202 BIRDS OF OHIO. — INTRODUCTION. 



its natural history. New species have become domiciled 

 here, or at least have become resident during a part of the 

 year. 



As an introduction to the series, the Fanner remarks 

 that as the land was cleared of forest, species of birds, 

 previously rare, became numerous, while the reverse holds 

 good with those species that love the deep recesses of the 

 dim old woods. A few years ago specimens of the Pinnated 

 Grouse, or Prairie Hen, were quite numerous on our small 

 prairies, now they are rare, and this is the case with many 

 others, influenced, no doubt, by various causes. The want 

 of a game law in the State, until recently, gave unbridled 

 liberty to every one who longed to try his skill on the 

 feathered denizens of the forest, has helped to banish many 

 species from the more densely inhabited parts of the State, 

 that would have been glad to take up their dwellings with 

 us, and would, if protected by man, increase greatly and 

 repay their benefactors for that protection with sweet 

 music, and useful assistance in thinning out the ranks of 

 injurious insects, which prey on our fruits and grains, our 

 meadows and gardens. 



Our position as a State brings within our borders a very 

 large number of the birds of our entire country. Many 

 species of land and water-fowl, who breed in summer 

 on the shores of Hudson's Bay and the many lakes and 

 rivers of the far North, pass through Ohio in their 

 spring and fall migrations while numerous species that 

 are generally to be found in southern States only, ascend 

 the Ohio river and its tributaries, and even reach the 

 northern limit of the State, the southern shore of Lake 

 Erie, encouraged by the warm genial weather of our 

 summer months. 



Birds are divided by naturalists into six orders, founded 

 principally on the structure of the bill and feet, these 

 organs being adapted, as in mammals, to the peculiar habits 



