1 84 



Bird - Lore 



to be repeated in the case of the Egrets. How- 

 ever, this year conditions look somewhat 

 brighter, although the news from Florida 

 continues to be discouraging. This state, 

 once the home of countless thousands of 

 Egrets and Herons, still continues to be the 

 worst slaughter-grounds for water-birds in 

 the United States, and the Florida Legislature 

 also continues to exhibit a primitive mind on 

 the subject of wild-life conservation and re- 

 fuses to establish a State Bird and Game 

 Commission to enforce its laws regarding 

 wild-life protection. 



Following is a letter from B. J. Pacetti, the 

 one United States game warden operating in 

 that state. He and J. M. Jackson, a warden 

 employed by this Association, recently vis- 

 ited a large number of places where Herons 

 and Egrets were supposed to breed in the 

 eastern part of the peninsula of Florida. 

 His report shows something of the situation 

 regarding these colonies and gives interesting 

 side-lights on the conditions under which one 

 operates in field-work in connection with 

 locating breeding-places of these birds. 



"I beg to say that I returned last night 

 from a three-day trip with .\udubon Warden 

 J. JNI. Jackson to the several Egret rookeries 

 in \^olusia County and one in the edge of 

 Brevard Comity, and am compelled to say 

 that I find a \er>- unusual condition as my 

 experience goes in these matters. 



"We visited seven well-known places 

 where Egrets have heretofore nested and 

 raised young, but I find that there is abso- 

 lutely not a bird in any of them, except the 

 one known as the Clifton Lake rookery. 

 Approximately four hundred large Egrets 

 came in there every evening to roost, but not 

 a sign of a nest or any preparation to make a 

 nest, and yet the place is co\Tred with shed- 

 ded feathers and there was a considerable 

 number of shedded plumes on the ground 

 around there. 



"On the afternoon of April i6 we got in the 

 rookery at 5.30. At that time there was not 

 a bird in sight except several Night Herons, 

 but about r. u. they began to come in and 

 from that time until it was so dark we could 

 not distinguish what birds they were, they 

 were still coming in. Even after it was en- 

 tirely dark we knew by the noise that there 

 were others coming. The next morning we 

 left camp before daylight and were in the 

 rookery just at light and the birds began to 

 leave. By the time the sun was up there was 

 not a bird in the rookery. They left as they 

 came in every direction, which proves to me 



conclusively that these birds gather to this 

 rookery from all over the county or at least 

 the southern end of it. 



"I found the birds gentle, paying but little 

 attention to us as we sat near the rookery 

 watching them, which would show they had 

 not been disturbed, but for some reason they 

 did not act to me as if they had any idea of 

 nesting for some time. 



"There was no water in the country, only 

 in the larger lakes, and every little water-hole 

 in the swamps had several Egrets feeding in it. 



"We went to what is known as Island Lake 

 rooker)^ It is four miles south of Maytown 

 and is an island in the middle of a small lake. 

 It was a sight to see the White Ibis and Little 

 Blue Herons that were in there, and which 

 were, I presume, nesting, but we did not go 

 on the island as I had no boat and could not 

 find the one that was there as it was hidden 

 in the swamp where we could not find it. 



"We then went to what is known as Buck 

 Lake in the edge of Brevard County, which 

 is quite a large lake and has an island in the 

 center of it. Here I saw a great many birds 

 of all kinds except Egrets. 



"On the morning of the igth we left camp 

 just at light and went to a point near the 

 Clifton Lake rookery and saw the birds all 

 leaving, and continued on to a rookery in 

 Hell's Half Acre country and saw but few 

 birds as it was all dried up. We then went to 

 Buzzard's Roost rookery and there found a 

 large colony of Wood Ibis nesting, as well as 

 se^■e^al big Blue Herons. We then crossed at 

 Cow Creek ford where there is always so 

 much water that it is almost impossible to 

 cross with a car. We did not find enough 

 water to put in the radiator of my car, in 

 fact it was dust}- dry. From Cow Creek we 

 went to what is known as the Prideau Lake 

 rookery and found quite a large colony of big 

 Blue Herons around there, but nothing else, 

 and this, like most other places, was dry, all 

 the water having dried up. 



"We crossed Spruce Creek Swamp twice on 

 foot and did not get wet nor could we find 

 an}- place where there was water enough to 

 drink, and as a rule the water is four feet 

 deep all over these swamps and every water 

 hole is alive with moccasin snakes of which I 

 am sure we killed fifty. 



"All these lakes that I have mentioned 

 where there are rookeries are way back in 

 Spruce Creek Swamp and are surrounded by 

 the most awful jungle of cypress and by 

 briars of all kinds, and a person going in has 

 to know the country well and then almost 

 crawl in to these places. 



"Jackson is camped at the Cow Pen Islands 

 and has a very comfortable place. It is the 

 onl}' place in the entire section where he 

 could get water as the cattlemen have a well 

 that is I So feet deep and which has very good 



