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THE WICKEDNESS AND FOLLY OF KILLING BIRDS

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Sep 11, 1901

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 27, No. 37.

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THE WICKEDNESS AND FOLLY OF KILLING BIRDS.

By Charles Dennison Kellogg

[Charles Dennison Kellogg, in Success.]
The thinking people of this country are gradually awakening to the fact that the mania for killing birds, which has existed for over a century, needs a substantial check to prevent the absolute extermination of the feathered friends of humanity.
The first intimation that something would have to be done to protect American animal life, was the rude shock caused by the announcement that the vast herds of bison were no more,—and the pitiful and abortive effort of the government to protect a few isolated specimens in Yellowstone Park. In the past five years, a similar sentiment has led to the creation of the Adirondack Park in New York, and much-needed restrictive legislation for the protection of deer.
What statistician will compute, what orator will present, and what legislators will provide the data, formulate the bills, and pass the laws necessary to save the wondrous bird-life of this continent from the fate of the bison and the deer?
The economic value,—the appeal to sordid commercial ideas, even if no phase of humanity should be reached in this age of commercialism,—should speedily bring about the passage of laws protecting bird-life.
Come out into the woods with me, and watch a pair of busy wrens or a hundred other birds as they toil from daybreak until sunset—and sometimes later. Try to count the number of trips they make during the day, and estimate, if you can, the quantity of destructive insects that is required as food for the family. You will find yourself growing tired of counting, and will gradually multiply the insects brought in at each trip by seconds, minutes, hours, and days, until the number will appall you. Then you will have a new idea of nature’s law of compensation; you will begin to realize that the birds you imagined were such a menace to your berries, cherries, apples, and other fruits, are really the protectors—and you can thank them for every sound, wholesome piece of fruit that is marketed, and also for the product of your flower and vegetable gardens.
If any of the sportsmen who pose before the public with records for having wantonly killed quail, grouse, and reed birds, could be made to see nature in the manner God meant they should see it; if they could study the charming domesticity of bird-life, or could realize the love that the parent bird bears to its young, they would never kill another bird. Birds do not sit quietly on their nests caring for their young all day; they have just as much work to do as any housewife, and they caress their babies just as often as any human mother.
If any woman who proudly displays a beautiful aigrette on a new bonnet could know the slaughter each of those plumes represents, she would never wear another. The plume is worn by the bird only when it is in its wedding dress—during the mating and nesting season. The bird can be more easily reached when returning to its nest. So the plume hunters wait until they catch it flying home; then they kill it, carve the plume out of the back, and the young birds die of cold or hunger. Each aigrette represents the slaughter of from four to six birds.
In the name of science, large numbers of birds, birds’ skins, and eggs are gathered for the purpose of study. It is claimed that this is necessary, in order to distinguish the different varieties of one family. But this is a mistake. Let the man of science leave his gun at home, let his heart be filled with love for the birds instead of the desire of possession, and he will find that he can get just as close to a bird as is necessary for study; that a mother bird will permit him to go right up to her nest and stroke her on the back just as one would stroke an old hen. A bird knows and feels the love that is in one’s heart. I have often taken friends and skeptical people into the woods, and never have I failed to show them the same results when there were no antagonistic minds present.
No words of mine can describe the thrill that comes over one when, for the first time, he feels the fearless love birds and animals have for us, when we assume the proper mental attitude—that of love, and cleanse ourselves of a desire to capture or kill.
Of all animated beings beneath mankind, the bird is the most innocent—the nearest akin to Eden. Open your Bible and see how these aerial spirits flit across its pages. It was a bird that Noah sent forth from the ark to learn whether a safe landing might be made. A raven fed Elijah, and Christ not only made frequent reference to birds in the parables, but declared that not even a sparrow falls without the knowledge of the Father in heaven.
And we Americans, practical and sentimental, chose the eagle as the symbol of our national glory.
Do I need to say more? Will not public sentiment, all powerful in this land, crystallize into legislation for the protection of birds?