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FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Dec. i, 1906. 
For the Protection of the Kildee. 
Boston, Mass., Nov. 26 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: The Boston Transcript prints nearly a 
column in its issue of Nov. 17 of information 
in regard to the approaching extinction of the 
kildee plover. The article is written by the 
Transcript's regular Washington correspondent, 
“Williams.” He speaks of the plea made for 
this bird by William Dutcher, president of the 
National Association of Audubon Societies, be¬ 
fore the American Ornithologists’ Union, which 
was then (Nov. 16) holding its annual session 
in Washington. 
In addition to the interest all bird lovers and 
good sportsmen will have in this noble plea 
for the preservation of the killdee, the article 
has for me special interest because of its full 
details of the wholesale destruction of this bird 
in the autumn of 1882 by a fierce storm which 
swept up the Atlantic Coast and met the hosts 
of migrating birds, whose flight took them a 
long distance to seaward, before turning toward 
Florida. 
Readers of Forest and Stream who may re¬ 
member my theory that the greatest destruction 
of the passenger pigeons was by a storm over 
the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, will readily 
understand my desire to bring to their atten¬ 
tion this additional evidence of the plausibility 
of that explanation. 
The theory of the destruction of the pigeons 
by catastrophism has been thought by many 
to be far-fetched and unworthy of credence. I 
commend to all who are skeptical as to the 
adequacy of this theory to account for the oc¬ 
casional almost complete destruction of a 
species, the facts cited by Mr. Dutcher. 
Presumably epitomizing Mr. Dutcher’s state¬ 
ments, the Transcript correspondent says: 
“Years ago Celia Thaxter made a similar 
plea for the protection of the killdee. She 
found the birds dead on the rocks near her cot¬ 
tage on the Isles of Shoals after a severe storm. 
At that time the killdee was an unfamiliar bird, 
and to learn what it was Miss Thaxter plucked 
some of the cinnamon-colored feathers from the 
bodies of the dead killdees and sent them to a 
Boston ornithologist, asking him to tell her the 
name of the birds, which had perished in such 
numbers in that late November storm. Her 
message of inquiry called the attention of the 
scientific world to the destruction in the ranks 
of the killdee. It was even then predicted, 
when the extent of the disaster which the birds 
had encountered was not fully known, that it 
would take years of protection to bring them 
into their own again. The effect of Miss Thax- 
ter’s efforts was that for a few years the kill- 
dees were not shot as wantonly as before. 
Nature makes a quick recovery and the killdee 
increased in numbers until apparently they were 
as plentiful as before. Since then their whole¬ 
sale destruction has begun again.” 
And again in his article he says: 
“Twenty-four years ago the killdees delayed 
their southern journeys for several weeks. The 
mild weather tempted them to remain in the 
north. A change came and the birds started 
south. Those that had left the north Atlantic 
Coast went seaward before turning their flight 
toward Florida. A southeast storm swept up 
the coast and met the birds midway. Countless 
thousands of the journeyers perished. From the 
sands of Barnegat to the rocks of East Cape 
the coast was strewn with their bodies. It may 
be that if the killdees of the year 1882 had not 
been betrayed by the promise of fair weather, 
there to-day would not exist the necessity of a 
plea for their protection. It was then that Celia 
Thaxter came to their rescue. Soon after they 
had reached their former numerical strength 
their persecution began again, and year by year 
it was noted that the spring returning birds 
came back in smaller flocks. 
“If the shooting of the killdee is stopped as 
the result of the plea made in Washington this 
week by the chief official of the associated Audu¬ 
bon societies it is estimated that the killdee 
within five years will be as plentiful on the 
shores and on the uplands as they were before 
they were storm swept nearly a quarter of a 
century ago.” 
The more one thinks of it the more reasonable 
it seems that a fierce storm at sea at a time when 
vast numbers of migrating birds are passing 
over its surface would be the most natural 
means of their destruction. There can be 
nothing incredible about the story, so circum¬ 
stantially told, of the destruction of the pigeons 
while crossing the Gulf of Mexico. The only 
point of evidence needed, as I have explicitly 
stated, is as to the southern limit of the migra¬ 
tory flight of the pigeons. 
My reasoning has been that the great flight 
did not winter in the Southern States, or there 
would have been abundant history of their 
presence there. Their numbers were so great 
that their wintering there—even supposing that 
they were widely separated and distributed— 
would not have escaped frequent notice and 
comment. Does any one know of any tradi¬ 
tions, even, of such presence? 
They were preeminently gregarious birds, go¬ 
ing and coming and during their stay in the 
north, and it is hardly to be supposed that this 
trait was utterly lost during their winter so¬ 
journ, wherever that may have been. They were 
noted for their swift and long sustained flight. 
