2 THE A UD iU’BiO No Boul ieee 
Recently, the Pentagon gave a contract to a midwest firm to prepare 
a report on the use and effect of the herbicides, which the Department of 
Defense has used so indiscriminately in Vietnam. The report cost $69,000. 
The spraying cost $167,000,000, but the spraying came first. This is typical— 
spray first and research later. 
The military mind is the same the whole world over—spend and spend, 
tax and tax, destroy and destroy. When Dr. Roger Tory Peterson last 
visited us at the Field Museum of Natural History, he made a moving 
appeal for the preservation of tiny Aldabra Island off the coast of Africa. 
This miniscule area, 260 miles northwest of Madagascar, is simply a large 
coral atoll, but the British government planned to build an airstrip and 
radio station there. Happily, the British military funds ran out and, faced 
with a financial crisis, they abandoned the idea. Dr. Peterson called upon 
the military-industrial complex to cease blundering our way off this planet. 
Aldabra is the home of the flightless rail, the giant land tortoise, green 
turtles, and thousands of frigatebirds fly over it. Dr. Peterson suggested 
that “we must shout from the housetops to wake up the small band of 
powerful men in big business and big government who rule our lives by 
their closed committee decisions.” He also blasted the SST—the sonic 
boom planes which could have a most enormous and disasterous effect on 
wildlife and humans. 
NOTES FROM THE NEST: Bumper 
stickers reading “Save Allerton 
Park” are now available from the 
Regional Office of the Illinois Audu- 
bon Society at 1017 Burlington 
Ave., Downers Grove, Ill. 60515. 
Twenty-five cents in coin will 
bring you one postpaid ... DuPage 
County has agreed to place trash 
barrels on a temporary basis along 
the Illinois Prairie Path. If they 
are not abused by local residents 
as depositories for their personal 
garbage, the trash cans will con- 
tinue to be used as an aid to hikers 
and cyclists ... The Scenic Hudson 
Preservation Conference (500 Fifth 
Ave., NYC) has blasted the report 
of the Examiner for the Federal 
Power Commission which recom- 
mends that Consolidated Edison of 
NY be permitted to build a world 
record hydro-electric plant at Storm 
King Mountain, the northern bast- 
ion of the famed Hudson River 
Gorge. The Conference feels it will 
again go to court on the battle to 
save the Highlands Senator 
Ralph Yarborough of Texas, has 
urged the Conservation Federation 
of Texas and the Texas Ornitholo- 
gical Society to continue their ef- 
forts for at least a 100,000-acre na- 
tional park for the famed Big 
Thicket. The NPS proposal calls 
for only 35,500 acres. The area is 
noted for the rare Ivory-Billed 
Woodpecker; it was featured in a 
recent issue of the National Audu- 
bon Magazine ... The Bureau of 
Public Roads has come under é 
nation-wide attack for its directive 
to state highway departments tc 
remove trees within 30 feet of 4 
public highway. It has since modi- 
fied this proposal. Conservatior 
groups are urging state highway 
departments to ignore the directive. 
In a study of 507 vehicle accidents. 
trees were involved in only 13 ac- 
cidents. Vehicles were more likely 
to hit traffic signals and guard 
posts and information signs 
The National Park Service has is- 
