' ' PROTECTION AND PRESERVATION OF BIRDS 133 



a pitiful sight for St. Valentine's Day, when, as the old song 

 has it, 'The birds were all choosing their mates.'" 



In the spring of 1904 when the Lapland longspurs were 

 passing through the State of Minnesota on the way to their 

 northern summer home, they migrated in vast flocks. They 

 Encountered cold weather, winds, and even snow and sleet, 

 and, exhausted, they came to the ground, where they were 

 either killed by the fall or died from exposure. The ground 

 for miles around was strewn with the dead bodies of the 

 birds, which lay thickly in the streets and on the sidewalks 

 and porches of the towns in the southwestern part of the 

 state. It will take many years of breeding to make up the 

 loss experienced by this species. 



Sometimes the birds are lured northward by mild weather 

 in early spring, and are then very numerously destroyed by 

 subsequent cold and snow. I recall one such spring in the 

 rolling prairie region of Minnesota. Many ground sparrows 

 had made nests and even hatched, when a snowstorm de- 

 stroyed not only the young but many of the old birds. The 

 bluebirds also fared very badly that year. 



These vicissitudes of the birds are mentioned to indicate 

 various agencies that tend to reduce their numbers. But 

 one of the most serious of all the enemies of birds is man. 

 Game birds are shot by the hunter. The farmer kills the 

 birds because he believes that they eat his crops or steal his 

 chickens. Rarity attracts the bird collector. Professional 

 collectors seek the skins and plumage for the millinery trade. 

 Even the song is a source of danger. Nightingales, finches, 

 thrushes, etc., are snared by thousands, to be sold as cage 

 birds. Eggs are collected for the markets, from the cliffs and 

 islands on the coast. Would-be ornithologists collect eggs and 



