No. 123.] DIVISION OF ORNITHOLOGY. 85 



is historic ground, as the place on which the first summer school 

 of natural history in Massachusetts was estabHshed in 1873 by 

 Louis Agassiz. In this school several of the most famous 

 naturalists of the United States received from the master early 

 training in zoology. This island should be held in perpetuity 

 as a bird reservation by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. 



Bird Banding. 



There is no field of endeavor which now offers greater possi- 

 bilities for the discovery of facts in ornithology than that of 

 banding birds. In two issues of the notes sent out semi- 

 monthly to the hundreds of observers who report to this Di- 

 vision, attention was called to the importance of the work 

 of bird banding. On July 16 Mr. S. Prentiss Baldwin of 

 Cleveland, Ohio, sent me a letter saying that he would be in 

 Massachusetts in August, and that he hoped to meet any 

 Massachusetts people who were interested in such work. Mr. 

 Baldwin is the originator of the plan of trapping birds for 

 banding purposes. His work in Ohio and Georgia has resulted 

 in the discovery of so much new information about birds that 

 the Bureau of Biological Survey of the Department of Agri- 

 culture at Washington has taken up bird banding, and will 

 furnish bands and trapping permits to suitable persons who 

 make application for them. 



Mr. Laurence B. Fletcher of Brookline, Massachusetts, one 

 of our divisional observers, has taken an active interest in or- 

 ganizing a bird-banding campaign. He arranged in August for 

 a meeting in the lecture room of the Boston Society of Natural 

 History, which was addressed by Mr. Baldwin. Much interest 

 was shown by those present. Mr. Fletcher has undertaken, 

 with characteristic energy and enthusiasm, and at his own ex- 

 pense, to organize a New England Bird Banding Association. 

 A large number of our observers and others have applied for 

 membership, and Mr. Fletcher has already secured from the 

 Biological Survey and the Massachusetts Department of Con- 

 servation trapping permits for numerous applicants. 



The work of banding can be done without injury to the 

 birds, and if many people distributed over a wide region can 



