502 BOARD OF AGRKTTLTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



with the few survivors, producing a .smaller but less hardy 

 race, which cannot withstand severe weather. 



The present intjuiry has brought unsought testimony from 

 Cape Cod to the Connecticut valley that birds of all kinds 

 have been growing less numerous for years, because of the 

 inroads made on their numbers by sportsmen and gunners of 

 all degrees, from the city sportsman with his modern guns 

 and high-bred dogs to the poor foreigner with his hired gun 

 and the small boy with his " air rifle." Now, if ever, there 

 should be a check put on this excessive destruction of birds, 

 that seems to be growing with the increasing population 

 and the manufacture of firearms ; for, if birds are not now 

 protected and given opportunities to breed unmolested, an 

 increase of insects is sure to come. Countless thousands of 

 birds are killed by gunners every winter in the southern 

 States, and our only hope for the preservation of lairds is to 

 protect them in their northern homes.* 



A List of Cokrespondents who furnished Information in 

 Response to the Circular Letter of July 10, 1903. 



Massachusetts. 



J. A. Clark, Easthani. N. B. Stone, Medway. 



W. F. Hammond, ^lashpee. JolmKin<;sbnry Bnrgess, Dedham. 



David Nye, Bourne. Walter B. Randall, Newton. 



Wm. C. Winter, Mansfield. A. 1). Wheeler, Hyde Park. 



Owen Durfee, Fall River. Frank A. Bates, Braintree. 



F. H. Mosher, Dartmouth. Geo. L. L. Allen, Medfield. 



H. W. Tinkham, Swansea. Eben Webster, Haverhill. 



H. M. Thompson, Easton. B. P. Pike, Topsfield. 



James H. Sullivan, Westport. N. B. Douglas, Shei'born. 



Isaac Alger, Attleborough. W. S. Kennedy, Belmont. 



J. II. Bourne, Marshfield. Samuel S. Symmes, Winchester. 



William R. Lord, Rockland. Ernest Harold Baynes, Stoneham. 



Outram Bangs, Warelium. ^Valter Steele, Stoneliam. 



Isabel B. Holbrook, Rockland. C. B. Lyman, Southaniptt)n. 



Flavel S.Thomas, M.D., Hanson. Harold Bowditch, Boston. 



Charles F. Curtis, Stoughton. A. A. Smith, Colrain. 



Marcus M. Porter, Stoughton. N. !>. Baker, Savoy. 



C. M. Allen, Franklin. Wm. H. Snow, Becket. 



* A bulletin on the means of protecting and attracting birds is now in process 

 «)f publication by tlio Hatch Experiment Station of the Massacliusetts Agricul- 

 tural College. 



