BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



UcT 



Bird and Tree (Arbor) Day. 



UoT I 



INTER-COUNTY COMPETITION. 



In order that the success of Pexvett School, 

 as first winners of the Inter-county Bird and 

 Tree Shield, might be celebrated in fitting 

 style, a meeting was held at the County Council 

 Chamber, The Castle, Winchester, on Feb- 

 ruary 8th , under the presidency of Sir William 

 Portal, vice-chairman of the Hampshire 

 County Council. The gathering was arranged 

 by Mr. D. T. Cowan, Director of Education 

 for the County, who has from the first given 

 the movement his invaluable support and 

 encouragement. The chamber was crowded, 

 and among those present were representatives 

 of a large number of competing Hampshire 

 schools. The Chairman, in explaining and 

 commending the aims and objects of the 

 Society's Competition, commented on the 

 unique charm possessed by England in her 

 beautiful hedge boundaries, and in the birds 

 for which these formed a refuge and home. 

 The chief enemies of some of our birds in 

 days past had been the gamekeepers ; and 

 if in the days when they went to school there 

 had been a Royal Society for the Protection 

 of Birds we should not find such birds as 

 Kestrels and Owls regarded as vermin, and 

 rare species like the Bittern shot at sight. 

 Other speakers were Mrs. Suckling, who 

 expressed the hope that Nature study 

 would become a subject recognised in County 

 Council work, and that every county would 

 have its Bird and Tree Day ; Mr. J. Gathorne 

 Wood (Chairman of County Education), 

 Rev. W. H. Thomas (Rector of Privett), 

 Mr. W. G. Nicholson, M.P., and Mr. Montagu 

 Sharpe (Chairman of the R.S.P.B.). The 

 Shield was handed over to Privett's head- 

 master and team by Sir William Portal. Mr. 

 Sharpe presented them also, on behalf of 

 the Society, with a framed silver medal as 

 a permanent memorial of their success, and 



Mrs. Suckling gave the school a coloured 

 picture. 



The two schools which were bracketed 

 second for the championship, Buckland 

 (Berkshire), and Yatton (Somerset), had 

 their festivals in December. Each received 

 a bronze medal and also a permanent silver 

 memorial, framed in oak, of their prowess 

 in winning their County Shield in successive 

 years. Buckland commemorated their fifth 

 annual Arbor Day by planting strawberry 

 and rose trees, and by fixing a nesting-box 

 and bird-table in the school grounds. In 

 the afternoon the Vicar (Rev. W. Bulmer) 

 entertained all the school children to tea, 

 and after the prize-giving and essay-reading, 

 fairy tales were illustrated with lantern 

 pictures. " The very name ' Bird and 

 Tree Day,' " writes Mrs. Fletcher, " signifies 

 to our children .all that is enjoyable and 

 pleasant." The pity is that a few more 

 teachers with Mrs. Fletcher's enthusiasm 

 should not have kept the County Shield 

 Competition alive in Berkshire. 



Mr. C. H. Bothamley, County Education 

 Secretary for Somerset, speaking at the 

 Yatton Festival on December 9th, said the 

 scheme deserved every encouragement, first, 

 from the agricultural point of view, and 

 secondly, because of the great good done by 

 the introduction of the competition into the 

 schools. Not only was the Society doing 

 an extremely useful work in endeavouring 

 to prevent the extermination of rare birds, 

 and to make people understand the value 

 and habits of birds, but this particular effort 

 was one which should be encouraged by all 

 interested in the real education of children, 

 in the development of their faculties and 

 their training for the occupations of after- 

 life. It was part of a movement for making 

 school- teaching less bookish than in the 



