PREFACE. vii 



are still extant, and indicates how they may be conserved and 

 how depleted areas may be restocked with certain species. 



It was my intention before beginning the work to under- 

 take an investigation of the food of wild-fowl and shore birds, 

 but as Mr. W. L. McAtee of the Bureau of Biological Survey 

 of the United States Department of Agriculture was then 

 engaged in a similar quest, and hoped to have the results 

 published, I arranged with him to make use of his publication, 

 and give credit to the Survey. Unfortunately, very little of 

 the results of Mr. McAtee's work have been published, and 

 this volume necessarily goes to press with but a small part 

 of them. For this reason the observations on the food of 

 these birds have not been brought down to date. 



Many of Mr. Beecroft's drawings, from which the line 

 cuts of the birds were made, have been corrected, and some 

 of them have been largely redrawn by myself, with the assist- 

 ance of Miss Annie E. Chase. Miss Chase also made the 

 drawing of the Whooping Crane, the plate of which faces 

 page 477. Mr. Beecroft was handicapped in his work by 

 having no opportunity to make studies from the living birds, 

 and by being obliged to draw his inspiration from skins, 

 stuffed specimens, photographs and the illustrations of 

 others. The drawings for the cuts of the Wood Duck, the 

 Mallard and the Red Phalarope are my own; also the draw- 

 ings for the cuts on pages 40, 49, 59, 70, 111, 147, 202, 224, 

 228, 230, 271, 277, 326, 331 and 417 (all after C. B. Cory), and 

 the figures on pages 133 and 147. All concerned in the prep- 

 aration of the drawings must acknowledge their indebted- 

 ness to many artists from the time of Audubon to the present 

 day, and particularly to Mr. Louis Agassiz Fuertes, whose 

 excellent drawings as figured in Eaton's Birds of New York, 

 gave many suggestions. The faults of the illustrations are 

 obvious, but every effort has been made to secure such rep- 

 resentations of form, proportion and markings as to make 

 the species recognizable. It was my intention to have the 

 birds of each family represented in Part I figured in proper 

 proportion one to the other, — to have the Sandpipers, for ex- 

 ample, of such relative size as to suggest the differences in 



