THE OSPREY. 



43 



ers not being- fully grown. Warrants 

 were sworn out for the principals, a pur- 

 chaser and an intending- purchaser. 



Arrests for violations of the game laws 

 in San Francisco last fall were crowned 

 b}' convictions before a jury in the police 

 court and a lively controversy is promised 

 this fall. The State Sportmen's Asso- 

 ciation were instrumental in passing- the 

 recent laws for protection of g-ame and 

 are justly indig-nant, to say the least, at 

 the offenders, and many members have 

 offered their services as deputy fish and 

 g-ame wardens, to serve without pay and 

 to handle whaL cases the regular officers 

 cannot find time for. 



The majority of sportsmen have their 

 own troubles, nevertheless, arising from 

 the actions of gun clubs who have fenced 

 in their preserves and blockaded the 

 sloughs, chiefly in Solano county, the 

 best duck g-round in this part of the 

 State, and within several hours ride from 

 San Francisco and the nuiuerous bay 

 cities. The preserves consist of "over- 

 flowed and unimproved marsh land,'' and 

 an act of the leg-islature last year granted 

 any person the privileg-e of shooting over 

 such land whether the owner or lessee 

 had objections or not. The outside 

 sportsmen were bitterly arrayed in court 

 ag-ainst the club men who monopolized 

 nearly all the g-ood duck g-rounds, fenced 

 them in and hired keepers to keep poach- 

 ers out, and in some cases bloodshed was 

 narrowly averted. The clubs recently 

 obtained a victory over outside shooters 

 in the Supreme Court. The main slough 

 on the Suisun marsh is barred to outside 

 shooters who intend to resume the fight 

 on the g-round that it is a navig-able 

 sloug-h and illeg-ally blocked. The club 

 men claim otherwise and their right to 

 blockade it to prevent boats from coming 

 up the small tributaries and scattering- 

 tresspassers over their preserves. 



The supervisors of Solano county are 

 thinking- to settle the trouble by prohib- 

 iting- shooting by both classes. At a 

 larg-e meeting- of the Sportsmen's Asso- 

 ciation a stand was taken favoring- legis- 

 lators who will make laws for the masses, 

 not for the classes. 



Gorr6S|}Oiid6iiC6. 



F^DITOK TUP, OSI'KEY: 



I hope Thk Ospkkv ma^' do much to draw the 

 ornitholog'ists, especially of this district, into 

 closer conmiunion. 



I see a movement is on foot to found iin 

 ()riiithol(jg-ist's club for Illinois. That is g"ood, 

 but would it not be be better to include some 

 of the neig"hb(jrinj4- States in the associa- 

 tion. It wtjuld seem to me there is everything'- 

 to g-ain and nothing to lose by so doing. It 

 seems doubtful if any one of our large 

 western states can furnish by itself sufficient 

 attractions t(j draw bird lovers to its meeting's 

 from all parts of its teritory, but a meeting of 

 the ornitholog-ists of several neighboring 

 states, could be made much more attractive and 

 useful, while the members attending would be 

 put to very little more trouble or expense, or 

 loss of time. 



It would be evidently- undesirable, however, 

 for a club of this kind to take in too much ter- 

 ritory. How would an association for the 

 Upper Mississippi work, that would include the 

 states of Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Wisconsin 

 and Minnesota? In siich a territory there 

 oug-ht to be enough ornitholog^ists, both pro- 

 fessional and amateur, enoug-h coUeg-es and 

 museums and private collections to furnish 

 material for the work of the society. And yet 

 all the centers of learning in this territory' are 

 within comparitively easy reach of one an- 

 other. 



There are many practical reasons why our 

 national association, the A. O. U., cannot at 

 present hold its meeting's within reach of the 

 <n-nitholocrists of the middle west, and thoug-h 

 we would not rival it in its work, j-et we must, 

 if we wish the help that such co-operation 

 among- naturalists g-ives, found societies for 

 ourselves, that will bring- together the best 

 material we have for our material benefit. 

 Very sincerelj^ yours. 



Wm. E. Pkakc.Kk. 

 Keokuk, la. 



Mr. W. H. Osg-Qod, vice-president of the 

 Cooper Club, is teachings natural history to the 

 young- son of President David Starr Jordan of 

 Stanford Universit3'. 



Editor thp: Ospkey: 



I wished very much this spring to add a set 

 of Screech Owf eggs to my collection, but when 

 I looked over my books and papers on oology 

 to see when fresh eg-g-s might be expected I 

 met with no better success than Mr. Barnes 

 records in the September issue. As Mr. Mc- 

 Greg'-or remarks, (pag^e 29) "a slig-ht difference 

 of locality will sometimes affect nesting dates 

 very materially," it mig-ht be interesting- for 

 the'correspondents of Thk Osi'KEv to compare 

 dates of collecting- eg-.gs of this bird. My only 

 record is as follows: April 5th, 1896. 



Yours truly, 



Wady Peta, 111. Vikc.inus II. Chask. 



[In Knox and Warren counties, Illinois, I 

 have been fortunate in examining between 

 twenty-five and thirty nests, fourteen of which 

 contained eg^g-s. The'first eg-g- in all these sets 

 was evidently laid between March 25th and 

 April 15th.— Ed.] 



