52 
BY THE WAYSIDE 
BY THE WAYSIDE 
Published on the tenth of each month except July and 
August. 
The official organ of the Wisconsin and Illinois Audu¬ 
bon Societies. 
Twenty=five cents per year. Single Copies 5 cents 
All communications should be sent to Thos. R. Moyle, 
Appleton, Wis. 
Trait of the Plume Hunter. 
Mr. William L. Finley, author of 
“American Birds,” and lecturer for the 
National Association of Audubon socie¬ 
ties, gave an illustrated lecture at the 
Unitarian church on “The Trail of the 
Plume Hunter.” Mr. Finley was intro¬ 
duced by Professor R. H. Denniston, 
president of the local Audubon society, 
under whose auspices the lecture was 
given. 
Mr. Finley told briefly of the organi¬ 
zation of the national association, which 
is the father of the various state Audu¬ 
bon societies, and which has been doing 
more for the protection of our wild birds 
than any other organization in the coun¬ 
try. Before this movement for their 
protection was started, many of our most 
beautiful birds, such as the American 
egret or white heron, were practically ex¬ 
terminated for millinery purposes. Mr. 
Finley has spent a large part of the past 
decade in the field and tells gruesome 
tales of the plume hunters of the Pacific 
states who often boasted of making $400 
to $500 a day in the slaughter of white 
herons. One man stated that he had 
made $1,200 in a day and a half by ex¬ 
terminating a peaceful colony of these 
birds in southern Oregon. The western 
<rrebe is another bird that will soon be a 
memory of the past unless it is afforded 
protection. The snowv-white breasts of 
this fowl are used for coats and capes 
and are now bringing fabulous prices in 
the markets of our large cities. “The 
worst feature of plume hunting,” said Mr. 
Finlev, “is the fact that these birds breed 
in colonies and hunters kill them at the 
very time they have eggs or chicks in 
the nest. This practise leads to suffer¬ 
ings and starvation of the young and the 
rapid extermination of the species.” 
It was due to the work of Mr. Finley 
and his associates that President Roose¬ 
velt set aside the large Klamath and 
Malheur lake regions in southern Oregon 
and northern California as national wild 
bird reservations. Each of these com¬ 
prises nearly 400 square miles and is 
patrolled by wardens of the national as¬ 
sociation, so that the birds may have a 
refuge where they can live and breed in 
peace. Besides these reservations there 
are a score of lesser ones scattered 
throughout the country which bear ample 
witness to. the good services of the Audu¬ 
bon societies. Besides these, nearly 
every state has passed laws which provide 
for the protection of non-game birds. 
In addition to denouncing the evils of 
plume hunting and the cold-blooded fads 
of society women that make the other 
possible and profitable, Mr. Finley gave 
an interesting account of his experiences 
while in the lake regions of Oregon. He 
described the methods used in photo¬ 
graphing the wild fowl and talked freely 
on bird habits and peculiarties. His 
lecture was illustrated by an exception¬ 
ally interesting series of stereopticon 
views taken by Mr. Finley himself while 
in the field. Many of these showed the 
awkward young birds in laughable pos¬ 
tures while others depicted the bloody 
results of the hunt. The lecture was 
highlv interesting and verv instructive 
to the large audience of university and 
town people who attended .—The Demo¬ 
crat , Madison , Wis. 
