we should destroy
all the Hawks, Owls, wild cats, foxes, skunks, {118} snakes, and other
predatory creatures, it is an open question whether in the long run our
game birds would be the gainers thereby.

Some time ago I visited a large game farm in one of the Southern
States, where for several years the owner had been engaged in raising
English Ring-necked Pheasants. The gamekeeper stated that there were
about six thousand of these brilliantly coloured birds on the preserve
at that time. He also pointed with pride to an exhibit on the walls of
a small house. An examination showed that the two sides and one end of
this building were thickly decorated with the feet of Hawks, Crows,
Owls, domestic cats, minks, weasels, and other creatures that were
supposed to be the enemies of Pheasants. Two men were employed on the
place to shoot and trap at all seasons, and the evidences of their
industry were nailed up, to let all men see that the owner of the big
game farm meant to allow no wild bird or animal to fatten on his game
birds.

A year later I again visited the same preserve and {119} found great
lamentation. More than five thousand Pheasants had been swept away by
disease within a few weeks. Is it going too far to say that the gunmen
and trappers had overdone their work? So few Hawks or Owls or foxes
had been left to capture the birds first afflicted, that these had been
permitted to associate with their kind and to pass on weakness and
disease to their offspring until the general health tone of the whole
Pheasant community had become lowered. In the end five-sixths of the
birds had succumbed to the devastations of disease.

All birds have their part to play in the great economy of the earth,
and it is a dangerous experiment to upset the balance of Nature.

{120}

CHAPTER VII

CIVILIZATION'S EFFECT ON THE BIRD SUPPLY

Twelve hundred kinds of wild birds have been positively identified in
North America. About one-third of this number are called sub-species,
or climatic varieties. To illustrate the meaning of "sub-species," it
may be stated that in Texas the plumage of the Bob-White is lighter in
colour than the plumage of the typical eastern Bob-White, which was
first described to science; therefore, the Texas bird is known as a
sub-species of the type. Distributed through North America are
nineteen sub-species of the eastern Song Sparrow. These vary from the
typical bird by differences in size and