sands of dollars have been offered "for first information, exclusive and confidential, of the location of a nesting pair or colony of passenger pigeons anywhere in North America; when properly confirmed, and if found by confirming party with parent birds and eggs, or young, undisturbed. Prof. C. F. Hodge of Clarke University, Worcester, Massachusetts, has had a list of gentlemen published, who have kept standing offers of rewards amounting to thousands of dollars in the effort to secure an intelligent search of the American continent for breeding pigeons in the hope that if found, the species may be saved from exterminationand yet not one claimant has reported! Not a feather has been seen in more than two years. Mr. Wm. B. Mershon, of Saginaw, has given a large amount of time to the investigation of this mystery of the pigeon and collected information from every possible source upon the subject which forms the matter of a volume published by him in 1907, of unique interest. Monroe county, especially that part lying along the valley of the Raisin, which was once densely wooded, was fifty years ago one of the favored resorts of this famous bird. It usually arrived about the time of fall seeding of wheat, and the newly sown fields would be literally covered with the birds, nor would they leave until the last kernel was removed. Of course this was a serious matter for the farmer, requiring re-seeding of his wheat fields-which has been known to be repeated three times in one season. When the birds would be disturbed in their feast by some gunner, they would rise in clouds, and if a dead tree chanced to stand in the field, they would settle upon it, until it seemed to be in full foliage! Other sections of the state were even more densely peopled by this now extinct bird, and the tales that are related of their inconceivably enormous numbers, their destructiveness and the war of extermination that was waged by men and boys, hunter and trapper, day in and day out, without perceptibly diminishing their numbers are almost unbelievable, yet quite within the possibilities and facts. It appears that from 1860 to 1875, there existed an army of about five hundred men and their families, in and about Oceana county, "pigeoners" by title and profession, who did nothing but follow these hordes of birds from nesting place to nesting place, trapping and netting them, old and young, in such numbers as to suggest at least one explanation of the ultimate disappearance if not extinction of the species. In the year 1874, from the single nesting place near Shelby, Michigan, it is a matter of record that there were shipped one hundred carloads, daily for thirty days, making for that one nesting, the astounding number of 309,000,000 birds, but does not include the large numbers consumed by netters, their families and their (four footed) pigs. (It was not unusual that porkers were fattened on the young birds.) Discarding entirely the masses taken for trap-shooting, wasted by losses from heat, lack of cars, or other causes, and considering only recorded shipments, taking the Shelby traffic as a normal one, and allowing three nestings a year, for the ten years of organized slaughter, there is accounted for the killing of no less than 9,270,000,000 passenger pigeons. But a few years ago a few live birds were taken from Michigan by Professor Whitman of Chicago, for the purpose of propagation, and a few pairs were raised from these birds. They did not thrive, however, outside their natural environments, and the wild life, and in 1910 only two birds were left. The oldest of these birds attained the age of twentysix years. It is believed that one bird only, a female, survives, of this beautiful and typical American game bird, which is now in the Zoological Gardens at Cincinnati, Ohio. CHAPTER XXIV NATURAL PRODUCTS EARLY TRIALS OF AGRICULTURE-SOILS AND SUBSOILS-FRUIT GROWING A keen appreciation of novelty, a readiness to adopt improved processes, and the extensive application of machinery constitute the most important elements of industrial successes in the twentieth century. Conditions have undergone a wonderful change and many farming methods of half a century ago are but a memory. The farming utensils of that period are curios today, while the farm buildings, dwellings, barns and cattle sheds reveal comfort, sanitary conditions, convenience, regard for the welfare of stock that are a surprising evolution from the conditions existing in the fifties, and make for the betterment of the general communities. The change does not stop here; the telephone, rural free delivery of the United States postal department, improved stone roads, automobiles, electric railroads, daily weather reports, circulating libraries, vast improvements in educational facilities, all these have been added to make the intelligent farmer's lot one to be envied rather than commiserated, and places him on the plane of his urban fellow citizens, in many cases indeed above him in the contributory means for comfort, rational enjoyment and intellectual improvement. EARLY TRIALS OF AGRICULTURE Monroe county is fortunate in the quality of its farming element of population. The original settlers in the country about the River Raisin and the small lakes and water courses and creeks were, as we know, French, and they were a good, kind-hearted and industrious people, though not having the same inclination to thorough farming and the development of the new country as that class of pioneers who followed them