The Bird Department 



By a. a. Ai^i^en, Ph.D. 

 Assistant Professor of Ornithology, Cornell University 



CONSERVING THE WATERFOWL 



FOR over a month now, sportsmen throughout 

 most of the country have been enjoying the hunt- 

 ing of waterfowl. The frosts in the north and 

 the falling temperature have driven them southward in 

 ever-increasing numbers and, on favorable days, countless 

 flocks have filled the air on their way to better feeding 

 grounds in the south. Many have stopped in passing. 

 lured by calls of their fellows or by decoys sporting about 

 in attractive ponds and marshes, and many have ap- 

 peared on the tables of successful gunners as the most 

 tempting item on the menu. For the ducks and geese 

 are far from extinct. In spite of the fact that their 

 present numbers represent but a small fraction of the 

 innumerable hordes that formerly swept over the country 

 twice a year, they still visit us in numbers sufficient to be 

 of value in the nation's food supply and to make the 

 hunting of them a legitimate and successful sport. They 

 have withstood the persecution of unrestricted shooting 

 better than any other game and, with the laws that are 

 now in force and the resting spots that have been granted 

 them, they are likely to hold their own unless some un- 

 thinking legislature should see fit to change the statutes. 



Fifty years ago the ducks received no protection at all. 

 The supply was thought inexhaustible and they were 

 hunted from the time they appeared in the fall until they 

 left again in the spring, and in states where they nested 

 they were shot by unprincipled gunners even during the 

 breeding season. As they became more and more wary, 

 various devices were contrived to make the killing of 

 them easier. "Big guns" with a range far greater than 

 that of ordinary guns were fastened in the bows of skiiifs 

 and in some places cannon, loaded with several pounds 

 of shot, were trained upon the waters and the ducks 

 baited within range by scattering grain. Even at night 

 there was no respite, for searchlights were thrown upon 

 their roosting beds and murderous volleys poured upon 

 them. This was not sport, but it supplied the tremendous 

 demand for them in the market. 



When you consider, in addition to this barbarous 

 slaughter, the fact that most of the United States breed- 

 ing grounds in northern Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin and 

 Minnesota were rapidly becoming wheat fields and gar- 

 dens, it is not surprising that the decrease in their num- 

 bers soon became appalling, and that the various states 

 began to pass laws restricting the shooting, laws that 

 have culminated in the passage of the Weeks-McLean 

 Bill, which gives the Federal Government jurisdiction 

 over all migratory birds, including the waterfowl. 



THE passage of this bill was one of the greatest 

 steps which the game conservation movement 

 has ever taken and already, though it has been 

 in force but two years, reports from all parts of the 

 country tell of an unprecedented increase in the numbers 

 of our migratory birds. Enemies of conservation, never- 

 theless, have attempted to interfere with its usefulness 

 by cutting the appropriation for enforcing it and have 

 even attacked its constitutionality. During the past 

 month, in fact, a test case has been brought before the 

 Supreme Court of the United States to determine this 

 point once and for all. If for any reason it should be 

 found to be unconstitutional, let us earnestly hope that 

 the difficulty can soon be rectified so that the protection 

 which the present law affords will not be removed and 

 so that we may continue to reap the benefits which we 

 are already deriving from it. 



One of the chief reasons for the great increase in the 

 numbers of migratory birds following the enforcement 

 of this law has undoubtedly been the clause prohibiting 

 all spring shooting, so that birds that would ordinarily 

 be killed in many states on their way to their breeding 

 grounds now return in the fall with their young, causing, 

 in some places, nearly 100 per cent increase. 



The stopping of all night shooting is another very 

 desirable feature of the law, for it gives the birds a 

 chance to feed undisturbed after sunset and before 

 dawn. If it could have included also a measure pro- 

 hibiting the sale of game anywhere in the United States, 

 the future of the waterfowl would have been assured. 

 This, however, seems to be a state right and up to this 

 time only seventeen states have availed themselves of the 

 privilege of thus conserving our game for the common 

 good of all. As Dr. Hornaday has observed, "The de- 

 struction of game birds by sportsmen is trifling in com- 

 parison with the slaughter by commerce," and this is 

 obviously true when we consider the facts that a single 

 market-hunter in the South has been known to kill nearly 

 4.500 ducks in a single winter and that each year over 

 150,000 waterfowl were formerly sold in the New York 

 markets. 



In this connection there is a clause in the game laws 

 of most states limiting the number of ducks that may 

 be killed in a day by each hunter. The number, however, 

 i.s in all cases far too generous for the best interests of 

 conservation. Those of New York, for example, noted 

 for their saneness, allow each hunter to kill twenty-five 

 every day of the season, if possible. This limit was 

 designated in the days of the market-hunter and for 



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