2o8 



NATURE 



[December 15, 1910 



every Hungarian province. By the more crucial 

 method of bird-marking the Rossitten observers are 

 busily engaged in carrying out investigations which 

 will give us eventually, we trust, the essential data 

 referred to above : the identification of the members of 

 a flock all along its migration route. 



Besides those of Rossitten, only a few other 

 ornithologists have attempted the " kennzeichnen " of 

 birds. These are Prof. Martensen in Viborg, Prof. 

 Thomson in Aberdeen, Mr. Witherby in London, and 

 the watchers at the Heligoland station. The "mark- 

 ing " is done by affixing a light aluminium garter, 

 capable of easy and quick attachment to the leg of 

 adult birds captured for the purpose, and of fledglings 

 before they leave the nest. The weight of these rings 

 is so disproportionate to that of the bird that they form 

 (as has been proved) no possible impediment to its 

 flight or feeding. The weight of a stork's ring, 

 for instance, is only 2*4 grammes, while that for 

 ?mall species is only o'o5 grammes. Each ring 

 bears a number and the name of the station em- 

 bossed on it, and when attached serves as an addressed 

 missive for its return to the station of origin. The 

 latter is obviously an essential factor to the success of 

 the system. At all events, if the ring itself be not re- 

 turned, its number with an accurate note of the time 

 and place of its wearer's recapture must be communi- 

 cated to the observatory, or published in some journal 

 likely to meet the eye of the Rossitten or other Euro- 

 pean ornithologists. Each bird, as soon as ringed, is 

 liberated to assemble with or rejoin its associates in 

 autumn and fare forth on its adventurous voyage. 

 The larger the number of birds ringed out of a migra- 

 tory flock, the greater are the chances of prizes being 

 drawn in this novel lottery by the man with a gun or 

 a snare, and of data, indisputable and free from con- 

 jecture, being accumulated towards the elucidation of 

 the routes followed by the flock, and of the terminus 

 of its journey. 



At Rossitten numbers of hooded crows, black-headed 

 and herring gulls, storks, rough-footed buzzards, and 

 various species of Totanidae, Fringida;, and Chara- 

 driidae have been ringed since the observatory was 

 established. The success of these experiments has 

 been most remarkable. Large numbers of hooded 

 crows were obtained for marking through the ob- 

 servatory's investigators associating themselves with 

 the crow-catchers who frequent the dunes for the 

 purpose of netting these birds for food. Twelve 

 per cent, of the marked crows were recaptured, and 

 the place of their misfortune plotted on a map, 

 which shows that this species disperses over a wide 

 region to the north and south. The most northern 

 point of recapture was 30 km. from Savonlunna in 

 Finland, and Solesmes in France, the most westerly 

 and southerly ; while Prettin on the Elbe was the 

 most southern spot in Germany itself. From Rossitten 

 to Savonlunna the distance is 900 km., to Solesmes 

 1280 km., and from Savonlunna to Solesmes 2180 km. 

 Recaptures were also often effected in the crow- 

 catchers' nets in the neighbourhood of the East Prus- 

 sian lagoons, sometimes after the lapse of three or 

 four years, showing that the hooded crows come back- 

 wards and forwards to this region. Strange to sav 

 not a single marked individual from Rossitten has 

 been reported from the Netherlands. 



Space does not permit our referring to any of Dr. 

 Thienemann's other records save that of the stork, 

 which indicates very clearly the great value of the 

 results to be expected by and by from these investiga- 

 tions. The first gartering experiments on storks were 

 made in the Zoological Gardens in Berlin on old and 

 on half-fledged birds. They were so successful that 

 assistance was requested, from those who had access 



NO. 2146, VOL. 85] 



to nests of these birds, in ringing as many individuals 

 as possible. The observatory distributed rings free and 

 post paid to all who requested them, on the sole condi- 

 tion that a list of the birds marked, with a note (il 

 the place and date of their liberation, and of the 

 numbers on the rings, be sent to Rossitten. In the 

 first year 1044 '"'"Rs were distributed to outside helper^. 

 The results were astonishingly successful. First of 

 all it was proved that the storks migrate in autumn, 

 not to the south-west, but to the south-east. On plo.- 

 ting the " find places " of the recaptured birds on a 

 map, the course of their long journey from Easi 

 or North Prussia, where they were ringed, could 

 be traced out with beautiful regularity to east and 

 south. One w^as returned from Poland, one each from 

 Damascus, Acco (in Palestine), and Alexandria; one. 

 snared by a native, from Fittrisee, in Central Nori! 

 Africa; one from Rosseres, on the Blue Nile; oi^ 

 out of a flock from Fort Jameson, in Rhodesia; on. 

 from the Kalahari desert, 8600 km. from its home, 

 killed for food by a Bushman, who, seeing the ring, 

 threw his prize away in terror as something uncannvf 

 and two from Basutoland, in southernmost Africa, 

 which were nine months old, and had travelled 9600 km. 

 from their birthplace. The dated rings proved also 

 that storks return from between one to three years 

 after leaving the nest to within a distance of 'their 

 natal district of from 6 to 94 km. 



The recapture of certain ringed swallows in the 

 nest in which they were born a year after leaving it 

 raises, by the way, the interesting question : If a 

 young bird of the previous year returns to its actual 

 nursery, where do its parents nest? This system of 

 marking the old and young of migrating species will 

 unquestionably go far to provide data for solving the 

 great mystery of bird-life; but it is essential that'it ba 

 extended to the northern regions of America and Asia ; 

 and be instituted not only there, but in the middle 

 and at the southern extremity of the journey — • 

 in Central Africa, in South America, in South China, 

 and in Australasia — a work in which ornitholo- 

 gists, travellers, civil servants, and military officers 

 in these regions could render very important as- 

 sistance. Nor must the marking be confined to large 

 birds. Passerines, because less conspicuous, and be- 

 cause they are captured in large numbers for food, for 

 cage-birds and as agricultural pests, should be ringed 

 in all holarctic regions in vast numbers while in the 

 nest. The establishment of new observatories in these 

 distant regions of the globe is also a matter of urgency 

 which should be seriously dealt with by the next Or- 

 nithological Congress. Chance and happy circumstance 

 will doubtless in time reward such efforts, and return to 

 the expectant ornithologist answers from out of the 

 empyrean to his numerous queries, and will yet, we 

 trust, reveal to him the causa causans of the periodical 

 restlessness that impels the novice-bird to start and [1 

 guides it on its long, dangeroiis, often fatal, but 

 hitherto untraversed route to winter quarters of which 

 it has no previous knowledge. 



(2) The second book on our list is, we fear, rather 

 an apple of Sodom, fair on the outside, but, within, 

 ashes — of gunpowder. It deals with birds marked for 

 verv different purpose from those of Rossitten. It is 

 chiefly made up of contributions by Mr. Harold Smith, 

 reprinted from a paper called Tropical Life, of whicli 

 he is editor, and from the Titnes, by various corre- 

 spondents, to defend those engaged in the plume trade 

 in the tropics from, as is suggested, attacks behind 

 their backs and in their absence by those "bigoted 

 members of society," " well meaning but badly in- 

 formed agitators," and "egotistical humanitarians," 

 who are urging the Government to legislate to prevent 

 the indiscriminate slaughter of ''plumage birds now 



