54 
BULLETIN' OF THE NUTTALL 
Woodpecker (Hylotomus pileatus), the Red-headed Woodpecker 
{Melanerpes erythrocephalus), the Wild Pigeon {Ectopistes migrato- 
rius), and the Snow Goose {Anser hyperhoreus). Besides these 
might be added, as among those which have also notably decreased, 
most of the wading and swimming birds, and nearly all of the rapa- 
cious species. None of the Ducks and Geese, and probably few of 
the limicoline species, are probably one tenth as numerous now as 
they were two hundred and fifty years ago, while a great depletion 
has also occurred amongst the Gulls and Terns. This great dimi- 
nution, however, is not of course limited to the State of Massachu- 
setts, but likewise characterizes most of the Atlantic States, and 
some of the older States of the interior. 
This reduction has been mainly brought about by what may be 
considered as inevitable and natural causes, as the removal of the 
forests, and other changes necessarily attending the agricultural 
development of the country. Excessive use of the gun, however, 
has had not a little to do with it. The rapacious species have ever 
been regarded as the natural enemies of the husbandman, and with 
them all species that have in any way preyed upon his crops. 
In early times premiums were paid by the local governments for 
the destruction of many of these species, and not without cause. 
The early records show that such was the abundance of the Black- 
birds and Crows that their destruction in large numbers was abso- 
lutely necessary, in order to secure more than a small portion of the 
maize harvest. While most, or at least many, of the towns early 
encouraged the destruction of the noxious mammals and birds by 
the offer of rewards therefor, others passed enactments rendering it 
obligatory upon each householder to destroy a certain number of 
blackbirds annually, and to bring their heads to the selectmen of 
the towns to show they had complied with the requisition, on pen- 
alty of a small fine for each blackbird lacking to complete the re- 
quired number.* These means seem to have been immediate, and 
in some cases disastrous, in their results. The traveller, Kalm, 
relates that Dr. Franklin told him, in 1750, that in consequence of 
the premiums that had been paid for killing these birds in New 
England, they had become so nearly extirpated there that they 
were “ very rarely seen, and in few places only.” In consequence of 
this exterminating warfare on the “ maize-thieves,” the worms that 
^ See Alonzo Lewis’s History of Lynn, p. 186. 
