466 GAME BIRDS, WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



birds were overwhelmed, and taken " in great abundance " by 

 the people.^ 



Some of the Pigeons may have been driven by persecution 

 to the far north to breed, in the latter part of the nineteenth 

 century, and they may have been destroyed by unseasonable 

 storms, for many species are subject to periodical reduction by 

 the elements; but the whole history of the last thirty years of 

 the existence of the Passenger Pigeon goes to prove that the 

 birds were so persistently molested that they finally lost their 

 coherence, were scattered far and wide, and became extinct 

 mainly through constant persecution by man. While they 

 existed in large colonies, the orphaned young were taken care 

 of by their neighbors. Mr. E. T. Martin, in a pamphlet 

 entitled Among the Pigeons, which was published in full in the 

 American Field, January 25, 1879, states that one of his men 

 shot six female Pigeons that came to feed a single squab in 

 one nest. (Comment on this shooting is unnecessary.) This 

 communal habit of feeding preserved the species so long as the 

 birds nested in large colonies; but when they became scattered 

 the orphaned young starved when their parents were killed. 



The Passenger Pigeon was not a suspicious bird, as birds 

 go; it was easily taken. It reproduced slowly, laid but few 

 eggs, and when its innumerable multitudes were reduced and 

 its flocks were dispersed, the end came rapidly. 



It often is asked how it was possible for man to kill them 

 all. It was not possible, nor was it requisite that he should do 

 so, in order to exterminate them. All that was required to 

 bring about this result was to destroy a large part of the 

 young birds hatched each year. Nature cut off the rest. She 

 always eliminates a large share of the young of all creatures. 

 The greater part of the Pigeons taken in summer and fall were 

 young birds. The squabs were sought because they brought a 

 high price in the market. The flock mentioned by Mr. Van 

 Cleef (see page 452), which nested in Missouri, Michigan and 

 New York the same year, was followed by the pigeoners, who 

 destroyed about all the squabs at each nesting. The young 

 when out of the nest were less experienced than the adults, 



1 Munsell, Joel: Annala of Albany, 1858, Vol. IX, p. 206. 



