The Passenger Pigeon WB Mershon Jackson Chambers 9781546428688 Books
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This special re-print edition of W.B. Mershon's book “The Passenger Pigeon” provides information on the rise, fall and eventual extinction of the legendary Passenger Pigeon. Written in 1907, only a few years before the last living Passenger Pigeon perished from this earth, in the decades previously, these birds could once be counted in the billions on the North American continent. Mr. Mershon, who had a lifelong fascination with these birds, starts with some of the earliest written accounts of them when they appeared in flocks so large that they could block out the sun and travels forward in time until the birds had completely vanished from the wild and had been reduced to a few specimens living in zoos. Note This edition is a perfect facsimile of the original edition and is not set in a modern typeface. As a result, some type characters and images might suffer from slight imperfections or minor shadows in the page background.
The Passenger Pigeon WB Mershon Jackson Chambers 9781546428688 Books
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The Passenger Pigeon WB Mershon Jackson Chambers 9781546428688 Books Reviews
Old William Butts Mershon Jr. came into age just as the old road was rapidly aging.In this book he wrote in 1906, published 1907, he begins with an indignation that the buffalo is gone, all our fault. He is going to tell you his childhood fun with passenger pigeons and then lambast us for exterminating them, but first he sets you on the road that doesn't blame him, in his book "My 50 Years Hunting & Fishing", in which he decries the disappearance of the grayling fish from Michigan's cold rivers north of his parents' first sawmill in Saginaw, brags how his daddy then brought trout to these fish-less rivers, then how he and 3 friends got 6,000 in 6 days. One page he'd be rambling on about how much venison Michigan shipped to New York, the next, the massive amounts of fish he can catch because it wouldn't be there at all if daddy hadn't put it there (I'm sure Michigan money was keeping the trout there but it was all his, all his, and soon, the rivers were really depleted.) In this book he tells you about a bird you'll never see-for example,you may see a drawing of one but not know that, "The most remarkable chaacteristic of these birds is their associating together, both in their original migration, & also during the period of incubation, in such prodigious numbers, as almost to surpass belief; and which has no parallel among any other of the feathered tribes on the face of the earth, which with all naturalists are acquainted." He explains that the birds have roosting places, in the woods, sometimes occupying large areas of forest, where the pigeon repairs after feasting on beechnuts all day elsewhere--their roost is an old section of beeches they've consumed every nut of. The appearance of such a roost after the bird has frequented it is surprising, he says. The ground is covered to a depth of several inches with their dung; all the tender grass and underwood destroyed, the surface strewn with large tree limbs which fell from the weight of the birds clustering one above another, and the trees killed as if girdled with an axe. For years after, no vegetable made an appearance...When discovered, these roosts were visited at night by creatures with guns, clubs, long poles, pots of sulphur,who within hours had filled many sacks,loaded their horses with them. In Kentucky the inhabitants came to a 6 mile-by 40-mile stand of breeders, almost every tree furnished with nests wherever they'd fit. When the young had grown but not left the nest the townspeople came in wagons with beds,axes,cooking utensils,& as Mershon put it " many of them accompanied by the greater part of their families", "encamped for several days at this immense nursury. Several...told me that the noise in the woods(terrified) their horses, that it was difficult for one person to hear another speak without bawling in his ear. " The ground was strewn with limbs, eggs, "young squab pigeons, which had been precipitated from above, and on which herds of hogs were fattening." Hawks, buzzards, & eagles "were sailing about in great numbers, seizing the sqabs fron their nests at pleasure, while from 20 feet up to the tree tops the view through the woods presented a perpetual tumolt of crowding and fluttering multitudes of pigeons, their wings soaring like thunder, mingled with the frequent crash of falling timber; for now the ax-men were at work cutting down those trees that seemed to be the most crowded with nests and contrived to fell them in such a manner that in their descent they might bring down several others, by which means the falling of one large tree could produce 200 squabs, almosy one mass of fat." On some single trees upwards of 100 nests were found, each containing one young only. He tells how the nests were so carelessly put together you could see the growing baby through the bottom. The babies would run together on the ground in packs seeking food and a person told Merschon he once rode into a "rolling multitude" of baby pigeons and picked up 13 pigeons which had been trampled to death by his horses' feet. (Remember Mershon is writing at the turn of the century, as it is evident in his sentence structure and the implements in his tales!)
