Vol. XV-| n ^ J 



,x jj J Corresponaetice. >jh 



thcv arc there forced to live, places tliein in a very ciiftcreiU environment 

 from that of the rest of their kind. The importance of a careful histori- 

 cal record of a case like this can scarcely be estimated; and are ornitholo- 

 gists and intellii^ent bird protectors to be reckoned as one with market 

 hunters and idle gunners in destroying the opportunities for obtaining 

 such data? 



That the Muskeget environment is sullicientiy potent to produce a 

 recognizable local race of the Short-eared Owl is shown hy the former 

 existence on the island of such a form. In his 'Birds of Eastern North 

 America' (iSSi), Mr. C. J. Majnard says (p. 264): "I had an excellent 

 opportunity of studying the habits of these Owls when camping .... on 



the island of Muskegat during the early part of July, 1S70 During 



the first few hours of our visit, we discovered two or three huge nests 

 placed in the tops of this dwarfed shrubbery [beach plum bushes], but 

 could not, at first, make out to what birds they belonged. The island 

 was swarming with three species of Terns, and, after a time, we saw a 

 cloud of these birds gathering around some object which was suspended 

 in air, but the Terns were so numerous that we could not see what it was 

 engaged their attention until it moved onward, when we saw that it was a 

 Short-eared Owl. We afterwards found that there was quite a colonv of 

 them on the place ; in fact, we secured four or five specimens." On 

 page 263, Mr. Maynard says that these specimens are so bleached as to 

 appear nearly white in the distance. Of course, at so early a period in 

 the summer, this bleaching could hardly have been due to a mechanically 

 abraded condition of the .plumage, and indeed Mr. Maynard has personally 

 assured me that such was not the case, but that the birds i-epresented a 

 pale, resident race. This race has long since been exterminated. During 

 my three visits to Muskeget in 1892 and 1893, I searched carefullv, but 

 unsuccessfully, for the birds, and am confident that I should have found 

 them were they then on the island. 



While the Owls unquestionably destroy many Terns, the latter are now 

 so well re-established on Muskeget that a colonj' of the former would be 

 no more a menace to their welfare than it was thirty years ago ; and by 

 helping to offer direct historical proof of the rapidity at which modifica- 

 tion may progress under natural conditions, the Terns would be fulfilling 

 a more important end than in gladdening the eye of the visitor to Mus- 

 keget, and the heart of the reader of Mr. Mackay's progress report. 



Muskeget is probably only one among hundreds of natural biological 

 laboratories. Ornithologists can do valuable work in preserving the 

 natural conditions in such places ; but a great danger is that, under the 

 influence of lesthetic and sentimental considerations, bird protection will 

 become so one-sided as to lose its scientific value. 



\try truly ^yours, 



Gerrit S. Miller, [r. 

 Peterboro. JVetu I'ork. 



