90 Bird - Lore 



mense numbers and indescribable confusion, to be roasted alive, and gathered 

 up dead next day from heaps two feet deep." 



On the migrations also they suffered. Every firearm, club, or implement, 

 was pressed into service when they appeared. Every one took a vacation. 

 The sportsmen shot them for fun; Indians and settlers sought them as fresh 

 food; and the planters killed them to protect his crops. If they fed on the 

 cultivated fields, it meant famine to the early colonists; if they foraged in 

 the wilds, they left no mast nor food for the hogs and resident wild animals. 

 Of course, a favorite weapon of offense was the old fowling-piece, and count- 

 less are the old stories of quarries ranging from ten to one hundred and thirty- 

 two secured at one shot. That huntsman who could not take from two hundred 

 to four hundred in a half day was poor indeed. When the Pigeons were flying, 

 it was an easy matter to knock down bagfuls by swinging a long pole or oar 

 to the right and to the left. Neither was it impossible to bring them down by 

 throwing sticks into the flocks. One writer told of a man who was enveloped 

 in a low-flying flock. To save his eyes, he had to fall on his face until they had 

 passed. Another asserted that when two columns, moving in opposite direc- 

 tions, encountered each other, many usually fell to the ground stunned. 

 Along the New England coast, they were caught on the marshes by means of 

 live decoys. In other parts, stuffed birds were used to attract passing flocks. 

 Many a man boasted of ten, twenty-five, or thirty dozens of Pigeons caught 

 in a snare at one time. One writer claimed that cuming seed or its oil was 

 found by experience the best lure to induce the Pigeons to these nets. Par- 

 ticularly favorable for netting were the salt springs, at which the netters 

 took as many as 800 to 1,500 or 1,600 at once in one net. These Pigeon traps 

 were various in form and construction. One was made of nets 20 x 15 feet 

 stretched on a frame. This was propped up by a pole eight feet long. When 

 the birds entered under it, a boy or man concealed by a fence withdrew the 

 prop with a string attached to it, and the falling net enmeshed the birds. 

 To the nets they were also allured by what we call tame wild pigeons, made 

 blind, and fastened to a long string. His short flights and his repeated calls 

 never fail to bring them down. Every farmer has a tame wild pigeon in a 

 cage, at his door, all the year around, in order to be ready whenever the sea- 

 son comes for catching them" (Crevecceur, 1783). 



Enemies and Mishaps. — Their enemies were legion. Wolves, foxes, and 

 many other beasts frequented their roosts; birds of prey sought them alive 

 or feasted on their dead bodies, both at the roosts, and over lakes. Mishaps 

 overtook them on land and sea. On the land, storms rarely overwhelmed 

 them. Over our Great Lakes, sometimes entire flocks were overtaken by severe 

 tempests, forced to alight, and consequently drowned. Many times when they 

 reached the shore safely from a hard flight, they were so fatigued as to fall 

 an easy prey to man. For example, a whole British encampment in the Revolu- 

 tionary War thus feasted for one day on Pigeons which had just flown across 



