I believe that six wild pigeons were actually seen in the latter part of April of 1905 near Vanderbilt, Mich., by this George King. I have tested his honesty and truthfulness time and time again. He told me he was seated in the branches of an apple tree when he saw six wild pigeons alight in another tree near him. He kept perfectly still and watched their movements for about thirty minutes. They flew from the old tree in which they had alighted, underneath a beech tree and began feeding on beech nuts from the ground. He says he heard them call and they made the same old crowing call of the wild pigeon. He was close to them; he is perfectly familiar with the dove and knows that these six were Passenger Pigeons. King has for many years lived in the section that formerly was the great pigeon nesting and feeding ground of northern Michigan.
Michigan Agricultural College,
July 14, '05.
Dear Sir:—I have been away for the past three weeks and find your letter of June 27 here on my return. The photographs sent you were those of the Passenger Pigeon and the Carolina dove, the one of the two birds being intended to show relative size and appearance. It was taken from two of the best specimens in the museum, placed at exactly the same distance from the camera so that the picture shows the comparative size exactly. The birds being so similar in general appearance, the smaller one looks as if it were further away than the larger, and this, I think, shows clearly how impossible it is for the ordinary observer to discriminate between these two species when seen separately in the field. Of course a mixed flock would be a different proposition, but so far as I know the two species never mingle, and, at least in this State, it is an unusual thing to find the Carolina dove in large compact flocks such as are characteristic of the Passenger Pigeon. In several cases, however, during August and September I have seen large scattered flocks of the Carolina dove which were feeding on weed seeds and grain in open fields, and which when disturbed, gathered into small bands of twenty to fifty each and flew and perched very much like Passenger Pigeons. In one case I saw at least five hundred Carolina doves acting this way, and had hard work to convince a sportsman friend of mine that they were not Passenger Pigeons. Finally, after getting directly under a small tree on which a dozen or more were perched, he was able to see that characteristic black dot on the side of the neck, and was also able to estimate more correctly the actual size of the birds.
Yours very truly,
Walter B. Burrows,
Professor of Zoology.
Agricultural College,
Ingham Co., Mich., June 17, 1905.
Mr. W. B. Mershon, Saginaw, Mich.