Passenger Pigeon. As the forests have been cut away these birds have gradually diminished in numbers, 
until in Central Ohio, a section where formerly the most numerous, they are seldom seen. I have within my 
easy recollection seen the sky darkened by them during their morning flights to their feeding grounds, and 
have seen several thousands taken in a single day in a spring-net. But at the present writing, the words 
occasional visitor and possibly summer resident, describe their numerical position in the bird-list of the 
State. 
In contrast with these few words I shall quote from Audubon. He writes as follows, page 320, 
“American Ornithological Biography”: “The multitude of Wild Pigeons in our woods are astonishing. 
Indeed, after having viewed them so often, and under so many circumstances, I eA r en now feel inclined 
to pause, and assure myself that what I am going to relate is fact. Yet I have seen it all, and that, too, 
in the company of persons who, like myself, were struck with amazement. 
“In the autumn of 1813, I left my house at Henderson, on the banks of the Ohio, on my way to 
Louisville. In passing over the barrens a few miles beyond ITardensburg, I observed the Pigeons flying 
from north-east to south-west, in greater numbers than I thought I had ever seen them before, and feeling 
an inclination to count the flocks that might pass within reach of my eye in one hour, I dismounted, 
seated myself on an eminence, and began to mark with my pencil, making a dot for every flock that 
passed. In a short time finding the task which I had undertaken impracticable, as the birds poured in 
in countless multitudes, I rose, and counting the dots then put down, found that 163 had been made in 
twenty-one minutes. I travelled on, and still met more the farther I proceeded. The air was literally filled 
with Pigeons; the light of noon-day was obscured as by an eclipse; the dung fell in spots, not unlike 
melting flakes of snow; and the continued buzz of wings had a tendency to lull my senses to repose. . . . 
“ Before sunset I reached Louisville, distant from Hardensburg fifty-five miles. The Pigeons were 
still passing in undiminished numbers, and continued to do so for three days in succession. The people 
were all in arms. The banks of the Ohio were crowded with men and boys, incessantly shooting at the 
pilgrims, which there flew lower as they passed the river. Multitudes were thus destroyed. For a week 
or more, the population fed on no other flesh than that of Pigeons, and talked of nothing but Pigeons. 
The atmosphere, during this time, was strongly impregnated with the peculiar odor which emanates 
from the species. 
“ Let us now inspect their place of nightly rendezvous. One of these curious roosting-places, on the 
banks of the Gfreen River in Kentucky, I repeatedly visited. It was, as is always the case, in a portion 
of the forest, where the trees Avere of great magnitude, and where there was little underwood. I rode 
through it upward of forty miles, and crossing it in different parts, found its average breadth to be more 
than three miles. . . . The dung lay several inches deep, coA r ering the whole extent of the roosting- 
place, like a bed of snow. Many trees two feet in diameter, I observed, Avere broken off at no great 
distance from the ground ; and the branches of many of the largest and tallest had given way, as if the 
forest had been SAvept by a tornado. Every thing proved to me that the number of birds resorting to this 
part of the forest - must be immense beyond conception. . 
“The breeding of the Wild Pigeons, and the places chosen for that purpose, are points of great 
interest. The time is not much influenced by season, and the place selected is Avliere food is most plentiful 
and most attainable, and always at a convenient distance from Avater. Forest-trees of great height are 
those in which the Pigeons form their nest. Thither the countless myriads resort and prepare to fulfil 
one of the great Iuavs of nature. . . . On the same tree from fifty to a hundred nests may frequently 
be seen: — I might say a much greater number, Avere I not anxious, kind reader, that however Avonderful 
my account of the Wild Pigeon is, you may not feel disposed to refer it to the marvellous.” 
274 
