208 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



that is expeeted to leave for the south daring the week. Sets of 

 various famihes of birds are hung during the summer months that 

 the children may learn what birds belong to the finch family for 

 example. 



In addition to these library pictures the committee bought and 

 gave to the Belmont public schools 426 similar pictures to be used 

 as follows: every grammar school grade, from the third to the 

 eighth, inclusive, was given a set of 21 or 22 pictures of common 

 Belmont birds. These begin in the third grade with the most con- 

 spicuous and most abundant birds and gradually become less notice- 

 able and less common in the higher grades. Beginning the 8th of 

 September a picture is hung fortnightly in every grade for a period 

 of two weeks until the 20th of April, when the pictures are changed 

 every week until the close of school in June. Every bird honored by 

 an Audubon Society educational leaflet has that leaflet with its pic- 

 ture. The local committee of the Massachusetts Audubon Society 

 co-operated with this committee and gave a copy of Ralph Hoff- 

 man's " Guide to the Birds of New England and Eastern New 

 York " to every floor of the four grammar school buildings. With 

 these leaflets and books the teacher is expected to tell her class about 

 the bird Avhile its picture is on the wall, and encourage her pupils 

 to find it in the field. These pictures are arranged in such an order 

 that the child not only learns the easiest birds first, but has the pic- 

 ture before him at a time when the bird can be seen within a mile 

 of the schoolhouse. 



Extermination of Birds for the Market Demand. 



The game, egg and feather markets are fast wiping ont of 

 existence the most useful and beautiful birds of the world. 

 Mr. C. W. Beebe, who in the fall of 1911 returned from a 

 long journey in Asiatic countries, informs us that many 

 species of pheasants are nearing extinction. The wild game 

 birds of all countries are being destroyed to supply the mar- 

 kets of the world. The number of birds killed for the 

 millinery trade is beyond computation. jMr. James Buck- 

 land, of the British Museum, states that the British vice- 

 consul at Ciudad Bolivar, Venezuela, says that the quantity 

 of egret feathers exported in 1898 reached the high total of 

 2,839 kilos, and, considering that about 870 birds have to 

 be killed to produce one kilo of the smaller feathers and 

 about 215 for one kilo of the larger, the destruction of these 

 birds must be very great. Were the number of birds killed 

 equally divided between the two species, 1,538,738 birds must 

 have been killed that year. 



