been most successful, and its 

 publications have done much to awaken 

 intelligent interest. But France cannot wait 

 for children Bird-Protectors to grow up. 

 Something immediate must be done ; the 

 State must ]oin hands with the societies, 

 reinforce the village police, prohibit the sale 

 of nets and traps, and exact heavy fines for 

 the killing of useful birds, the list of which 

 ought to be considerably extended. The 

 country could at the same time be re-stocked 

 with real game by a union of sportsmen. 



M. Godart's proposal, which gives its 

 name to his book, is more especially for the 

 rearing of interesting and beautiful species 

 now practically extinct. His suggestion is 

 that broods should be artificially reared in 

 vast aviaries, and released when full-grown 

 to people the now deserted Avoods and fields. 

 He goes into all the details for carrying out 

 such a scheme. Each enclosure must cover 

 not less than 25 square metres of ground, be 

 surrounded by walls at least 3 metres high, 

 and roofed over by fine wire netting. Nature 

 must be copied as faithfully as possible ; 

 bushes planted against the walls, in which 

 holes and crannies have been made, a stream 

 wander through the reserve, suitable vegeta- 

 tion provided ; and many pages are devoted 

 to tables of food for each species, including 

 some forms of animal food to take the place 

 of the insects and grubs on which the young 

 are fed in a natural state. Birds such as 

 Goldfinch, Bullfinch, Limiet, Yellowhammer, 

 Thrush, Blackbird, and Starling, will nest 

 readily in a garden aviary. But in the case 

 of Woodpeckers, Waders, and gallinaceous 

 birds, recourse must be had to the incubator 

 and rearing by hand. M. Godart believes 

 th^t this plan, successfully adopted for 

 Warblers, Wrens, Rails, etc., would answer 

 also for the Flamingoes, of which a few 

 representatives still survive in Camargue, 

 and for many migratory species. 



The birds born and bred in the garden 

 aviary are to be released in January of the 

 following year, having previously learnt to 



pick up their natural food. Their survival 

 would have to be ensured in the district 

 to be re-stocked by the planting of thickets 

 (indispensable in a hedgeless country), sur- 

 rounded if necessary by barbed wire to keep 

 off two-footed and four-footed enemies. 

 By such means M. Godart believes that 

 species now migratory might become resident, 

 such as Wild Duck and Bustard, and, if 

 carefully housed and fed in winter, the 

 Corncrake. 



Entomologists dwell on the value of insects 

 that prey on others, as allies of farmer and 

 gardener ; but many of the most harmful 

 insects are not thus destroyed. As for the 

 much cried-up chemicals they have proved 

 inefficient or insufficient again and again. 

 Let there be, says M. Godart, on a property 

 of 100 hectares (about 250 acres), a vigilant 

 body of eight to ten Owls, 100 Wheatears, 

 Ortolans, and Pipits, 30 Blackbirds and 

 Thrushes, 10 Rooks, 20 Starlings, as many 

 Nuthatches and AVoodpeckers, 100 Linnets 

 and Goldfinches, as many Warblers, Wag- 

 tails, and Tits, 30 Nightjars, Swallows, and 

 Flycatchers, and there will be no more talk 

 of the hopeless state of agriculture. 



M. Edmond Perriere of the Institute of 

 France, reviewing M. Godard's book in Le 

 Temps (September 28th, 1916) quotes striking 

 accounts of the ravages wrought by insects, 

 and of the work done by birds in keeping^ 

 down various pests : 



" The nocturnal birds of prey destroy a 

 great quantity of mice and rats. In the 

 vast plain of the Beauce there is no cover 

 for them, and that is why the Beauce is 

 periodically invaded by field-mice, who are 

 worse for her than locusts for the East. In 

 1876, M. de La Sicotiere valued at a thousand 

 millions (francs) the annual losses that these 

 rodents cause to French agriculture. 



" All the little passerine birds are of in- 

 contestable utility. People describe them, 

 grosso niodo, as graminivorous and insecti- 

 vorous. As the former are accused of 

 eating useful grain this is made a pretext for 

 destrojdng them. That excuse once ad- 

 mitted, the others are destroyed also. 

 This is a double mistake. The gramini- 

 vorous feed their young with insects only, 

 and they themselves eat a certain quantity 



