July 29, 1911.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
197 
Great guns win great 
events because of long 
distance, close shooting 
and hard hitting qualities 
GRAND 
AMERICAN 
HANDICAP 
Cottontail, 62 
Crow-jack, 85 
Curlew, 65 
Diver, 62 
Dumb mockingbird, 91 
Eveque, 86 
Flamant, 64 
Flat-head, 91 
Flycatcher, Black-crest¬ 
ed, 82 
Flycatcher, Yellow, 82a 
Flying auger, 79 
Fly-up-the-creek, 69 
Garde-soleil, 68 
Gawk, 72 
Gaze-soleil, 68 
Geese, Nigger, 63 
Georgia boy, 76 
Gourd head, 67 
Grasset, 92 
Grasset, Gros, 82 
Poor joe, 70 
Pullet, Indian, 68 
Qua-bird, 72 
Ouaker, 88 
Quawk, 72 
Red-breasted swallow, 89 
Red caille, 88 
Red mockingbird, 94 
Red pop, 87 
Robin, Bastard, 98 
Sandy mocker, 94 
Scow, 72 
Shivering owl, 78 
Skimmer, 89 
Speckled caille, 94 
Sungazer, 68 
Swallow, Red-breasted, 89 
West Indian bat, 80 
White beccroche, 65 
Yellow caille, 88 
Yellow flycatcher, 82a 
McILHENNY’S HERONRY. 
Probably very few people in Louisiana know 
that a heronry with 20,000 pairs of breeding 
herons is in existence in this State, says the New 
Orleans Picayune, and that it began fifteen years 
ago, when Edward Avery Mcllhenny, of Avery 
Island, took up an experiment with the species 
of plumed egrets which were at that time being 
rapidly exterminated by the plume hunters of 
Paris and America. The work has been car¬ 
ried on quietly by Mr. Mcllhenny at his own 
cost and personal effort. 
Mr. Mcllhenny was formerly the president of 
the Audubon Society of Louisiana, and his work 
among birds has stretched from Labrador to 
Florida, Alaska to Southern California, and most 
extensively in the Gulf coast and Southern 
Louisiana, the place of his nativity. 
About fifteen years ago Mr. Mcllhenny found 
some nests of the snowy heron, which is com¬ 
monly known as the white egret, and when the 
birds were fairly well grown he captured six 
pairs and located them on the shores of an arti¬ 
ficial pond. 
He took extreme care to feed the birds him¬ 
self and they soon learned that he meant them 
no harm, and they became as tame as chickens 
in an ordinary barnyard. When he wanted 
them he called to them. They would come to 
him, eat out of his hands and fly all over and 
about him. 
In the fall of the first year at the beginning 
of the migratory season Mr. Mcllhenny turned 
the herons out of their confined quarters, and 
true to the instinct of their kind they flew away, 
going south, probably to Central America or 
South America. The following spring two pairs 
of the liberated birds returned to Avery Island, 
resumed friendly terms with Mr. Mclihenny, 
reared their young and prospered. In the fall 
the “tribe” again “lit out” for South America, 
but in the following spring returned in increased 
numbers. 
At the end of the fifth year a pair of little 
blue herons joined the herons, and three years 
later three pairs of Louisiana herons located on 
the Mcllhenny preserve. 
Less than a month ago the herony was over¬ 
crowded with more than 20,000 pairs, including 
species as follows: Snowy heron, little blue 
heron, Louisiana heron, green heron and yellow 
crown night heron. 
Other waterfow's have joined the colony, and 
the known species comnrise the anhinge, which 
is sometimes called snake bird or water turkey; 
the purple gallinule, Florida gallinule, least bit¬ 
tern, wood and summer duck, blue-winged teal, 
gadwall and ma’lard. 
The waterfowls have learned that they are 
safe from mo’estation around the heronry, and 
at least ten other species join the colony during 
the winter. 
So secure a place is the heronry that nothing 
short of a shotgun discharged will scare them. 
They are not afraid of men, as they have learned 
they will not molest them. The business insti¬ 
tutions, the factories, mill whistles and locomo¬ 
tive whistles and behs do not scare them. The 
discharge of a gun, however, literally puts them 
“up in the air" in two ways. They immediately 
take wing and become badly scared and con¬ 
fused, and fly about as aimlessly as bats in the 
sun. 
Another heronry is being established to take 
care of the overflow. 
Mr. Mcllhenny is also trying an experiment 
with Texas blackducks. He is trying to teach 
them to nest, just as he taught the herons. 
Charles Wilds Ward has made a careful sur¬ 
vey of the heronry, and he is certain there are 
20,000 nests, averaging three young birds to the 
nest. This makes 60,000 young birds. Counting 
the 40,000 parent birds the colony at the most 
conservative calculation has a total population 
of too, 000 birds. 
The fame of the heronry has reached other 
birds of passage. The great American ibis and 
the roseate spoonbill throughout the world will 
want to go there, but finding all nesting quar¬ 
ters taken up and the “S. R. O.” sign out, they 
pass on. 
The interesting feature of the heronry is the 
fact that several thousand pairs of the “egrets" 
are there. Owing to the great slaughter of the 
bird a few years ago the common opinion is that 
the bird is practically extinct in North America. 
Naturalists throughout the world will be sur¬ 
prised at the great work done by Mr. Mcllhenny. 
Avery Island is a formation of low and hill 
land. It has a maximum altitude of 190 feet 
above the marsh, and is eight miles south of 
New Iberia and about 100 miles west of New 
Orleans. It has been the homestead of General 
Dudley Avery and his ancestors since 1830. 
