2l8 Scott on the Bird Rookeries of Southern Florida. [July 



Mr. Johnson told me of the extermination of a Brown Pelican 

 Rookery, near where he lived, which is a very fair example of 

 the atrocities that have been and are still being committed to ob- 

 tain 'bird plumes/ 



It seems that the year before the Brown Pelicans selected a 

 small mangrove island near to that on which Mr. Johnson lived, 

 and about eighty or a hundred pairs made nests, laid eggs, and 

 hatched out their young. Johnson had not touched the birds or 

 disturbed them, as he proposed to let them rear their young. But 

 one afternoon when Johnson was absent from home hunting, the 

 old Frenchman before referred to, A. Lechevallier, came in with 

 a boat, and deliberately killed off the old birds as they were feed- 

 ing the young, obtaining about one hundred and eighty of them. 

 The young, about three weeks old, to the number of several hun- 

 ched at least, and utterly unable to care for themselves in any 

 way, were simply left to starve to death in their nests, or to be 

 eaten by raccoons and Buzzards. It is needless to say that the 

 birds never came back to that rookery. 



There were very few birds that came in to roost at the rookery 

 where we were, and I killed only one Reddish Egret. I paid 

 Johnson two dollars not to shoot, so that I might get a good idea 

 of the birds, both as to kind and number that roosted there. 

 Johnson went with us back to the camp, and it was during the 

 evening that he gave the information transcribed above. 



Thursday, May 13. Going back to the sloop this morning I 

 saw very tew birds ; in the afternoon I went out to the roosting 

 place and killed two Reddish Egrets ; one of them had large 

 patches of white feathers on the throat, neck, breast, and back. 

 A flock of them in the pure white phase (A. pealei) flew by me, 

 just out of gun shot, during the afternoon. These birds are not 

 at all uncommon at this locality, but are not so numerous as at 

 points further south. They are well known by the 'plume hun- 

 ters' as 'muffled-jawed Egrets', and sound and flat skins of them 

 command good prices. I saw, in a rookery at the north entrance 

 to Matlacha Pass, among a great pile of other birds that had 

 been recently killed and their plumes removed, twelve of this 

 phase that were easily recognizable, having had only the skin of 

 part of the back, neck, and head taken off. 



For the last few days I have noted Black-bellied Plover in 

 full plumage, going north in considerable flocks. These were, 



