372 NORTH A^n:i!i('AX birds. 



of tri'ps, tho Wild Pijicon is rciniirkalile fur its case and grace. It walks on 

 the ,Lcr(mnd and also un the linili.s of trees with an ca.sy, j;raceful motion, 

 frecmently jcrkinji; its tail and moving its neck backward and forward. 



]\lr. Aiidulion states tliat in Kentucky lie lias repeatedly visited one of 

 the remarkable ruosting-places tu wliich these birds resort at night. This 

 one was on the banks of (ireen IJiver, and to this jdace the birds came every 

 night at sunset arriving from all direction.s, some of them from the dis- 

 tance of several hundred miles, as was conjectured from certain oUservations. 

 This roost was in a jjortion of the forest where the trees were of great mag- 

 nitude. It was more tlian forty miles in length, and averaged three in 

 breadth, it had been occupied as a roost about a fortnight when he visited 

 it. Their dung was several inches deep on the ground, covering the whole 

 extent of the roost ing-j dace. .Many trees, two feet in diameter, had been 

 broken down l)y their weight, as well as many branches of the largest and 

 tallest trees. The forest seemed as if it had been swept by a tornado. 

 Everything gave evidence that the nundier of ])irds resorting to that part 

 of tlui forest must lie immense. A large number of persons collected before 

 sunset to destroy them, ])rovi(le(l with torches of pine-knots, and armed 

 with long ])oles and guns. The Tigcjons began to collect after sun.set, 

 their ajijiroach prccctled, even when they were at a distance, by a noise 

 like that of a hard gale at sea souniling in the rigging of a acsscI. As 

 the birds passed over him, they created a strong current of air. The 

 birds arrived by thousands, fires were lighted, and the work of destruc- 

 tion conniienccd. ^lany were knijckcd down by the ])ole-men. In many 

 ca.ses they collected in such s(diil masses on the branches that several of 

 their perches gave way and fell to the ground, in this way destroying hun- 

 dreds of the l)irds beneath them. It was a scene of great confusion and 

 contiinied until past midnight, the Pigeons still continuing to arrive. The 

 sound made by the birds at the roost could be heard at the distance of three 

 miles. Ah day ajjiiroached, the noise in some measure subsided ; and long 

 before objects \vere distinguishable the Pigeons began to move off, and before 

 dayliglit all that were able to fly had disappeared. TJie dead and wounded 

 liirds were then collected and piled into heaps by those who had assembled 

 for the pin'])ose. 



Though for the most ])art living, moving, and feeding together in large 

 companies, the Wild Pigeon mates in ]iairs for purposes of breeding. They 

 have several broods in the season, and commence nesting very early in 

 the spring, the time being considerably affected by the amount of food. 

 In the sjtring of 1849 an innn(!nse number of these birds collected on Fays- 

 ton Mountain, near Montpelier, Vt., although at the time of their coming 

 the weather was very cold and the ground covered with snow. There 

 they seemed to find a great abundance of food, berries of the mountain-ash 

 and such other fruit as they could procure, and there they remained, breed- 

 ing in great numbers, until late in the sunnuer. Tliey were still collected in 



