The Pigeon in Manitoba 191 



the market was in no way proportionately lessened in 

 the vicinity of these smaller colonies as long as a suffi- 

 cient number of the birds remained to make the traffic 

 profitable, it can at once be seen that this continued drain 

 upon these smaller colonies, when other conditions were 

 becoming more difficult for the birds to contend with, 

 would be instrumental in depleting the entire former 

 main column to a point when netting and shooting were 

 no longer profitable ; and, the remnant of these colonies 

 having to run a gantlet of persecution over their en- 

 tire course of migration to and from winter quarters, 

 there could be but one result to such proceeding, and 

 that one we now face; extermination. 



Of these records made during the pigeons' day, as 

 we might call it, the earliest we have are those made 

 by a Mr. T. Hutchins, who was a Hudson's Bay Com- 

 pany trader, operating for some twenty-five years in 

 the district adjacent to Hudson's Bay, during which 

 time he made copious notes of the birds frequenting 

 that district, which were afterwards published by 

 Pennant In his "Arctic Zoology" in 1875. He says in 

 part: 



"The first pigeon I shall take note of is one I re- 

 ceived at Severn in 1771 ; and, having sent it home to 

 Mr. Pennant, he informed me that It was the migratoria 

 species. They are very numerous Inland and visit our 

 settlement in the summer. They are plentiful about 

 Moose Factory and inland, where they breed, choosing 



