The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-02-24
KIRK MUNRO'S VIEWS
FAMOUS WRITER WANTS A ELORE-
 DA CAME LAW.
Issues . Strong Statement on Folly of State Permitting Continued
 Slaughter of Hts


 State Game and Fish Commissioner John H. Wallace has received 2. copy of a paper written by Kirk Munro. President of the Florida Audubon Society, which he considers one of the best arguments in favor of the preser- vation of birds and game he has ever seen.
 "Few people really realize the i'm portance of protecting our birds" said MT. Wallace. .'and Mir. Munroe has set 1t forth more strongly than any one l have seem recently"
 Mir Monro's statement: is as follows:
 Florida is pre-eminently an agricul- tural State, and fruit-raistng is it's chief industry. The hardest fight Of the fruit grower is against the hordes of insects, aphides. ants. bugs. beetles, caterpilIars. grasshoppers. flies and grubs that devote their entire energies not only to the destruction of his crop, but of his trees. which they attack in leaf, bark and root. He fights, them with sprays, washes and fumigations, and perhaps succeeds in destroying one beetle out of q thousand. one aphis in a million, and one ant of each billion His efforts are expensive. more or less injurious, and ridiculous in their inet- ficiency. In spite of them he would quickly be driven out of business were 1t not for an army of trained allies. alert sharpeyed. tlreiess. and eager to devote their time to his service without pay, ss ss.
 I mean, of course. the birds. without which our fair State would quickly be< come not only non productive. but ab- solutely uninhabitable. A noted French scientist has declared that without birds to check the ravages of insects, human life would vanish from this planet within the short space ofenire years; and I venture the prediction that in half that time no one could live in Florida were our birds suddenly to leave for places where their services are better appreciated
 In our inconcelvable folly we of Florida never hesitate to kill a bird. if seized with an inclination to do so. A little gray-coated chap, Hitting from tree to tree, in search of the insects that are sapping their life, offers a tempting mark, and we blaze away al himS with twenty-two rifle just to see if we can hit him. To kill him is such an expensive form of amusement that it would be more economical to charge our rifle with a golden bullet and fire 1t into the sea- A fruit-grower spies a. red-bellied wood-pecker examining his ripening peaches, and instantly declares war of extermination against the whole family. He had better retire from business at once and save the further expense of caring for his orchard; for without the expert aid of the wood-' peckers his efforts can only result in failure. g,
 A boy is allowed to catch a young mockingb bird. or a red-bird, and sell tt to a tourist for fifty cents. The state is made at least one hundred dollars poorer by the act. It would be cheaper in the end to give away golden birds of the same weight.
 A meadow lark, or each one of a covey of quail, in ten-acre tomato: field, earns ten dollars In a single season as an nsect-destroyer. Yet we not only shoot these birds ourselves. but we invite our friends from far and wide to come and help us destroy them as though they were g pest we are desirous to abate.
 Besides the insectivorous birds upon whose efforts we are absolutely de- pendent for success in every branch of agriculture, there are those of ines timable value as tourist attractore-- was there ever,a Northerner in Florida, who did not listen eagerly for his first mocking-b bird song. or watch with de- light the fishing of a pelican? Is he not willing to spend money for the sight of a flamingo, roseate spoon bill. or woodibis? and, does he not ex- claim with pleasure at flashing glimpse of a parrakeet. or a nonpareil2 He is willing to pay liberafly for such sights as these, and We have given him just cause to complain of the ab- sence of bird life along our coasts and inland waterways. A few years ago these swarmed with birds whose move ments were of the greatest Interest to our winter visitors. Now they are silent and deserted, despoiled of chief attraction by plume and skin hunters who have robbed us without so much as saying thank you"
 | We take every precaution to prevent thief from stealing even the most trifling of our possessions, and at the same time make no effort to dissuade the gunner from shooting the birds upon whose existence depends our very livelihood. Queer, isn't 1t?