FOREST AND STREAM. 




NATURAL FETISIO 






the Life in Four Square Feet. 
\EOPLE who live in the country know that all 
at them life is abundant. There are small 
laals in the fields, swamps and woods, birds 
he meadows and treetops, frogs, turtles: and 
ies in the fields and along the brook sides, in- 
3 and plants everywhere. In the cities much 
this life is absent; there we have hurrying 
vds of people, domestic animals, a few birds 
| comparatively few insects. How abundant 
| country life is, no one appreciates; but in- 
ligations of a tiny bit of territory recently 
le by Mr. W. L. McAtee, at Washington, 
some figures so astounding as to interest 
‘y one, and even to excite incredulity. Yet 
inquiry was made with scientific accuracy. 
That Mr, McAtee wished to discover was the 
‘oximate numbers of the fruits and seeds, and 
nsects and other invertebrate animals pres- 
on a given area. This is information often 
led by the student of economic problems. To 
re this information for a certain locality—that 
\Washington—the investigator laid off areas 
by two feet of forest floor and _ grassy 
\dow, which were examined in November and 
ch respectively. As his inquiry was under- 
m chiefly because of its relation to the study 
bird food, he removed from these areas of 
- square feet everything on the surface and 
|ground itself to the depth a bird readily can 
\teh, and then all plant and animal objects in 
ses known to be used as food by birds were 
ated. 
rom the four square feet in the woods there 
e taken twelve beetles, seven bugs, eight 
ienoptera (bees and ants), eleven spiders, 
aty-six other anthropods, nine worms, eleven 
l-like animals, twenty-seven cocoons and in- 
| eggs; in all 112 animal items. Besides there 
le 194 seeds and fruits. 
s it seems perfectly fair to assume that this 
was not especially different from all the 
‘ounding forest floor, its examination indi- 
s that on the average there are present in 
\locality of Washington, on each acre of forest 
r, 1,216,880 animals of the kinds above re- 
led to, and 2,107,810 fruits and seeds. 
lhe four square feet of meadow land yielded 
1 more astonishing results. The count here 
sixty-one beetles, twenty bugs, 940 bees and 
;, fifty-three spiders, 127 other anthropods, 
lworms, 20 snail-like animals, 20 cocoons and 
ct eggs; in all 1,254 animal objects. There 
e 3,113 seeds. The average life per acre for 
1eadow like this one would, therefore, be, 
nals 13,654,710, and of seed, 33,822,745. 
hese estimates seem quite beyond belief, but 
show that they are the result of adding to- 
ier numbers individually so small that no one 
ld question them, Mr. McAtee gives a list of 
species with their numbers. 
lost interesting in this investigation is the 
le difference between the abundance of life 
he woods and in the meadows; that of the 
dows being vastly more dense than that of 
woods. An examination of his list shows a 
iber of cases where the discrepancy is ex- 
ned. In the forest area only eight ants were 
ad, while in the pasture more than 933 ants 
a single species were found, yet there was 
ant colony on the four square feet examined. 
reover, the area in the meadow gave 102 
ngtails (Thysanura) to fifteen in the woods. 
the seeds 2,716 of the 3,113 found in the 
dow were seeds of a single species of grass. 
n if these enormously abundant species are 
*n from the total, it would still appear that 
meadow plot averages more than double the 
iber of seeds and animals found in the woods. 
he result of these investigations agrees with 
ular belief that life is more abundant in the 
a than in the deep forest. This has been 
ed a thousand times, but it was perhaps not 

until Prof. Forbes last spring printed his “Orni- 
thological Cross Section of Illinois in Autumn” 
that the matter was definitely stated. In mak- 
ing this cross section, it was found that the num- 
ber of birds per square mile of woods was 785 
and in pasture 1,551. 
Other reflections are suggested by Mr. Mc- 
Atee’s investigation, but the figures above given 
are sufficient for the present. 
Wild Pigeons? 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
On the morning of Oct. 23, while we were 
seated at the breakfast table, a large hawk flew 
down into the yard and attempted to carry off 
a chicken. Father seized a shotgun and ran out 
to shoot him, but the thief made good his escape 
among the big willow trees which fringe the 
banks of a large creek near our house. While 
we were looking about among the willows, I hap- 

