VoI hhh XX ] Recent Literature. 601 



Ostrich plumes, and the commercial terminology and points used in valuing 

 plumes. Chapter four considers the methods of procuring the plumes from 

 the birds and other chapters relate to the commerce in Ostrich plumes, 

 the domestication and care of the birds, and the extension of Ostrich farm- 

 ing. When we learn that in 1911 over 800,000 pounds of Ostrich plumes 

 were exported from Cape Colony, valued at about ten million dollars, 

 and that Ostrich raising is now going on in Transvaal, Australia, Algeria, 

 Tunis, Soudan, Madagascar, Egypt and the United States, we begin to 

 realize the magnitude of this business, and more than ever the absolute 

 lack of necessity for tolerating in any way, shape or form the traffic in 

 wild bird plumage. M. Menegaux has furnished us with a valuable work 

 of reference which can be read with profit by all interested in the feather 

 trade, either commercially or in its relation to bird protection — W. S. 



Dubois' List of the Birds of Belgium. 1 — Dr. Dubois prepared in 1885 

 a list of Belgian birds of which this is a ' new edition.' Eight names in the 

 old list are cancelled and 25 species added during the twenty-seven years 

 that have intervened making a total of 353. In comparing the avifauna of 

 Belgium with that of any of the United States it may be of interest to state 

 that Dr. Dubois finds that 70 species are resident, 57 summer residents, 39 

 winter visitants, 49 regular transients and 123 irregular or accidental. 

 To these he adds as a separate category, 15 climatic varieties — surely a 

 severe reflection upon the ' subspecies.' Dr. Dubois is very conservative 

 in matters of nomenclature adhering to the twelfth edition of Linnaeus, 

 and rejecting tautonomy and trinomials, his 15 climatic varieties being 

 designated by the old-fashioned " var." — W. S. 



McAtee on the Relation of Birds to Grain Aphides. 2 — Mr. McAtee 

 presents an elaborate report of a week's study of birds in connection with 

 an outbreak of Grain Aphides near Winston Salem, N. C. Of the species 

 present which fed upon the Aphides the following were the most important 

 and in the order named, Field Sparrow, Goldfinch, Chipping Sparrow, 

 Savannah Sparrow, Song Sparrow, Vesper Sparrow, and Snowbird. By 

 estimating the number of birds present on the area of 100 acres which was 

 under observation and the average number of Aphides found in the stomachs 

 examined, Mr. McAtee concludes that these birds devoured about a million 

 aphides a day, while migrants passing through at the time consumed as 

 many more. It is interesting to see that all the species cited above are 

 Fringillidse, birds not usually credited with this sort of diet. — W. S. 



Beal on Our Meadowlarks in Relation to Agriculture. 3 — The dis- 

 tribution and economic status of Sturnella magna and S. neglecta are here 



i Nouvelle Revue des Oiseaux Observes en Belgique, par Le Dr. Alph. Dubois. 

 Mom. Soc. Zool. France. Tom. XXV. 1912, pp. 162-209. 



- Relation of Birds to Grain Aphides. By W. L. McAtee. Year book U. S. 

 Dept. of Agriculture for 1912. pp. 397-404, 3 figs. 



» Our Meadowlarks in Relation to Agriculture. By L. Beal. Yearbook U. S. 

 Dept. of Agriculture. 191-'. pp. 279-284. 



