58 



BIRD NOTES AND NEWS. 



indiscriminating and distinctly harmful 

 Sparrow Club, with its tale of Hedge- Sparrows 

 and Tits and Flycatchers and Thrushes and 

 Larks killed to meet the prejudices of farmer 

 and fruit-grower, Magpies and Jays and 

 Hawks killed to please the squire and his 

 gamekeeper, and miscellaneous assortments 

 of birds and eggs included under the country 

 definition of " spadger " ? The answer to 

 this (if answer it can be called) is contained 

 in an article which appears in both numbers 

 of the " Journal " on the organisation and 

 affiliation of Rat (and Sparrow) Clubs 

 (by all means let us have the apologetic 

 brackets), and rules for their working. These 

 rules certainly contain the words " Rats and 

 House-Sparrows only to be decreased." 

 There is nothing new in that. But it is 

 hardly credible that the I.S.D.V., with an 

 experience which leads it to denounce the 

 past work of the clubs in no doubtful terms, 

 proposes no safeguard whatever for the main- 

 tenance of the rule, and adds nothing whatever 

 to it, not so much as a suggestion that the 

 receiver should be a person with some 

 knowledge of birds, who can tell a Sparrow 

 or a Sparrow's egg when he sees it, or a 

 warning that " distinct harm " has been done 

 for want of strong insistence on such a rule. 

 Still less is there any condition that the 

 taking of other birds and eggs should be the 

 subject of fines, with expulsion from the Club 

 in the case of useful and protected species. 

 There is in fact no single feature to differ- 

 entiate the Society's " scheme " from the old 

 Sparrow Clubs except — and the exceptions 

 are telling enough — that the immediate 

 burning of all heads is advised (whereby sub- 

 sequent inquiry or identification would 

 become impossible), and that, over and 

 beyond each club's prizes to individual 

 members, substantial prizes from the Society 

 are now to reward the Clubs showing the 

 greatest number of points for birds destroyed. 

 Truly a remarkable way of ensuring that no 

 other species than House-Sparrows shall 

 be allowed to run up the totals. 



" Sparrow Club," says Mr. Moore, is "merely 

 a title." And merely a title it is likely to 

 remain, of clubs for the destruction of all 

 small birds. 



Again, farmers and fruit-growers have, we 

 are told, no system in defining vermin. 

 What is the definition given by the I.S.D.V. ? 

 " In particular, without prejudice to others 

 included in the general term vermin, rats, 

 mice, sparrows, ticks, fleas, mosquitoes, 

 and flies." That is to say, anything the 

 vague term " vermin " can be supposed to 

 comprehend. And this while it is elsewhere 

 stated that in the eyes of this same Society 

 the Sparrow itself is " merely a local pest " 

 to be warred against where it is proved to be 

 a pest. How proved, and by whom ? Not 

 a ghost of a hint is given from cover to cover 

 of either number of the " Journal " ; nor is 

 the smallest condition laid down in the prize 

 scheme. The whole argument is that clubs 

 to be of any use must exist all over the 

 country. 



This brings us to another point. Alluding 

 to the rat plague, one I.S.D.V. voice speaks 

 as follows : — 



" The ruthless shooting down of weasels, Kestrels, 

 and Owls has been one of the main conditions- 

 operating in favour of the unchecked multipli- 

 cation of the rat." 



The second voice, dealing with the Rat 

 (and Sparrow) Club, observes : — 



" Rats and Sparrows being the chief pests, were 

 always included, but in game-rearing districts, 

 stoats, weasels, Magpies, Jays, Hawks were also 

 included. For the present the Society is confining 

 its energy and funds to rats but is at the same time 

 collecting all the information available regarding 

 other pests, as the information will be needed some 

 day as much as the information regarding rats 

 now." 



The Society, then, is already contemplating 

 the time when its elastic phraseology will 

 include " Hawks," Magpies, and the rest of 

 the gamekeeper's " vermin." Where it pro- 

 poses to stop is pleasingly uncertain, for who 

 can say what may be " proved to the satis- 

 faction of the Society " where no proof is 

 asked for ? Dr. Louis Sambon, in a lecture 

 before the Societv on " Vermin as Disease- 



