current developments. The Biological Siii'vey is setting up stations for 

 regional wildlife research in sel.ected land-grant Colleges throughout the 

 United States. Eleven of these already have heen established, and four 

 more are needed if the project is to he fully adequate* 



By fulfilling the second requisite the third will also he met— 

 that of providing for a carefully trained personnel to administer the 

 wildlife resources of America in the future. There is now a sorlous lack-- 

 of men r.'ho are qualified fc>3: this work. The land-tyrant college units will 

 serve as research stations, and they will also offer to graduate students 

 courses in wildlife management similar in purpose to those offered in for- 

 estry. 



The main ohjective of the wildlife-restoration progr.am now heing 

 developed is to prevent, if possible , the extermination of any valuable 

 species of wild "birds and other animals, and to increase their numbers to 

 the greatest extent consistent v;ith the land-use requirements of the h\man 

 population. Wildlife has a very groat economic value, and it also furn- 

 ishes a mepns for recreation and relaxation that may well become of even 

 greater importance than arc its financial values to human beings subjected 

 to the increasing strains and stresses of modern ways of living and working. 



Several valuable and interesting species were allowed to become ex- 

 tinct in the years before there was any general conception of the need for 

 a carefully worked out wildlife-conservation prograiri that could be coordin- 

 ated with agricultural and industrial activities. It is bad logic to argue 

 that because there is no realization of a loss no loss has been suffered. 

 The present generation of Americans never knew, nor can any ever know, the 

 passenger pigeon and the heath hen, but it is a certainty that modern life 

 is the poorer for the extermination of those birds. Then, too, there is 

 alvjays the active possibility that the extermination of njiy native creature 

 may cause grave disturb^mces in the complicated ecological system of a coun- 

 try. Evidences of such damage and a realization of its significance may not 

 appear for many years following the disaster, 



Fact-finding Basis for Flans 



Such in brief is the philosophy underlying the recent restoration ac- 

 tivities and plans in the United States, Actually these plans have been de- 

 veloped over a period of more than 50 years of research and study by techni- 

 cians on the staff of the Biological Survey, Facts slowly accumulated through- 

 out the period have beentrought together, like the sections of an aerial land- 

 scape photograph, until a definite, recognizable pattern has appeared. When at 

 last the means to proceed with a program were provided, the essential needs 

 were known as well as the methods b'^ which they could be met. 



The principal need was for land, Birdc»banding, food-habits, and habitat 

 studies conducted for half a century furnished precise infoiTnation as to the 

 type of land required to support each of the many different species. It was 

 realized that, except for the habitats of such creatures as find suitable en- 

 vironmental conditions upon cultivated lands, most of the areas that might be 



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