Twenty-Seven Years in Canada West - The Experience of an Early Settler (Volume I) by Samuel Strickland
page 222 of 232 (95%)
page 222 of 232 (95%)
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CHAPTER XXII.
VISIT OF THE PASSENGER-PIGEON TO THE CANADAS. -- CANADIAN BLACKBIRDS. - - BREEDING-PLACES OF THE PASSENGER-PIGEONS. -- SQUIRRELS. THE passenger-pigeon* visits the Canadas in the early spring-months, and during August, in immense flocks, bringing with them an agreeable change in the diet of the settler. [* The passenger-pigeon is not so large as the wild pigeon of Europe. It is slender in form, having a very long-forked tail. Its plumage is a bluish-grey, and it has a lovely pink breast. It is, indeed, a very elegant bird.] Persons unacquainted with the country and the gregarious habits of this lovely bird, are apt to doubt the accounts they have heard or read respecting their vast numbers: since my return to England I have repeatedly been questioned upon the subject. In answer to these queries, I can only say that, in some parts of the province, early in the spring and directly after wheat-harvest, their numbers are incredible. Some days they commence flying as soon as it is light in the morning, and continue, flock after flock, till sun-down. To calculate the sum-total of birds passing even on one day, appears to be impossible. I think, the greatest masses fly near the shores of the great Canadian lakes, and sometimes so low, that they may be easily killed with a horse-pistol, or even knocked down with a long pole. During the first spring in which I resided at Goderich, the store- keeper was out of shot, and the pigeons happened to be uncommonly numerous. I had a large fowling-piece with a wide bore; so I tried a |
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