That Herons are rapidly becoming scarce and more difficult to obtain by the plume-hunters is shown by the difference in price in the raw material. Twenty years since, the cost per ounce was only a few dollars, now it is more than quadrupled. In circulars sent by New York feather dealers to plume-hunters in Florida during 1903, thirty-two dollars per ounce was offered for fine plumes. This not only indicates the rapidly increasing scarcity of the white Herons but also that some dealers are willing, in order to obtain the plumes, to offer special inducements to hunters to violate laws enactd for the protection of these birds.
The much-sought-after plumes are worn by the Herons only for a very limited period during the year, that is, in the breeding season. Unfortunately, during that time the Herons gather in colonies; whether this is for protection or is merely social is not known. During the remainder of the year they are wild and wander over large disctricts, when it is impossible for plume-hunters to kill them in quantities that would afford pecuniary returns. However, during the breeding season the habits of these unfortunate birds change entirely,
-
‘SCALP’ OR RAW
PLUMES AS
TAKEN FROM BACK
OF BIRD -
PLUMES FROM EGRET: THE
‘STUB’ PLUME OF
COMMERCE -
PLUMES FROM BACK OF SNOWY
HERON: THE ‘AIGRETTE’
OR ‘OSPREY’ OF
COMMERCE
and with the growth of the parental instinct they lose all sense of fear or wilderness and the hunter has little trouble in securing his victims. The death of the parent birds entails the destruction of the helpless nestlings by the painful and lingering method of starvation.
Mr. Chapman says, in his ‘Birds of Eastern North America,’ “The destruction of these birds is an unpleasant subject. It is a blot on Florida’s history.” The blood stain is not on Florida alone but may be found in every part of the world. A few years more of reckless slaughter during the breeding season and the white Herons will be classed among the extinct birds, the number of which is far too rapidly increasing.
Dealers often state that ‘aigrettes’ are manufactured, but this is not so; man has never been able to imitate successfully these beautiful plumes; all that are offered for sale have been torn from the backs of the smaller white Herons. Even the stiff plumes, which are known in the trade as ‘stubs,’ are not manufactured but are the plumes of the larger species of white Herons.
Herons’ plumes are often sold as ‘ospreys’; this is simply another trade name used to disguise the fact that they are Herons’ plumes; the ‘Osprey’ of science is the Fish Hawk which produces no plumes of any kind.
Both ‘aigrettes’ and ‘stubs’ are dyed various colors, especially black; however, no matter what the tint of the plume when offered for sale at the milliners’, its original color when on the back of the Heron was white; the artificial color is merely in response to the dictates of fashion.
