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Birding in the "Good" Old Days

by Mike Stiles

I was recently gifted several old bird references, Birds of the Pacific Slope of Los Angeles County (1898) by Joseph Grinnell, and several editions of The Condor, a major ornithological journal, edited by Grinnell, from 1907/08. It became readily apparent how the birding was drastically different those 100+ years ago.

Grinnell's book of Los Angeles County is barely recognizable. Many of the common and Latin names are different, and the taxonomic order ends with the bluebirds, with warblers following the sparrows for a few examples. A quick skim of the book reveals birds such as Calaveras Warbler (now Nashville), Lutescent and Dusky Warbler, now called Orange-crowned. The Dusky Warbler is now considered a race of the Orange-crowned, and occurs on the Channel Islands. And too, there is an old world bird named Dusky Warbler already, so the name couldn't stand.

One can find Cabanis's and Gairdners's Woodpeckers (Hairy and Downy), Intermediate Sparrow (one of the White-crowned races), Spurred Towhee (Spotted), and interestingly Stephen's Sparrow (now the red race of Fox Sparrow). Grinnell calls them common in the higher elevations. The "Red" Fox Sparrow is rare in our area these days.

The brief species accounts are also telling of the mindset of early ornithologists. In virtually every single case, the bird is known from a collection of either the skin or the egg set. "In July of '97," Grinnell recounts, "I took an adult female (Ruby-crowned Kinglet) which undoubtedly had a nest in the vicinity, probably with young."

Grinnell tells of shooting Sharp-shinned Hawks after dark and collecting egg sets of the "Pacific" Horned Owl even though he states the bird "…is becoming scarcer every year." He does not, (at least) admit to collecting the "tolerably common" California Vulture (Condor), which he says "is not by any means becoming extinct…and if they continue to be as shy as now, there is not much likelihood of their extermination very soon."

Ninety years later the only California Condors alive were in zoos, due in some part to the collection of egg sets which were advertised for sale or trade in Grinnell's journal The Condor.

I trust the irony above is not lost on the reader, but I vacillate between both sides of the debate here. I grant that these collections have added greatly to the knowledge of bird species, but I also wonder of the real validity of countless thousands of bird skins residing in dusty museum drawers, unseen but to the rare taxonomist.

Egg collecting was becoming controversial even in 1907. In a letter to the editor in one of the journals from March of that year, a Reverend Peabody very eloquently tries to defend the practice of egg collecting. He said that egg collectors have elevated themselves into all the ranks of the American Ornithologist's Union, and that the "acquiring of scientific data is the summon bonum (greatest good), thus the early erratic and impulsive career of these "bird men" has been richly worth the while. "

In another letter, Frederick W. D'Evelyn, the president of the Cooper Ornithological Society was railing against the wholesale slaughter of "blue jays," both Scrub and Steller's. It seems there was a contest in California, with prizes, for whoever killed the most jays. The jays were considered detrimental to quail and dove nests, robbing eggs and young. In one year 6000 jay scalps were turned in, and was reported to "be the best season for the quail." Mr. D'Evelyn writes (and I love this line) "if the main object is to save quail eggs, one naturally asks what advantageth it the quail, whether he dies in embryo, or a few months later falls a sacrifice to his kindly protector, who has shielded him in egg so that he might pot him in early maturity."

And finally, Grinnell, as the editor of The Condor asked for a vote of the subscribers whether or not to adopt the metric system. It did not pass. I guess some things never change.