Bird Banding Department 
111 
raising these pests or did you simply capture and tag it to see how far 
it would migrate?” 
Inquiry elicited the information that owing to the depradations of 
Kingfishers, “ Hawks ” and Herons on their fish steel traps were set on 
the tops of posts near the pond, where the birds would alight. Concern- 
ing the capture of our banded specimen, it was added: 
“As he hung suspended he was obliged to ‘ throw up ’ his catch be- 
fore he could quack and the same was three trout and two pickrel all 
about 5 inches long. We catch and shoot about 40 of this family of birds 
every year and consider we have saved about $5.00 of trout per bird 
destroyed.” 
Bird-banding not only has its romance, but it seems to stimulate the 
imagination. Mr. Finley banded a wren in Oregon and it was later 
found dead in a watering trough in the same state. A newspaper re- 
ported the finding, with a headline announcing that Wren Crosses Con- 
tinent, since it had on its leg a band bearing the inscription, “ The Auk, 
New York, 3429.” 
It became evident during the year that some more definite organi- 
zation was necessary to carry on the expanded work, and this necessity 
grew into the idea of forming a national society for this purpose. At 
the meeting of the American Ornithologists’ Union in New York City 
in November, 1910, I presented a report of the season’s work and em- 
phasized the need of a permanent organization. At the dinner, held at 
the Hotel Endicott on the evening of November 8, a paper was circu- 
lated calling for the signatures of those who desired to become charter 
members of such an organization. As a matter of historical interest it 
may be worth while to reproduce the list here. It includes the follow- 
ing names: G. J. Carpenter, B. S. Bowdish, George P. Ellis, W. DeW. 
Miller, L. A. Fuertes, T. Gilbert Pearson, Leon J. Cole, Thos. S. Roberts, 
Ruthven Deane, Witmer Stone, George Spencer Morris, John H. Gage, 
Charles F. Batchelder, James Savage, C. J. Pennock, Bruce Horsfall, 
Arthur H. Helme, J. A. Weber, A. C. Bent, Frederic H. Kennard, Dwight 
Franklin, J. T. Nichols, E. H. Forbush, J. Dwight, Jr., Louis B. Bishop, 
Lynds Jones, Chas. W. Miller, Edw. J. F. Marx, Francis Harper, Arthur 
A. Allen. To this list were added the following whose names were put 
down by request: Glover M. Allen, C. H. Pangburn, A. A. Saunders 
and Samuel Wright. 
Following the dinner there was a meeting to perfect organization and 
a committee drew up articles of association, which were duly approved. 1 
Thus came into being the American Bird Banding Association. At the 
first meeting the following officers were elected: President, L. J. Cole; 
Secretary-Treasurer, C. J. Pennock; additional members of the Executive 
Committee, Louis B. Bishop, Glover M. Allen and Thos. S. Roberts. 
The progress of the work was interrupted to some extent by my 
change in April, 1910, from New Haven to take up my present position 
at the University of Wisconsin. Furthermore, the duties of my position 
occupied so much time and were so foreign to the bird-banding, that I 
felt I must drop the active direction of this as soon as some one could 
be found to take it up. I carried it on as best I could, however, till April, 
4 The Auk, Vol. XXVIII, 1910, p. 167. 
