44 STORIES OF BIRD LIFE 



ordinary night's work. Men and boys would come in 

 wagons from all the adjoining counties and camp near the 

 roost for the purpose of killing robins. Many times one 

 hundred or more hunters with torches and clubs would be 

 at work in a single night. ' ' 



For three 3^ears this tremendous slaughter continued 

 each winter. Then the birds deserted the roost. This 

 desertion has been attributed by Professor Claxton, whose 

 account of the roost has just been given, to three possible 

 causes. First, the constant and wholesale killing of their 

 numbers ; second, the failure of the crop of cedar berries ; 

 and third, the cutting away of much of the growth which 

 formed their feeding grounds. Whether the birds chose 

 some other roosting place in common I have been unable to 

 learn ; but the old roost has not been occupied for twenty- 

 five years. 



In many places robins are considered game birds, and 

 during the colder months are often shot as they wander in 

 flocks about the country, seeking food. Once I asked a 

 boy on the Carolina coast near Nag's Head what game 

 birds were to be found there. ^^ Ducks, and rabbits, and 

 robins," he replied. 



In the southern part of their range these birds do not 

 pass the spring and summer, so their song is unknown to 

 many. In fact, the birds here are not always looked upon 



