The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1892-05-01
LOST BIRDS AND BEASTS.

An interesting communication in the
columns of local contemporary few days
ago, relates to the birds of Utah, which are
shown to be far more numerous and OF
greater variety than might be thought of
mountainous aud arid region. But the
feathered population of any section is not
always the same in kind. Doubtless the
writer, who appears to have been so OBJ
| servant of the habits of birds, if he has
been long resident of the territory, has
noticed many changes in the constitution
Of this population as well as in their num-
bers.
| There are few men of fifty years or more
that came hither from the middle states,
who cannot recall the pigeon flights in the
days of their youth when, in the fall of the
year, one vast field of pigeons after another
would in succession pass overhead towards
the south nearly the whole day long for q
week. There were localities in the forests
of Missouri, Indiana and Kentucky that had
been pigeon roosts as far back as could be
remembered, and in these the flocks settled
down at sunset in such masses, that often
the locality would resound with the crash
of failing limbs and the tumult of futter-
ing birds.
Civilization has caused the pigeons to
disappear. Their breeding grounds and
roosting places have been turned into
farms, they have been deprived of the food
they once suDsisted on, and field of pig
! cons several acres in extent, such rs could
be seen hundred times dsy forty years
ago, is never seen at all. The cranes and
wild geese were the high-Ayers Of the pig
con days. The smaller birds were per-
United to monoPolize the level just above
? the tall tree tops, while the more aspiring
waders and swimmers winged their figh
from the cold waters Of the north to tht
silent lakes. lagoons and rivers of southern
climes. But the cranes and wild geese
have disappeared. too, or almost so, ant
the sky is now rarely trianguleted with tbs
V-shaped focks whose return in the early
, spring was 6 sign that the backbone O.
= winter was broken.
D When we feel like lamenting the loss o.
these birds, we are reminded of the disap-
pearance Of another and nobler gam,
which could not live side by side with civil
izstion-the buffalo of the plains. Les
1 than twenty years ago these animals wer,
so numerous that the railroad trains wer
forced at times to halt while the herd
crossed the tracks. They still claimed tn
plains as their domain by right of pre-
emption and settlement, and when tn
multitudes began to drift towards tn
I, south in the fall or the north in the spring
even the fierce locomotives had to Civ
them the right-of-way and wait till tn
last animal had passed. 1t was no uncom
J. mon sight to see from the windows of
l. passenger car the plain on one side covere
9 to the horizon with buffalo quietly grazing
: undisturbed by the rush Of the train or tn
r shrek Of the engine.
?, But the buffaloes have vanished like q
Is Illusion. The whiteman wanted the plain
y for his cattle and himself, and the buffal
IL had to move oil in the tracks of the II
y dams who preceded them and who, ssvag
though they be, were less unkind than tt
70 pale faces who slaughtered them by tt
D. thousands for their hides. A few, yer
ss few, shriveled lunches are still to be four
in some of the mountain valleys along Il
northern boundary, but they also are val
. ishing, and in few years the haitian
animals protected by the government
Yellowstone Park win be all that is left
ed the countless thousands that once occupi
Oh the great region between the Mississip
20. river and the Rocky mountains.