Nature Books

IMPORTANCE OF RODENT GROUPS. As the serious character of the depredations by harmful rodents is recognized, State, Federal, and private expenditures for their control increase year by year. These depredations include not only the attacks by introduced rats and mice on food materials stored in granaries, warehouses, commercial establishments, docks, and private houses, but also, particularly in the... more...

PREFACE Mushrooms and their extensive and profitable culture should concern every one. For home consumption they are a healthful and grateful food, and for market, when successfully grown, they become a most profitable crop. We can have in America the best market in the world for fresh mushrooms; the demand for them is increasing, and the supply has always been inadequate. The price for them here is... more...

BIRD SONG. T SHOULD not be overlooked by the young observer that if he would learn to recognize at once any particular bird, he should make himself acquainted with the song and call notes of every bird around him. The identification, however, of the many feathered creatures with which we meet in our rambles has heretofore required so much patience, that, though a delight to the enthusiast, few have... more...

THE BLUEBIRD It is sure to be a bright March morning when you first hear the bluebird's note; and it is as if the milder influences up above had found a voice and let a word fall upon your ear, so tender is it and so prophetic, a hope tinged with a regret. There never was a happier or more devoted husband than the male bluebird. He is the gay champion and escort of the female at all times, and... more...

In his excellent taxonomic treatment of the tree squirrels of Mexico and Central America, Nelson (Proc. Washington Acad. Sci., 1:15-110, 2 pls., May 9, 1899) recognized three subspecies of red-bellied squirrels, Sciurus aureogaster aureogaster F. Cuvier, Sciurus aureogaster hypopyrrhus Wagler, and Sciurus aureogaster frumentor Nelson. In his lists of specimens examined, Nelson (op. cit.:42 and 44)... more...

CHAPTER 1. SUPPLY AND DEMAND. For years there has been a belief that the supply of fur-bearing animals would soon be inadequate to the demand. This belief is well founded and is apparent when the fact is known that the natural haunts and homes of the fur-producing animals are becoming less each year. The draining of swamps and marshes is destroying the homes and breeding places of muskrat and to a... more...

The Freedom of the Black-faced Ram n the top of Ringwaak Hill the black-faced ram stood motionless, looking off with mild, yellow eyes across the wooded level, across the scattered farmsteads of the settlement, and across the bright, retreating spirals of the distant river, to that streak of scarlet light on the horizon which indicated the beginning of sunrise. A few paces below him, half-hidden by a... more...

FOREWORD "And in the lion or the frog—In all the life of moor or fen—In ass and peacock, stork and dog,He read similitudes of men." More and more science is being taught in a new way. More and more men are beginning to discard the lumber of the brain's workshop to get at real facts, real conclusions. Laboratories, experiments, tables, classifications are all very vital and all very... more...

Preface. I have been called upon to write illustrative sketches to a series of engravings, designed by an eminent artist. In performing my part of the work I have thrown the Mammalia into twenty-four groups—corresponding more or less to the picture designs—and have dwelt chiefly on the geographical distribution of the animals. The Cetaceae and Vespertilionidae are properly omitted. In the groups... more...

BABY BIRDS. "Ears have they, but they hear not," may be said of all the world. Tragedies and comedies go on continually before us which we neither see nor hear; cries of distress and prattle of infants, songs of love and screams of war, alike fall upon deaf ears, while we calmly discuss the last book or the news from Borriboo-lah-Gha, as completely oblivious as if all this stirring life did not... more...