Part I] REPORT OF STATE ORNITHOLOGIST. 81 



James Buckland of London, to whose well-directed efforts in 

 agitating the matter this interdiction was mainly due, writes 

 me that there is good reason to believe that after the war it 

 will be made permanent. If England will thus follow the lead 

 of the United States, a long step will have been taken toward 

 the destruction of a traffic which tends to the extermination of 

 many of the rarer and more beautiful birds of the world. Un- 

 doubtedly ways and means will be found to evade the enforce- 

 ment of this prohibition. Feathers have been smuggled into 

 the United States notwithstanding the law forbidding their im- 

 portation, but the traffic is now illegal, and most of it can be 

 prevented if the authorities are vigilant. 



Field Work of the Year. 



For various reasons much work in the field was required in 

 1917. 



Bird Days. 



The Board of Agriculture joined with the Massachusetts 

 State Grange Patrons of Husbandry and the Massachusetts 

 Audubon Society in celebrating bird field days at Norton on 

 May 5, at Amherst on May 19 and at Dudley on June 12. At all 

 these meetings there were exhibitions of bird houses and feed- 

 ing appliances and addresses on pertinent subjects. There were 

 prize contests open to children and adults, and other exercises. 

 At Dudley there was a trip to the bird reservation maintained 

 on the estate of Hon. Edgar S. Hill. At Amherst the exercises 

 were held at the Massachusetts Agricultural College, where 

 there was an address by President Butterfield in the afternoon, 

 and some excellent moving pictures from the National Associa- 

 tion of Audubon Societies, exhibited by Rev. Herbert K. Job. 

 These meetings, which have now been held for three years in 

 various parts of the State, continue to create popular interest. 



The Heath Hen. 



The great fire that swept the heath hen reservation on 



Martha's Vineyard in May, 1916, menaced the existence of the 



species. Just previous to that time I had completed a census 



of the birds, and was satisfied that there were at least 800 on 



