The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1906-03-06
PROTECTING BIRDS
AUDUBON SOCIETY ACQUIRES as
ISLANDS
Largest Bird-Breeding Preserve in the
World-Heretofore Millions Of
Wings Have Been Shipped
From These Islands.

Wild grass-covered islands, number
ing twenty-five, embracing 1000 acres,
and with capacity for breeding 3,000,-
600 to 100000 birds year, have been
acquired by the Audubon Society, of
Louisiana, just off the Louisiana Coast,
in the Gulf of Mexico.
They comprise the largest bird
breeding preserves in the world. Paid
wardens patrol the preserves, careful
ly guard them during the Matching
1t is expected that over 100000 terms
will be raised in one year alone.
With the limited machinery of the
society in operation over 100000 birds
we're raised and protected in 1905.
One island produced $4,000.
There are three groups of islands
now dedicated to one purpose-Bre-
ton Island Reservation, owned by the
United States Government, the largest
of which is Breton Island, six miles in
length, the seventeen islands obtained
from the Lake Bergne Levee Board on
ten-year lease for a rental of $45
per year, and Bastledore Island and
its keys, obtained by purchase from
the State of Louisiana, embracing
about one thousand acres. The So
ciety paid 25 cents per acre.
The islands rise only a few feet
above the sea. They are covered with
sea grass and species of saltwater
reeds. They present barren waste,
desolate and dreary. No human being
was ever known to live on one of
them, although bird hunters have for
years frequented the reservation to
kill the birds for their beautiful plum
age.
Getting the eggs and killing the
terms and laughing gulls for large
millinery houses in the East has been
thriving business ON this coast until
the Audubon Society finally secured
possession of the preserves and pro-
tected the game Millions of wings
have been shipped from these islands,
and as high as 100000 eggs in a sea-
son have gone to st. Louis, Mo-,
where they are used in the manufac-
ture of the delicate films on photo
graph plates.
So persistent is the demand for the
wing feathers certain New York whole
sale millinery establishments offered
the natives on this coast the fabulous
price of $50 in gold per ounce for the
plumage of the white heron and rs
cents each for the wings of the terms.
The birds bred on these islands are
laughing gulls, shear waters, white
herons, Wilson's terms, Fosters terms,
royal terms and Caspian terms.
They lay their eggs on the sand and
shells-no covering whatever. The fe-
male birds set on them there, the
sun having as much to do with the
Matching as anything else. AS soon
as the young birds come from the
shells they are fed along the beach,
and soon catch their own supply of
small fish. The millions of birds that
infest the place have caused the island
to become the great breeding places
for raccoons, the animals burrowing
in the grass and sand, as there are nc
trees for their dens.
The Audubon Society has just let
exclusive privileges to a number of
| trained and professional trappers of
the Louisiana swamps to catch the
'coons on the islands, and assure them
protection and exclusive grants. It
will be the first time that any human
beings have attempted TO live ON the
islands. 1t is expected that fully
5000 'coons will be trapped on the
| islands, the process being practiced
every winter until the preserves are
free from them. The trappers will
make big money from the furs.