He says the passing of the passenger pigeon is different than seeing the passing of the deer, buffalo, and elk--those were indiginous, pigeons were continental.He notes that around 1840 we commenced netting them for market.These men banded together so were called professional pigeoners. They kept in telegraphic communication with these great moving bodies of pigeons. They called down passing flocks with trained stool-pigeons and flyers;secured as many by net as they could pack in ice and ship (1848, ---80 tons shipped from a N.Y.county,1878,--300 tons from Michigan,all caught during brooding season, which decreased numbers even more).
It takes some figuring to realize that while Mershon wrote this book, its chapters include articles by Audubon and several other writers, and one is titled, "as James Fenimoore Cooper Called It." Other chapters include "My Boyhood Among the Pigeons", "The Passenger Pigeon" from 'American Ornitholgy' by Alexander Wilson, "The Passenger Pigeon" from 'Ornithological Biography', by John James Audubon, "The Wild Pigeon of North America" by Chief Pokagon, in 'The Chautauquan',"The Passenger Pigeon" (from 'Life Histories of North American Birds,' by Charles Bendire,"Netting the Pigeons"(by William Brewster, in '"The Auk'), Efforts to Check the Slaughter, " by H. B. Roney, "The Pigeon Butcher's Defense", by E. T. Martin, in 'American Field', "Notes of a Vanished Industry", "Recollections of Old-Timers", "The Last of the Pigeons",etc. People who wonder about this man's proclivity for being where 6,000 trout were caught in 6 days by 3 men while he sounds off for catch-and -release get a semi-idea in his previous book, which tells of his love of camping and hunting gear; he does not disappoint here, spending paragraphs describing his get-up as the youngest pigeon-hunter out there,the leather pouch with his shiny bullets in it... the male loved to hunt and fish, and he felt it was the commercialization of our game that was depeting us of it. But yet he could not help unloading the raw figures on us, whether they prevented him from trying to build a case for the individual hunter or not. "Young men who are now hunting for something to shoot and wondered what has become of our game,must hear with anger...990,000 dozen pigeons were caught and shipped to NY in 3 years' time, in the next 2 years the same men caught and shipped a third more than that, 2 years later there shipped 5 carloads a day for 30 days, 8,250 dozen to the carload.." "Young man, if we had been restrained by laws of hunanity, you, too, could have enjoyed this sport for years to come." Mershon without any of the evidence people like Robert Hewitt will publish by 1945 is saying that the little guy, Joe Pigeon-Hunter, did not do the pigeons in.(Later a lot of studies of various birds and mammals will show that were man not allowed to hunt them the same amount would die, usually 50% of deaths are from the cold and 50% from predators-- the names of the predators would just differ--more young, unable-to-find-food raptors may die when man gets the food, but...)
It's this whole-saling of our game, our trees,which his family was right in there with the first mill rights to what would become 4 miles of mills on either side of the Saginaw River with all the logs from the deep forest of northern Michigan, the giant white pine, floating in so many groups boats had trouble turning around. His father was also right in there desiring a Game Commission or Warden whose position wasn't a political present owed but because he was the man for the job of preserving Michigan's riches.One who wouldn't take money to look away as a railroad car filled with iced venizon. And the Sr. Bill was effective in getting a Game warden position going,and stopping the posession of the 'spotted deer",the killing of 'deer run into water by dogs". Got trout to stock the rivers, which his son really partied hardy with, but the son did see what was unethical in our treamtment of our gane meat and told us so in a book, a book that assures us he wants to be an Indian with musket and ball as bad as you might, but let's get real. As for the catch-and-release and barbless hooks of today,he likes 6 fish in his frying pan-- luckily, today's youngsters are gasping at sight of 6 fish in a frying pan. Their sensibilities have been unconciously offended, from all that their parents and groups like Trout Unlimited teach them at fly clinics and the like. Mershon's on the cusp of those who got anything, any manner, for food, and those able to lock up such people as pigs.He stands on his side of the law more than on a moral stance. But the story can still apply to so much of how our country handles its problems. A whole lot of us saying the same thing is true and fair and fine at the same time,("Look what they're doing to my land!") no one in a control seat, though those who can see, warn; but they aren't even heard (maybe their books are too ambiguous?), and it all one day goes "pop!" or "BBOOMM!"--something's forever lost...and there's no choice, anymore._
I am delighted with this book as an introduction to the story of the Passenger Pigeon. I think it would be very suitable as a children's book, and adults will find it an enjoyable book as well. I highly recommend it.
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