100 TEXAS NATURE OBSERVATIONS AND REMINISOENCES, 



Just at this time of writing 

 these notes, in June, the prairie 

 plains, pastures and forests, etc.. 

 are full of breeding wild doves j 

 and about the end of August the 

 main breeding season is over, 

 and they are met with only 

 sparingly afterward when they are, 

 as a rule, well protected by the 

 wild game hunter of any decency 

 about him — to shoot a dove that 

 had escaped its nest. 



Besides the elements, especially 

 storms, and the various enemies, 

 the dove eggs are apparently 

 destroyed by the socalled egg 

 sucker bird — a long slender bird, 

 of olive brown color, and I have 

 myself occosionally met a nest 

 of dove eggs where the eggs were 

 perforated and empty. This egg- 

 sucker, with its long curved and 

 sharp pointed bill is very at- 

 tractive in appearance, and some 

 time ago I endeavored to snapshot 

 one on its nest, but it is a very 

 shy bird and it flew to a nearby 

 mesquite thicket and the wild 

 persimmon trees. The nest had 

 been built on one such persimmon 

 tree, and the view of same herein 

 shows the four large eggs, which 

 were of light bluish-green color, 

 and the nest inside was 

 outhned entirely with dried up 

 mesquite leaves. Some of the 

 persimmons are seen on the photo 

 scattered around the branches and 

 close to the nest. The four eggs 

 were reproduced in normal size, 

 with extra close focusing lens. 



In conclusion and in connection 

 with the above mattef of our Texas 

 wild dove, I append below interest- 

 ing and valuable publications anent 

 the wild pigeon, from the pen of 

 Mr. David N. Hoy, — which was 

 published in the June numbet of 

 the Texas Field and National 

 Guardsman, to wit: 



"How the Wild Pigeons Were 

 Destroyed 



' Many of the sportsmen, now 

 veterans, who resided in the line 

 of immigration of the passenger 



pigeons, thirty to forty years 

 ago, will remember the flights 

 and perhaps the resting places 

 of these birds, then so plentiful 

 that their annihilation seemed al- 

 most an impossibility. Mr. 

 David N. Hoy, of Milton, Pa., 

 writes us as follows on this sub- 

 ject, with special reference to the 

 manner of trapping pigeons for 

 the market. 



"I have frequently read ar- 

 ticles about wild pigeons and 

 about the big rewards offered for 

 a nest of the wild passenger 

 pigeons. It has been a long while 

 since the birds have nested 

 in Pennsylvania. As near as I 

 can tell it has been twenty-eight 

 years ago this spring since they 

 have paid us their last respects. 

 I know very well that I went to 

 Potter county, in the northern 

 part of Pennsylvania, to trap 

 some. But as I was farming I 

 could not stay to trap any of 

 them, as this was in the spring 

 and- 1 had to go home and get to 

 work. 



"What I want to tell you about 

 the birds is this: Two of my 

 friends stayed there all summer 

 and trapped pigeons on salt beds. 

 Perhaps some of my brother sports- 

 men do not know how this is done. 

 The trappers would select a swam- 

 py place in the woods and clean it 

 off nice and clean, and then take a 

 hoe and make little mud puddles 

 and then the water would collect in 

 them. Thpn the trappers would 

 scatter a few quarts of salt over 

 this place and the pigeons would 

 come to these places for water 

 and would feed their young some 

 of the mud. Then the trapper 

 would have a net say fourteen 

 feet wide and twenty-eight feet 

 long, would set this net and 

 build a small house made of pine 

 brush, and when a large number 

 of birds had gathered on the 

 net place, then the net would be 

 thrown over them and as many 

 as from three to six hundred 

 birds woiild be 'caught at one 



