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The following appeared in the Zoological Society Bulletin, for January, 1909, from Richard Walter Tomalin, of Sydney, N.S.W.: 

“In the subdistricts of Robertson and Kangaloon in the Illawarra district of New South Wales, what ten years ago was a waving mass of English cocksfoot and rye grass, which had been put in gradually as the dense vine scrub was felled and burnt off, is now a barren desert, and nine families out of every ten which were renting properties have been compelled to leave the district and take up other lands.  This is through the grubs having eaten out the grass by the roots.  Ploughing proved to be useless, as the grubs ate out the grass just the same.  Whilst there recently I was informed that it took three years from the time the grubs were first seen until to-day, to accomplish this complete devastation;. in other words, three years ago the grubs began work in the beautiful country of green mountains and running streams.

“The birds had all been ruthlessly shot and destroyed in that district, and I was amazed at the absence of bird life.  The two sub-districts I have mentioned have an area of about thirty square miles, and form a table-land about 1200 feet above sea level.”

The same kind of common sense that teaches men to go in when it rains, and keep out of fiery furnaces, teaches us that as a business proposition it is to man’s interest to protect the birds.  Make them plentiful and keep them so.  When we strike the birds, we hurt ourselves.  The protection of our insect-eating and seed-eating birds is a cash proposition,—­protect or pay.

Were I a farmer, no gun ever should be fired on my premises at any bird save the English sparrow and the three bad hawks.  Any man who would kill my friend Bob White I would treat as an enemy.  The man who would shoot and eat any of the song-birds, woodpeckers, or shorebirds that worked for me, I would surely molest.

Every farmer should post every foot of his lands, cultivated and not cultivated.  The farmer who does not do so is his own enemy; and he needs a guardian.

At this stage of wild life extermination, it is impossible to make our bird-protection laws too strict, or too far-reaching.  The remnant of our birds should be protected, with clubs and guns if necessary.  All our shore birds should be accorded a ten-year close season.  Don’t ask the gunners whether they will agree to it or not. Of course they will not agree to it,—­never!  But our duty is clear,—­to go ahead and do it!

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CHAPTER XXIV

GAME AND AGRICULTURE; AND DEER AS A FOOD SUPPLY

As a state and county asset, the white-tailed deer contains possibilities that as yet seem to be ignored by the American people as a whole.  It is quite time to consider that persistent, prolific and toothsome animal.