I have known pigeons shot in northern Illinois 
to have undigested rice grains in their crops, and 
the passage of the Gulf of Mexico would have 
been an easy feat for them. I hope I shall be 
pardoned for bringing this subject before 
Forest and Stream readers once more. 
While I am writing let me add a few obser¬ 
vations of recent travel: 
One morning early in September last my son 
and I were in Rome and took the well-known 
drive out over the Appian Way. We noted the 
paucity of bird life as compared with what any 
similar excursion in almost any part of America 
would reveal. Only two or three times did we 
hear a bird note, and these were faint and sub¬ 
dued and came from tiny specimens no larger 
than a wren or chipping sparrow. Several times 
we passed a man or boy with a gun over his 
shoulder and wondered what possible use he 
could have for such a thing. On our return we 
saw one of these persons in a little orchard and 
heard the report of his gun, but saw no sign 
of game of any sort. Later nearly opposite the 
entrance to the ruins of the Baths of Cavacalla 
we passed three men and two dogs—the men 
rigged with all the paraphernalia which would 
be needed for a prairie chicken hunt in Illinois 
in the old time. They had double-barreled shot¬ 
guns, game bags, belts, top boots, etc., and the 
self-satisfied air of successful nimrods. 
I could not resist calling on my coachman to 
stop, and of stepping up to them and telling 
them of my interest in their occupation and 
begging them to show me their game. 
Evidently they recognized in me a fellow 
sportsman and proudly they opened their bags 
and displayed — five tiny little songsters, of the 
size of canary birds, and one of them with only 
a broken wing, but alive and bright eyed in its 
silent terror and pain. A more sickening and 
shameful sight I have not recently seen. Only 
one of these tiny birds could in any sense be 
classed as game. That one was—as I recognized 
when the proud “hunter” pointed it out to me. 
but not till then—a wee little quail, the smallest 
of its kind that I ever saw. 
There wasn't enough material in all they had 
secured to feed a convalescent cat, but they 
seemed as elated as if they had bagged ruffed 
grouse and mallard duck. I thanked them and 
resumed my seat and meditated much on con¬ 
ditions which make the Italian immigrant the 
indiscriminate shooter of everything that hath 
life, and the foe of the game warden. 
On the homeward voyage I spent many hours, 
field-glass in hand, watching and studying as 
often as before the flight of flying fishes—that 
perennial puzzle—and confirmed myself in the 
fullest persuasion that the fins are used as true 
wings, and that the progress of these silvery 
sprites of the sea is, while it lasts, genuine 
flight, and under considerable control, at least 
enabling the fish to veer to right or left, and to 
rise or fall somewhat and to sustain itself far 
beyond the limits that could be reached by the 
force of the initial spring from the sea. 
While the brief appearance is generally so 
baffling and puzzling, and perfectly satisfactory 
observation is very hard to get, there yet come 
times to the patient observer when there can 
be no doubt that it is genuine flight that is seen. 
C. H. Ames. 
The Ways of Gray Squirrels. 
Mr. Moonan’s interesting article about the 
squirrels in the Bronx woods recalled memories 
of the times when as a boy I studied the ways 
of the squirrels in the Indiana woods, and in 
fact as I have studied them for most of my life. 
In regard to their storing food for hard times, it 
has been observed that they do not store it in 
quantities in one place. I helped to fell many 
trees which had squirrel dens in them and was 
always on the lookout for anything pertaining 
to squirrels, but never found so much as a single 
handfull of nuts stored in one place by squir¬ 
rels. It is a fact that they bury thousands of 
nuts in the ground, and can find them again when 
the ground is covered with six inches or more of 
snow. How they find them is not known, but 
presumably by the sense of smell, as there could 
be nothing else to indicate where a nut was 
buried. Why they bury the nuts instead of stor¬ 
ing them in hollow trees is another one of 
nature’s mysteries, but it is probably one of 
nature’s plans for the planting of seeds. 
The nests made of leaves and twigs are not 
made on account of a scarcity of holes, but are 
the hot weather sleeping places, and the differ¬ 
ence in the number of nests built during a hot 
summer and a cool one is very noticeable. I 
studied the'squirrels in a tract of woods where 
there were many more holes in the trees than 
there were squirrels, so the nests could not have 
been built on account of lack of room. 
Mr. Moonan is right when he says that no 
squirrel starves to death. If there are no nuts 
he can and does often live on tree buds and the 
tenderest of the twigs. I have seen them work¬ 
ing carefully over the top of a tree and clipping 
off and eating the buds, and there are some kinds 
of bark eaten by them. The holes in the trees 
have a tendency to close up with the growth of 
the tree, but the squirrel sees to it that the hole 
does not grow up by keeping the bark gnawed 
away from the edge of the hole which prevents 
the hole from closing. 
Under all circumstances the squirrel is one of 
the best fitted animals to take care of himself, 
and he generally does it up to the time he meets 
death coming from the muzzle of a gun. 
O. H. Hampton. 
