194 THE PASSENGER PIGEON IN PENNSYLVANIA 



take them by the lumdreds. In 18G8, a famous nesting 

 occurred on Bell's Run. 



A. Reilly, of Smethport, in speaking of tliem says 

 in part : "At one time the nesting was ten miles long 

 and five miles wide, with every tree and limb of the 

 forest being covered. Many made a business of catch- 

 ing them, and on Potato Creek, there were placed nets 

 about every one hundred yards apart for fifteen 

 miles. Each net captured from ten to one hundred 

 dozen a day. I have shipped from twenty to thirty 

 barrels a day, each barrel holding twenty-five dozen 

 and selling from twenty-five to fifty cents a dozen, 

 but discontinued when the market became glutted." 



In the Spring of 1842 Stephen Sickles, of Smeth- 

 port, caught thousands of them, but as there was no 

 market at that time, hired himself and his net to his 

 neighbors for $2 a day, and captured in a snigle day 

 from 500 to 2,000 pigeons. 



In this immediate vicinity, C. M. Slack tells of 

 netting them with E. S. Carpenter on the flats where 

 the refinery is now located. At one time there was a 

 large nesting up at Windfall. 



A. N. AIcFall described a nesting made at ^It. 

 Alton and they picked them. He says that after a 

 successful day with the nets, a trough would be built 

 around the four sides of a good room and into this 

 the dead pigeons would be dumped. Women would 

 be hired to pick them, taking the feathers for us€ in 

 making feather beds. 



