Ci)e i&utiubon §3)Qtittit8 



" You cannot with a scalpel find the poet's soul, 

 Nor yet the wild bird' s song." 



Edited by Mrs. Mabel Osgood Wright (President of the Audubon Society of the State of 

 Connecticut), Fairfield, Conn., to whom all communications relating to the work of the Audubon 

 and other Bird Protective Societies should be addressed. Reports, etc., designed for this department 

 should be sent at least one month prior to the date of publication. 



After Legal Protection, What? 



It is recognized that giving the bird legal 

 protection against unnecessary death is the 

 first step toward establishing its citizenship 

 in the commonwealth, and it is equally 

 well understood that the judicious reading 

 and enforcement of the law is not to be 

 merely the work of a few years but the 

 duty of successive generations. Moreover, 

 if legal protection was a deed accomplished, 

 instead of an uneven and local "declaration 

 of intentions," so to speak, it would not be 

 sufficient to give the freedom of the land ; 

 the opportunity for establishing the home 

 and earning a living must be offered as it 

 would be to human colonists coming to a 

 region of questionable hospitality. 



The liberty to come and starve in a tree- 

 less, arid region of destroyed forests and 

 dwindling watercourses is of little avail in 

 restoring birds to haunts so entirely trans- 

 formed; protection, food and shelter must 

 be the invitation. 



I put shelter first, for given proper, i. e., 

 natural shelter of tree, bush, hayrick, the 

 bird will seldom fail of eking out a living, 

 except in the four or five months that ice 

 locks the storehouses and granaries of bark 

 and seeding weeds and wild grass lands. 

 In many cases the very means of shelter in 

 themselves offer a food supply, like the red 

 cedars by their berries, the spruces by their 

 cones, and the heavily matted compositse, 

 by roadsides and field corners, by their seeds. 

 The feast that seeded sunflowers, zinnias, 

 asters and marigolds set for the birds of 

 the garden in autumn and winter is spread 

 freely along the highways of the migrants, 

 if only the purblind farmer can be made to 

 withhold his stub-scythe from the autumnal 

 massacre of the beautiful. 



Shelter is the bird's first necessity at all 

 periods of his life. Before birth shelter 

 for the nest and unhatched egg, then pro- 

 tective feather colors to shield the bird until 

 its pinions can bear it to safety. Next 

 woodland shelter for the period of the molt, 

 then shelter of night, foliage or dusky 

 traveling cloak for the southern migration. 



In a state of nature, when the succession 

 of growth and decay marched in the simple 

 path of purposeful evolution, when the 

 crumbling tree offered its sheltering hollow, 

 the mature tree its stalwart branches, and 

 the sapling its close, low-growing verdure 

 all went well, but now man must work out 

 the penalty for man's stupidity, and if he 

 would restore the birds not only plant trees, 

 but see to it that he plants the trees of the 

 birds' choice, not his own. 



In the forestry now being practiced in this 

 country, as well as in the somewhat scatter- 

 ing Arbor Day planting, the matter of va- 

 riety and individual fitness should have more 

 attention. When cleared woodland is to 

 be replanted, or a naked watercourse to be 

 recovered, it is always best to replace the 

 former inhabitants as far as possible, but 

 where the planting is of a bare and newly 

 surveyed suburban town, the difficulties are 

 great and the choice of trees will be in a 

 measure an index to the future bird popula- 

 tion. If one may not expect grapes of 

 thorns, or figs of thistles, neither can one 

 have Baltimore Orioles in stiff young maples, 

 Catbirds in elms, or Bluebirds, Nuthatches 

 and Chickadees nesting in new apple trees 

 with awful whitewashed trunks. 



If you would consider tree-planting from 

 the bird standpoint, make a list of a dozen 

 or fifteen of the birds that were once the 

 common inhabitants of your village, or gar- 

 den and its neighboring byway, and study 



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