experience in which he has only a part of the whole story, 
wondering who else may be able to supplement his own frag¬ 
mentary record, and wishing for some way to bring all the 
facts together for the complete record, even though it covered 
but a brief period in the bird’s life. 
Can we not give a little wider scope to some of these prob¬ 
lems, though we undertake, perhaps, but a few of them? 
As an example, in its own way, in compiling data for the 
first record of the spring arrivals of a species, can we not 
devise a simple but fairly complete system which will show 
whether such record is merely the early arrival of an individual 
bird, or whether it represents the general appearance of its 
species, in large or small numbers, in many localities simul¬ 
taneously? Again, there are always several of our members 
who are unable to take our annual Ipswich River trip during 
the spring migration. It could probably be arranged to 
have some of them, as a group, go afield in another locality 
for a part of the time during which the main party is on the 
river, and make a census, thus giving us an opportunity for 
a comparaitive study of observations made at the same time 
in different regions. 
These are but two of the many suggestions which come to 
mind, and for which there is no opportunity at this time for 
discussion. To be sure, group work, rather than mere indi¬ 
vidual effort, will increase the tasks of a Club, but the results 
attained in a period of years will probably amply reward us 
for our efforts by giving a more thorough and accurate survey 
of Essex County bird life. 
X 
1 ; 
37 
j 
