IOWA ORNITHOLOGIST. 



39 



only feasible one — at least in my 

 mind — it now employed by a few 

 of the states, paying a bounty on 

 the pests. 



To prevent or rather change 

 the fashion for wearing birds, 

 some advocate legislative action 

 against hats trimmed with feath- 

 ers. It is a question in my mind 

 whether such a course would 

 prove feasible, for the ladies-have 

 as much right to use the birds 

 that way as some of our collect- 

 ors have to hoard them awa}/ in 

 their cabinets. It is quite gen- 

 erally agreed that the only way 

 is to appeal to the better nature 

 of the ladies and trust them to 

 put away the fashion and take 

 up something more in keeping 

 with the close of the nineteenth 

 century. Many ways are sug- 

 gested for bringing the subject 

 before the public. One is by 

 placing placards in street cars, 

 another is by distributing slips in 

 churches, on which are printed a 

 a few statistics showing the num- 

 ber of birds that it takes to sup- 

 ply the demand, etc. 



The next and most difficult 

 question to solve is how to con- 

 vince the farmer that he is injur- 

 ing himself every time he kills an 

 owl or robin or the other birds 

 that he probably believes to be 

 his enemies. Now we all know 



that there are some "black sheep" 

 among the birds. It seems to me 

 that one of the objects of our 

 association is to point out to the 

 farmer just which these "black 

 sheep" are. It is perfectly nat- 

 ural and right for a man to pro. 

 tect his property, and even if he 

 knows that many of the raptores 

 are beneficial, he does not like to 

 have them take his poultry. I 

 do not know how to prevent the 

 hawks from taking toll for their 

 work, but if the farmers would 

 build respectable chicken-coops, 

 they would not be troubled with 

 owls, tor they being nocturnal are 

 not out until the chickeiis have 

 gone to roost and it is only the 

 farmer who allows his poultry to 

 sleep in trees that suffers, and we 

 might say in the words of the 

 small boy, "It's just good enough 

 for him." 



Finally, I would say that the 

 only way to preserve our birds is 

 to present facts to the people 

 showing them the true character 

 of each bird. They can then 

 distinguish how the birds 

 should be treated, protecting 

 their friends and destroying their 

 enemies. 



Thus by awakening the farmer 

 to his own interests, securing 

 needful laws, and with a never- 

 ceasing warfare against Lhe 



