blush for?

Is there in those fifteen states _nothing_ too beautiful or too good to
go into the pot?

* * * * *

THE WOODCOCK _(Philohela minor)_, is a bird regarding which my
bird-hunting friends and I do not agree. I say that as a species it is
steadily disappearing, and presently will become extinct, unless it is
accorded better protection. They reply: "Well, I can show you where
there are woodcock yet!"

A few months ago a Nova Scotian writer in _Forest and Stream_ came out
with the bold prediction that three more years of the usual annual
slaughter of woodcock will bring the species to the verge of extinction
in that Province.

It is such occurrences as this that bring the end of a species:

"Last fall [1911, at Norwalk, Conn.] we had a good flight of woodcock,
and it is a shame the way they were slaughtered. I know of a number of
cases where twenty were killed by one gun in the day, and heard of one
case of fifty. This is all wrong, and means the end of the woodcock, if
continued. There is no doubt we need a bag limit on woodcock, as much as
on quail or partridge." ("Woodcock" in _Forest and Stream_, Mar. 2,
1912.)

As far back as 1901, Dr. A.K. Fisher of the Biological Survey predicted
that the woodcock and wood-duck would both become extinct unless better
protected. As yet, the better protection demanded has not materialized
to any great extent.

Says Mr. Forbush, State Ornithologist of Massachusetts, in his admirable
"Special Report," p. 45:

"The woodcock is decreasing all over its range in the East, and needs
the strongest protection. Of thirty-eight Massachusetts reports,
thirty-six state that "woodcock are decreasing," "rare" or "extinct,"
while one states that they are holding their own, and one that they are
increasing slightly since the law was passed prohibiting their sale."

Let not any honest American or Canadian sportsman lullaby himself into
the belief that the woodcock is safe from extermination. As sure as the
world, it is _going_! The fact that a little pocket here or there
contains a few birds does not in the slightest degree disprove the main
fact. If the sportsmen of this country desire to save the seed stock of
woodcock, they must give it _everywhere_ five or ten-year close seasons,
and _do it immediately_!

OUR SHORE BIRDS IN GENERAL.--This group of game birds will be the first
to be exterminated in North America as a _group_. Of all our bird