146 
WILD WINGS 
ago, these beautiful and spectacular species of water-fowl 
were to be seen nearly everywhere. In 1903 I had hard work 
to hnd a few scattered colonies in the remotest and wildest 
parts of the state, in the unsurveyed and trackless swamps 
of its lower end. Mr. F. M. Chapman went there last season 
and found them all practically annihilated. The same is 
becoming true even in southern Brazil. 
When we know about the millinery plume trade, we under¬ 
stand the reason. In 1903 the price for plumes offered to 
hunters was $32 per ounce, which makes the plumes worth 
about TWICE THEIR WEIGHT IN GOLD. There will alwavs 
be men who would break any law for such profit. No rookery 
of these herons can long exist, unless it be guarded by force 
of arms day and night. 
Here are some official figures of the trade from one source 
alone, of auctions at the London Commercial Sale Rooms 
during 1902. There were sold 1608 packages of “ ospreys,” 
that is, herons’ plumes. A package is said to average in 
weight 30 ounces. This makes a total of 48,240 ounces. As 
it requires about four birds to make an ounce of plumes, 
these sales meant 192,960 herons killed at their nests, and 
from two to three times that number of voung or eggs 
destroyed. Is it, then, any wonder that these species are on 
the verge of extinction ? 
The killing of these white herons — and others, as well — 
is now ]:)unishable with heavv fines, and the Milliners’ Asso¬ 
ciation of America has pledged itself not to deal in these 
contraband plumes. Yet the}' reser\'e the right to sell FOR¬ 
EIGN plumes. Now it happens that these same species also 
breed in Central and South America, and also that the 
plumes of distinctly foreign species of white herons are so 
exactly similar to those of our native ones that not even the 
most expert ornithologists can tell them apart. This means 
