1895.] Zoology. 377 
Destruction of Food Fishes.—A gradual diminution of salt- 
water food fishes is reported all along the eastern coast of the United 
States. This destruction is caused by willful violation of game laws. 
The fish phosphate factories cause the disappearance of immense 
quantities of bluefish, bass and scup. The gill nets at the entrance to 
bays and harbors have almost exterminated the striped bass, which 
was once very plentiful, while early every spring pound nets are set 
for alewives, flatfish, smelts and flounders, and these are caught by the 
ton and spread upon the land as a fertilizer. The most destructive 
nets probably are the pounds, since they are made of fine meshed net- 
ting and cover an immense area. In some instances these nets are 4000 
feet in length, and naturally catch immense quantities of cunners, kil- 
lies, butterfish, white perch and young fry of the blackfish and sea 
bass which frequent our waters. It is to be hoped that stringent game 
laws will be adopted and that they will be stringently enforced. (Sci- 
entific American, Jan. 12, 1895). 
A Swallow Roost at Waterville, Maine.—The following 
interesting account of a Swallow Roost is given by A. F. C. Bates in 
the January number of The Auk. 
Not far from where a small stream called the Messalonskee joins 
the Kennebec River, one may see at evening, from the middle of July 
to about the third week in September, an interesting sight in the bird 
line. 
The willow trees along the banks of this stream, particularly a close 
row some five or six hundred feet in length, form the roosting place of 
vast numbers of swallows. During the forenoon and early afternoon 
very few swallows are to be seen in the sky—indeed they are conspicu- 
ous by their absence—but a little before sunset the birds begin to 
arrive in the vicinity, flying, sailing, chasing each other around in the 
upper air, everywhere within the eye’s reach. From north and south, 
east and west, in they come out of the distance till one thinks the 
barns, banks, martin-houses and swallow nests of whatever description 
all over Maine must have yielded up their inmates. Shortly after sun- 
set they gather more nearly in the region directly above the trees, in- 
comers from every point of the horizon still joining them, and toward 
the last exhibiting great hurry and intentness, as if fearful of being 
“ late to meeting.” 
Then begin movements that are the most interesting fiktion of this 
gathering. At intervals clouds of swallows will evolve something like 
order out of their numbers and perform en masse some of the most 
