Reports of Field Agents 341 



REPORTS OF FIELD AGENTS 



REPORT OF EDWARD HOWE FORBUSH 



Owing to the pressure of legislative work in New England, during the past 

 year, and to lack of financial support, the educational work done by your agent 

 in this territory has been somewhat less than heretofore. Throughout the 

 spring, legislative matters required so much attention that many engagements 

 to lecture were of necessity refused. However, thirty lectures were given during 

 the year; the audiences aggregating about 7,500 people. The series of articles 

 heretofore published monthly in about one hundred different newspapers 

 has been discontinued for the present, for want of means to pay for the type- 

 writing, postage, etc., but during the year your agent has been devoting all 

 his spare time to the History of Game Birds, Shore Birds and Wild Fowl, 

 which will be published by the Massachusetts State Board of Agriculture. 

 That work deals with the former abundance of these birds, their decrease and 

 its causes, and the means of conserving them. It will form an illustrated 

 volume of about five hundred pages, and will probably be available for dis- 

 tribution about the time that this report reaches the public. It may be obtained 

 of Hon. J. Lewis Ellsworth, Secretary State Board of Agriculture, 136 State 

 House, Boston, Mass. Let us hope that this work will help to awaken the 

 people of New England to the necessity of more fully protecting many of the 

 birds now known as game, and that it will do something toward inducing 

 people to propagate certain species. Perhaps the work of obtaining sustain- 

 ing members and contributors to the work of the National Association, may 

 properly be considered educational. It certainly helps. The work that your 

 agent has undertaken along these lines has not been an unlimited success. The 

 Rev. Herbert K. Job, whose appointment as State Ornithologist of Con- 

 necticut was advocated by the National Association in igio, has been doing 

 excellent educational work through the newspapers, and in many other ways. 



Most of the work of the past year in New England necessarily has been 

 devoted to legislation. Every legislature in the New England states has been 

 in session, and the work of advocating legislation for the protection of "wild 

 birds and animals," and of opposing legislation inimical to their protection, 

 began in Vermont early in October, 19 10, and continued until it closed in 

 Connecticut, late in September, 191 1, when the General Assembly of Con- 

 necticut, of the year 191 1, dissolved. Nearly a thousand bills relating to 

 birds, game and fish, were presented to these six legislatures, a large part of 

 which aimed to remove some protection now accorded, or to secure special 

 privileges for certain interests. In addition to these, there were bills relating 

 to the use of firearms, bills granting special privileges on public preserves, 

 etc. The privilege-seekers sometimes avoid the regular channels, in pressing 



