42 



BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



THE FEATHER SALES. 



The plumes offered at the Commercial 

 Sale Rooms on August 5th, included a very 

 large supply of Indian Paroquets ; some 

 Indian Rollers ; 263 packages of Egret 

 feathers, both American and Asiatic ; 6880 

 Birds-of-paradise ; and 6850 Kingfishers. 



Among the quills were 266 bundles described 

 as " Albatross.'" The House of Lords 

 Committee were informed that " Albatross" 

 is the trade name for the quills of the Jabiru 

 Stork ; and coincidently with this statement 

 a strong protest appeared in the Field 

 against the extent to which the Jabiru is 

 being shot down. 



County Challenge Shield Competitions. 

 The Essays from Schools competing in 

 the R.S.P.B. Inter-County and County Com- 

 petitions should reach the Society's office 

 not later than Monday, October 5th. 



Nature Study in the School. 



" Every encouragement should be given 

 to the institution of school field-clubs, ' Bird 

 and Tree ' teams, scouting parties, naturalist 

 societies, and other developments of a like 

 nature among the pupils." 



Now that the Bird and Tree Competition 

 has received this official approval in the 

 Memorandum on Nature Study and the 

 teaching of Science in Scottish Schools 

 (Scotch Education Department, 1908), it 

 may be hoped that some progressive Scottish 

 county — and Scotland is usually progressive 

 in the matter of education — will introduce 

 the scheme into its educational programme. 

 The whole Memorandum is entirely in accord 

 with the Bird and Tree work of the Royal 

 Society for the Protection of Birds, and some 

 paragraphs might have been written to set 

 forth its aims and methods. For example :— 



" From the beginning the pupil should learn, 

 as far as possible, to rely upon his own observation 

 for his facts, and to endeavour to frame his con- 

 clusions independently. . . . The main endeavour 

 should be not simply to impart information, but 

 to quicken the interest of the children in the world 

 around them, to train them to observe accurately, 

 to reason intelligently from their observations, to 

 state and illustrate their conclusions clearly, and 

 generally to form habits of acquiring and sifting 

 out information for themselves. . . . 



" Good text-books, or, better still, the writings 

 of great naturalists and exjalorers, will often prove 

 helpful in suggesting lines of work and methods of 

 carrying them out. But the formal intrusion of 

 a text-book, or the dependence upon it for informa- 

 tion which ought to be gleaned directly from actual 

 observation, is altogether foreign to the spirit of 

 Nature Study. . . . 



" The continuous study of a living plant or animal 

 in its natural environment, accompanied by careful 

 dated records of its growth, development and 



changes throughout the successive seasons of the 

 year, forms an exceptionally interesting and valuable 

 exercise. 



" The collecting instinct will be brought out 

 strongly in all this work, and must be carefully 

 guided. Any tendency towards the indiscriminate 

 robbing of birds' nests, the ruthless killing of living 

 creatures, or the thoughtless uprooting of rare 

 botanical specimens, merely for the sake of increas- 

 ing a collection, should be strongly discouraged. 

 Nature Study should lead children to have a deep- 

 ened respect for the rights and feelings of all their 

 fellow-creatures, and should teach them to regard 

 with abhorrence the wanton destruction of what 

 is rare and beautiful. 



"In no case should the keeping of animals in 

 captivity, either in school or elsewhere, be per- 

 mitted, unless their well-being and comfort can be 

 provided for in a thoroughly satisfactory manner. 

 . . . Wherever captivity is, from the nature of 

 the case, irksome or cruel, it should be absolutely 

 forbidden. A skylark kept imprisoned in a cage is 

 neither a fitting subject for Nature Study nor a 

 desirable object-lesson in the treatment of 

 animals. 



" Under suitable conditions, the provision of 

 convenient nesting places for the song-birds of the 

 district permits of their habits, especially at nesting 

 time, being studied. With a little ingenuity, an 

 empty box of suitable size can be readily enough 

 adapted for this purpose, and fixed to a convenient 

 wall or tree, or erected on a pole in a favourable 

 situation. Schools in which Manual Instruction 

 courses have been established might include the 

 design and construction of such bird-houses or 

 nesting-boxes, in their schemes of work. En- 

 deavours to modify the forms of these to suit the 

 habits of different birds would lend much interest 

 to their construction, and their erection would lead 

 to more intimate study of local bird-life and a grow- 

 ing desire to protect it. The design and construction 

 of feeding tables and perches, suitable for the 

 smaller birds, would further encourage this desirable 

 development." 



In an appendix of suggestions to teachers, 

 Professor J. A. Thomson, of Aberdeen Uni- 

 versity, sums up pithily : "In Nature Study 

 we aim at seeing, understanding, enjoying, 

 and practically learning from the natural 

 world round about us. It need hardly be 

 said that Nature Study has gone wrong 

 when it becomes bookish or too much of a 

 ' lesson.' " 



