512 Recent Literature. [oct. 



period has arrived when European pheasants, grouse, and plover are 

 rapidly replacing corresponding American birds; and unless suitable 

 measures be adopted for preserving and increasing our own game, we 

 shall doubtless have to depend more and more on imported game for our 

 market supply." 



The present scarcity of game is compared with its former abundance, 

 and the cause of the decrease is traced to the recklessness of the early 

 colonists and their pioneer successors in the settlement of the country, to 

 the conversion of wild into cultivated land, and to unrestricted trade in 

 game, aided by modern cheap rapid transit and cold storage. The present 

 prices of game here and in Europe are compared, and also the cost in this 

 country of European grouse, plover, etc. in comparison with the far greater 

 cost of American game of similar character. " The principal reason for 

 this apparent anomaly is," it is stated, " that the European game markets 

 are largely supplied by private preserves, which are comparatively few in 

 number and near the market, and which can maintain their stock at a 

 fairly constant point; while the American supply is obtained from distant 

 and numerous sources and is derived from wild and practically unregulated 

 stock .... Free marketing of wild game leads swiftly to extermination, 

 while game reared as private property may be marketed freely without 

 reducing stock." — J. A. A. 



Cooke on Migration Routes of North American Birds. 1 — Prof. 

 Cooke states: "The Bureau of Biologic Survey of the United States 

 Department of Agriculture has collected much information on the migra- 

 tion of North American birds, and this article is an attempt to put in 

 popular form some of the data that have already appeared in the more 

 technical bulletins and reports." 



A number of outline maps effectively illustrate the text. The seven 

 principal migration routes used by North American birds in their migra- 

 tions to and from South America are thus graphically shown. We are 

 warned against supposing that " these routes as outlined on the map 

 represent distinctly segregated pathways. On the contrary, they are 

 merely convenient subdivisions of the one great flightway which extends 

 from North to South America. There is probably no single mile in the 

 whole line between northern Mexico and the Lesser Antilles which is not 

 crossed each fall by migrating birds." The great bulk of the land birds, 

 both as to species and individuals, cross the Gulf to eastern Mexico, while 

 two less important routes run from Florida through the West Indies to 

 South America. The species of the western United States whose migra- 

 tions are, on the whole, much less extensive, follow two main routes to 

 their winter homes in Mexico. 



x Our Greatest Travelers: Birds that fly from Pole to Pole and Shun Darkness: 

 Birds that make 2,500 Miles in a Single Flight. By Wells W. Cooke, of the Bio- 

 logical Survey, U. S. Department of Agriculture. National Geographic Magazine, 

 April, 1911, pp. 346-365, 6 maps. 



