446 Fleming, The Niagara Swan Trap. [q^ 



I was at Niagara Falls, Ontario, on April 15th, and saw the two 

 living swans; one was an adult with a lemon yellow spot on the 

 beak, and the other was not fully adult, the beak having an almost 

 imperceptible flesh-colored spot and there was a good deal of gray 

 in its plumage. The only note the birds uttered was a low call. 

 I saw Mr. H. Williams and Mr. Leblond but got no further informa- 

 tion than that in Mr. Wallace's letter. There is no record of any 

 swans being killed in 1910, but on March 22, Mr. James Savage, 

 of Buffalo, N. Y., saw a flock estimated at 28 in the upper river 

 opposite Chippewa, Ont., and I quote from his letter. "You may 

 be interested to know that there was another flock of swans on 

 the Niagara River last March which did not go over the Falls. 

 Mr. Broderick, the game inspector at Niagara Falls, N. Y., phoned 

 me that there were twenty-eight of them near Navy Island and 

 that he had approached within 100 yards of them before they took 

 flight. I joined him in the afternoon and we had an interesting 

 experience trying to photograph them about a mile above Goat 

 Island. They finally mounted into the air and filed away towards 

 Lake Ontario. It is not improbable that we saved their lives by 

 driving them away from the place where so many of their kind 

 have come to an untimely end." 



In 1911 some swans came over the Falls, 22 were taken on 

 March 23, most of them by Mr. Leblond. Some of these birds were 

 seen by Mr. Wallace, but I have no note of the conditions of the 

 weather or ice at the time. Mr. Ottomar Reinecke of Buffalo 

 records a large flock seen on April 11, presumably in the upper 

 river. 



The 1912 toll is the heaviest yet recorded. Mr. Savage writes 

 of the March losses as follows : " My notes show that four swans 

 were picked up on the morning of March 18, and seven others 

 were secured by Leblond on the morning of March 27. He tells 

 me that on this later day, three others were obtained by other 

 parties." 



On April 6 Mr. Leblond telephoned me that a great number 

 of swans had come over the Falls that morning, and that he had 

 taken 70 out of the river. I went to Niagara Falls next morning 

 and saw Mr. Leblond at the 'Maid of the Mist' landing on the 

 Canadian side. Two men were standing on the edge of the break- 



