196 



SCIENCE. 



[Vol. VII., No. 160 



DESTRUCTION OF BIRDS FOR MILLINERY 

 PURPOSES. 



It is difficult to gather the actual statistics of 

 bird-slaughter for millinery purposes, since it can 

 be done only at the expense of much time and 

 labor. We see on every hand — in shop-windows, 

 on the street, in the cars, and everywhere where 

 women are seen — evidence of its enormous ex- 

 tent. We know also that it is carried on more 

 or less almost everywhere, but especially in the 

 neighborhood of the larger cities, or at points 

 within easy access from them, and also at various 

 distant points, which are visited by the millinery 

 taxidermists or their agents for the express pur- 

 pose of supplying the demands of the hat-trade in 

 bird-skins. At present only a few specific details 

 can be given, relating to only a few localities ; but 

 these may be taken as illustrative of what actually 

 occurs at many points, respecting which the facts 

 are known only in a general way. For many of 

 the data here given, we are indebted to statements 

 published from time to time in Forest and stream, 

 the well-known New York weekly journal devoted 

 to field-sports and natural history. In an editorial 

 on ' The destruction of small birds,' published 

 a short time since (March 6, 1884), occurs the 

 following: "We know, for example, of one 

 dealer . . . who, during a three-months' trip to 

 the coast of South Carolina last spring, prepared no 

 less than 11,018 bird-skins. A considerable num- 

 ber of the birds killed were, of course, too much 

 mutilated for preparation, so that the total number 

 of the slain would be much greater than the num- 

 ber given. The person referred to states that he 

 handles, on an average, 30,000 skins per annum, of 

 which the greater part are cut up for millinery 

 purposes." The same article, in referring to the 

 destruction of birds for millinery purposes on Long- 

 Island, states, that, during the short period of four 

 months, 70,000 were supplied to the New York 

 dealers from a single village. 



A writer in the Baltimore Sun, of about the 

 same date, gives some account of the destruction 

 of birds at Cobb's Island, on the coast of Virginia. 

 He says, "An enterprising woman from New 

 York has contracted with a Paris millinery firm 

 to deliver during this summer 40,000 or more skins 

 of birds at forty cents apiece. With several taxi- 

 dermists she was carrying out the contract, having 

 engaged young and old to kill birds of different 

 kinds, and paying them ten cents for each specimen 

 not too much mutilated for millinery purposes. . . . 

 The birds comprised in this wholesale slaughter 

 are mainly the different species of gulls and terns, 

 or sea-swallows, of which many species in large 

 numbers could formerly be found upon this island. 

 But now only few of these graceful birds remain 



upon Cobb's Island itself ; and the pot-hunters, or 

 rather skin-hunters, have to go to some distance to 

 carry out their cruel scheme. If we consider, that, 

 with each old bird killed, — and only old buds have 

 a suitable plumage, — also many of the young buds, 

 still unable to take care of themselves, are doomed 

 to starvation, this wholesale slaughter becomes still 

 more infamous and criminal." 



Cobb's Island was formerly one of the most noted 

 resorts of the terns, smaller gulls, and other shore- 

 breeding birds along our whole coast ; but recent 

 visitors to the island report that the once popu- 

 lous colonies of these birds have been almost 

 completely exterminated by the wholesale slaugh- 

 ter referred to by the writer of the foregoing 

 extract. 



Similar butchery has been carried on along the 

 sandy shores of Cape Cod, also formerly a noted 

 resort of these birds ; it being reported that 40,000 

 terns were killed there in a single season by one 

 party for the hat-trade. At points where, a few 

 years since, these beautiful birds filled the air with 

 their graceful forms and snowy plumage, now only 

 a few pairs remain. 



The same sad havoc has been wrought with the 

 egrets and herons along our southern shores, the 

 statistics of which, could they be presented, would 

 be of startling magnitude. We only know that 

 colonies numbering hundreds, and even thousands, 

 of pairs, have been simply annihilated — wholly 

 wiped out of existence — in supplying the ex- 

 haustless demand for egret-plumes. The heronries 

 of Florida suffered first and most severely ; later 

 the slaughter was extended to other portions of the 

 Gulf coast. As an instance of the scale on which 

 these operations are carried, it may be mentioned 

 that one of our well-known ornithologists, while 

 on an exploring tour in Texas, heard an 

 agent of the millinery trade soliciting a sportsman 

 to procure for liim the plumes of 10,000 white 

 egrets. Although, in the present case, the sports- 

 man had too much humanity to become the 

 abettor of such a heartless scheme, the incident 

 serves to show on what a grand scale the 

 destruction of these birds is attempted ; and 

 doubtless the agent did not fail of eventually 

 securing his coveted plunder. 



Among the birds most in favor for hat decoration 

 are the various species of grebes, whose soft, furry 

 plumage is particularly adapted to the purpose, 

 being of durable texture, pleasing in effect, and 

 susceptible of being readily dyed any desired tint. 

 Grebes are used to such an extent, that the source 

 of the abundant supply was not at first evident, 

 owing to the comparative scarcity of the birds in 

 the Atlantic States. It is found, however, that the 

 supply is derived from the far west, mainly from 



