98 



Bird - Lore 



thing to do, and that was for the National 

 Association and the State Audubon Societies 

 and the real sportsmen of the country to 

 rally to the work of saving the Survey. 



The first week after the matter was dis- 

 covered was a busy time at the Association 

 headquarters. The mails weie entirely too 

 slow, and whole letters were sent by wire to 

 all parts of the country, asking for help in 

 this emergency. Our lecturers and organ- 

 izers were taken from their legitimate work 

 and were detailed to help save the Biological 

 Survey. The importance of this Survey to 

 the Association can hardly be realized, 

 unless one is actively connected with the 

 work at headquarters. To the Biological 

 Survey we turn for all data regarding the 

 food habits of birds and their relations to 

 agriculture that are used, and in addition, 

 whenever the Association is advocating a 

 legislative bill relating to game or non- 

 game birds, the Bureau of Biological Survey 

 is appealed to for an expert to appear at 

 hearings. To the Bureau also we turn for 

 publications, relative to birds and game, 

 for distribution to help in the educational 

 <;ampaign the Association is always carry- 

 ing on. 



Who instigated the outrageous attack on 

 the Bureau of Biological Survey is hard to 

 discover, but when we recall the work done 

 by the members of the House Agricultural 

 Committee in 1906, in the matter of the 

 meat-packing bill, it suggests the thought 

 that the same interests, through the same 

 channels, sought to cripple the work of 

 game protection and to remove a factor that 

 is doing so much to stop the sale and cold 

 storage of game. 



The Senate of the United States insisted 

 that the Survey be continued, and forced the 

 House into a compliance with its wishes; 

 thus reflecting the wishes of every person in 

 the United States interested in the preserva- 

 tion of its wild life. 



The Bureau of Biological Survey was 

 continued with the same meager appropria- 

 tion that it had last year. This appropria- 

 tion is so small that it does not permit the 

 Bureau to carry on its valuable work with a 

 force of scientists that it should be able to 

 employ. 



The National Association and the real 

 sportsmen of the country are struggling at 

 the present time with the subject of the 

 preservation of the water game-birds of the 

 country, and the Survey is unable to give 

 us any data as yet regarding the food habits 

 of this class of birds, simply because they 

 have never yet been in a position to make 

 these important investigations. It is ex- 

 tremely desirable and vitally important that 

 the food of the shoal water-ducks and the 

 shore-birds of the country should be de- 

 termined at once; there is little doubt but 

 that it will be discovered that these two 

 classes of birds destroy enormous numbers 

 of noxious insects whose larval stages are 

 passed in water, but the proofs are needed. 



Maine —Our representative in Maine, 

 Mr. Arthur H. Norton, some time since 

 sent us a copy of a petition that had been 

 sent to the legislature of his state by eighty- 

 three persons, residents in the township of 

 Lubec, and another petition from nineteen 

 persons in the township of Trescott, both of 

 which towns are in Washington county, in 

 the extreme eastern part of the state. The 

 petition prayed for an amendment to Section 

 8 of Chapter 32 of the Revised Statutes by 

 adding after the word "caught" in the 

 fourth line the words "but this shall not 

 apply to the shooting of Gulls by the owners 

 of land or those having lawful possession 

 thereof in the towns of Lubec and Trescott 

 and Whiting in Washington county, while 

 said Gulls are in the act of taking or menac- 

 ing to take fish exposed for drying purposes 

 or fish refuse or pumice spread upon said 

 land for manure or fertilizer." 



This Association and its predecessor, the 

 Thayer Fund, spent several thousands of 

 dollars in protecting the Gulls of Maine. 

 There is no part of the United States at the 

 present time where Gulls are not considered 

 as non-game birds of beneficial character 

 and are not protected by the model law. 



There was but one thing to do, which was 

 to send an ornithologist to make an investi- 

 gation of the damage claimed to have been 

 done by the Gulls and also to investigate the 

 character of the persons who petitioned. 

 The Honorable James Carroll Mead was 