THE 76-INCH MOOSE ANTLERS 
In the Reed-McMillin collection in 
Zoological Park. 
the New York 
pened to glance overhead and saw a flock of 
about forty pigeons flying over. I noticed that 
they were flying faster than I had ever seen 
pigeons fly before, but concluded that they were 
someone’s tame pigeons after all, and so said 
nothing; but father looking up also discovered 
them, and at once exclaimed, “Clarence, there 
goes a flock of wild pigeons and they are the 
first I have seen for years.” 
Now, father has shot hundreds of wild pigeons 
in the days when they were plentiful, and is 
positive that these are the genuine old time birds 
like those he killed years ago. The birds were 
of a bluish color, so near as I could see, and 
flew northward in a bee line, not varying in 
either direction, until lost to view in the dis- 
tance. They were unlike any species of pigeon 
common to this country, and if they were not 
wild pigeons what were they? Cr Atv: 
Tue Forest AND STREAM may be obtained from 
any newsdealer on order. Ask your dealer to 
supply you regularly. 
The Alligator. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
If you can so stretch your imaginations, trans- 
port yourselves to a land of swamps and jungles 
where shallow lakes and cypress ponds abound, 
and deep narrow bayous creep sluggishly be- 
tween banks overhung by giant live oaks heavily 
draped with Spanish moss, hanging in sombre 
gray festoons, often to the water’s edge. Here 
are found flocks of snowy herons, egrets and 
night herons, known locally as _grosbec, and by 
the natives esteemed as game. Here, too, is the 
wood ibis or flamingo and another variety of 
ibis known as buroach. This is the chosen home 
of the crocodile of our western world, and here 
he can best be hunted for use or sport. In Louis- 
jana alligators have an immense extent of im- 
penetrable swamps, lagoons, small bayous and 
cypress ponds where they breed, and were it 
not that in the same regions soft shell turtles 
and buffalo fish, their usual food, are still more 
prolific, they would doubtless, emboldened by 
hunger, become more dangerous to man than 
they are. 
The alligator not only catches its prey by 
knocking it over with its tail, but its breath will 
paralyze a fish, so that it will die in a few 
minutes; a fact which I believe is not generally 
known. The alligator, like the beaver, makes 
holes in the banks of streams, beginning below 
the surface of the water, and enlarging and ris- 
ing under ground until above average flood tides. 
There they eat their prey at leisure and spend 
the winter months, occasionally coming out on 
fine days to bask in the sun. They also find suit- 
able dens in hollow cypress trees, the entrance 
thereto being also under water. Their nests are 
usually on the borders of some pond, and are 
made of leaves, sticks and mud, and contain a 
half bushel or more of nearly round eggs about 
the size of goose eggs. The natives of Louisiana 
say that alligators will fight for their nests and 
young, and at such times are dangerous. I once 
found a nest on the border of a pond in my 
plantation. I was accompanied in my walk_by 
a twelve-year-old boy and a young man. We 
had our guns, and as soon as we discovered the 
nest we prepared ourselves for a contest, as the 
young man said the ’gator would certainly attack 
us, and might catch us in the thicket if she saw 
us, but fortunately the matronly saurian was 
away from home. There was a small sapling 
that had been cut down, whose bushy top lay in 
the thicket beyond and behind my companions 
as they were inspecting the nest. By getting 
hold of the body of the sapling I rattled the top, 
at the same time yelling, “Look out!” and I 
speedily had the nest to myself, but my laughter 
was cut short by a splash in the water, and the 
head of the angry alligator showed itself coming 
toward me. I lowered my rifle and fired. With 
a splash and a snort she turned and disappeared 
in the green scum of the pond. The nest con- 
tained forty eggs with lively young ‘gators in 
them about six inches long. 
The young grow very rapidly, and from June 
to October will attain to twelve pounds in weight 
and three feet in length. I know of one being 
killed in a pond in the Tombigbee bottom near 
Columbus in this State that was thirteen and a 
half feet long. The pond was covered with ice 
thick enough to bear the weight of those who 
killed it with axes. It was not torpid with cold, 
as might have been expected, and made a fierce 
ficht. It was observed that it could not remain 
long under water, but would break through the 
ice to get air, being evidently too far north for 
comfort. The largest alligators I have met were 
females, though I have heard the bellowing of 
some males that had-the voice of a grown per- 
son. When much hunted they become wild and 
cowardly. An educated ’gator is a match for 
the patience and skill of the average hunter. In 

