:PA:RT n. 



REPORT ON CONDITIONS ON LAYSAN, WITH RECOMMENDATIONS 

 FOR PROTECTING THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS RESERVATION. 



By WM. ALANSON Tlfiy^v "V\ 



Professor of Zoology in the College of Hawaii. 



INTRODUCTION. 



On the occasion of my recent visit to Laysan Island during the week 

 from April 24 to 30, 1911, which was made on board the U. S. reve- 

 nue cutter Thetis, in company with a party from the State University 

 of Iowa who were making the journey to the island to secure 

 material and background studies for a large group to be assembled 

 at that institution, I was able to study conditions as I found them 

 in this wonderful bird colony and compare them with conditions 

 existing there at the time of my former visit in April, 1903. 



The slaughter of tens of thousands of birds by the party of feather 

 and wing hunters and the depredations now being wrought by the 

 rabbits and guinea pigs that have been introduced on the island make 

 it important, if this colony is to be saved from extermination, that 

 every effort to this end be made, both by the Federal Government 

 and by the Territory of Hawaii. It will be necessary (1) to have 

 the islands in the Leeward chain of the Hawaiian group properly 

 patrolled and protected; (2) to take steps to exterminate or reduce 

 the rabbits on Laysan Island; (3) to distribute the peculiar land birds 

 on Laysan to other islands of the chain in order to prevent their 

 early extermination; (4) to introduce the important economic species 

 on the inhabited islands of the group ; (5) to plant on Laysan and the 

 other islands certain trees and shrubs that will flourish on them; 

 (6) to develop this valuable possession of the Territory of Hawaii as 

 the great natural parks are developed elsewhere as a natural breed- 

 ing preserve for wild birds. Since the birds are all perfectly fearless, 

 the reservation may be visited at any season under proper regula- 

 tions, thus affording to the Hawaiian Islands a unique opportunity 

 to preserve this great colony in a flourishing condition and at the same 

 time utilize the chain of otherwise unimportant and unproductive 

 islands, over a thousand miles in length, as a cruising and camping 

 park and fishing ground, the like of which is found nowhere else in the 

 world. 



