BIRD-BANDING IN AMERICA 



["Return records" quoted from a report by Mr. Howard H. Cleaves, of the Ameri- 

 can Bird-Banding Association, 1 before the American Ornithologists' Union] 



IT WAS on June 7, 1911, thcat an adult chimney swift fluttered down a 

 chimney into the study of Mr. Ernest Harold Baynes in Meriden, 

 New Hampshire, and was promptly banded and released. The band 

 bore the number 6326. At eight o'clock p. m. on June 15, 1912, two chim- 

 ney swifts flew from the chimney into the same room where the bird had 

 been caught a year and eight days before. When these birds were taken 

 in hand and examined one of them proved to be 6326. Remarkable as it 

 may seem this diminutive creature less than six inches in length, had 

 traveled hundreds of miles to Central America or elsewhere in the tropics 

 where he spent the winter and then had made the long return journey at the 

 approach of summer and found again the chimney of his choice in a village 

 of far-off New Hampshire. And throughout his journeyings the little 

 aluminum ring had traveled with him. 



Two French Canadians were gunning along a small river near the hamlet 

 of Whitebread in southwestern Ontario, Canada, on August 5, 1912. Black- 

 birds, their intended booty, were not numerous and the men were about to 

 return to camp when one suddenly touched the other on the arm and said 

 pointing to a flying tern, "You cannot hit him!" In answer to this chal- 

 lenge the second gunner wheeled quickly about and took a difficult chance 



1 The American Bird-Banding Association, but recently organized, is planned on the 

 lines of the many European bird-banding associations of long standing and large results. 

 It has its headquarters at the American Museum and is thoroughly in sympathy with the 

 conservative work of the bird lovers of the country, its membership including not only the 

 foremost members of the American Ornithologists' Union but also leaders of the great Audu- 

 bon movement. 



The aim of the work is purely scientific, the extension of knowledge of bird habits by 

 means of records made by men who are enthusiastic bird students and accurate observers. 

 Each wild bird banded wears an aluminum ring that slips loosely up and down the tarsus so 

 as to be of no injury or inconvenience to the bird. The ring bears the words, "Notify Ameri- 

 can Museum, New York," and corresponds to a card in the filed records of the Museum 

 giving the species of the bird, and also the date, place and circumstances of banding. The 

 following questions quoted from the association's pamphlet of directions suggest some of the 

 results hoped for: 



1. To what extent do birds return year after year to their previous nesting place? 



2. How far from their birthplace will birds be found nesting? 



3. In cases where an identical nest is occupied in successive seasons, how is the tenancy 

 determined? 



4. Do birds reared in distinctive nesting sites themselves favor a similar site? 



5. In migration, how far and in what direction do individual birds travel? 



6. Do migrants travel by definite routes, and if so, what is the nature of these routes? 



7. Do birds have definite winter quarters which they seek each year? 



8. To what extent are males and females, young and old, separated while migrating 

 and in winter quarters? 



9. What relation do the winter quarters of the northerly-breeding members of a species 

 bear to those of the southerly-breeding members? 



10. To what age do wild birds live? 



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