during the period before and after the admission of the state into the Union, who came from the eastern and middle states. Agriculture was not encouraged in this neighborhood in the early days of the last century and no considerable grants of land were made during the English possession, from 1760 to 1796. A few traders had a substantial monopoly of the traffic in furs and with the Indians, and they secured an equal monopoly in government influence. Instead of encouraging the growth of a free and manly yeomanry like that which had made the other colonies prosperous and self reliant, an influential number deliberately planned, as well as they could, to keep this whole region from improvement. And, under the combined influences of avarice and hate the time came when they did not hesitate to encourage the extermination of civilized families to keep it as an asylum for savages and wild beasts. If the people of the district had all grown up under the free system of English law, the monopolies must have been shut out or controlled, and settlements would have been extended. But when the traders found a state of things which favored their selfish plans, they had no desire to change it. Michigan, as we know, was well adapted for hunting and trapping. The traders and authorities in their interest, desired to retain it as it was; and they were too far off from the seat of authority to be prevented from doing as they pleased, with impunity. Men of the present day, or up to a comparatively recent period can remember how, even in their manhood days, we were cut off during the winter from all intercourse with the rest of the world, except by means of the irregular mail arrangements that gave occasional glimpses of things beyond, through the thickets of the "black swamps. But early in the last century there were no railroads nor steamboats nor canals, nor roads of any kind. There was complete isolation. The woods were full of Indians, in the pay and friendship of Great Britain; and encouraged by the unscrupulous emissaries of some very unscrupulous men to prevent American settlers and especially farmers from coming north of Ohio, by slaying without mercy or compunction, men, women and children. The importance of gaining possession of Detroit, and cutting off this malign influence was apparent to all of the public men in this portion of the northwest, and Washington himself, at various times, made efforts to bring it about. George Rogers Clarke organized an expedition for that purpose, and captured Governor Hamilton at Vincennes, whence he was sent to Virginia in irons, as an offender against the rules of war, and as an instigator of savage cruelties. Those few settlers who were scattered along the River Raisin, the Huron, the Rouge or Ecorces, were terribly harassed by savages and found it difficult to do any farmingscarce enough to raise supplies for their own families and animals. It was certainly a discouraging outlook for the farmer, and not a few utterly gave up the attempt, depending upon hunting, fishing and trapping for their food and upon the traders for flour and tea. Tea must be had at any cost! SOILS AND SUBSOILS The different townships have each their own characteristics of soil and subsoils. (It is said, by the way, by our state geologist that there is no sharp line of division to be drawn between soil and subsoil, but by the latter term is commonly meant those loose deposits, which are beyond reach in the ordinary process of cultivation, say from eight to twelve inches deep.) The subsoil of Monroe county consists very largely of clay, with more or less silica and iron gradually growing darker and heavier towards the northwestern part of Milan. Without attempting too fine a classification, it may be said that the farmers of Monroe county have to deal with five types of soil, which possibly shade into each other by imperceptible gradations; sand, clay, loam, silt and muck. The sand varies in different localities, in its commercial value, very greatly; "building sand" in some localities, is of the best quality and highly valued; in others, although it is used to some extent the "sharp characteristic is absent, it is practically valueless for the builders' use. Sand and gravel, which are great belts of sand with limited patches of gravel have been produced by the wave action of the various bodies of water which covered the region after the withdrawal of the great ice sheet, of the glacial period. The beach ridge of sand was formed by the action of the waves, wherever found. Its loose particles after drying, would be seized by the winds and gradually moved landward, until the belt of sand would increase to a width of from three to seven miles broad. This is seen (to a less extent) along the western shores of Lake Erie, where a high, broad ridge intervenes between the waters of the lake and the marsh. While the action just mentioned, was in progress in the littoral or shore region of the lakes, the finer particles of sand and alumina was taken in suspension and carried lakeward by the waves and currents. This material would settle very slowly into the deeper and quieter portions of the waters and from the clay deposit, covering the bottom of the lake. The vegetable growth on the bottom of the lake became imbedded in the clay and gave it a dark color. This deposit would be thinner in the western, and thicker in the eastern part of the country, where it covers the surface boulders. This clay is very sticky when wet. The term loam is applied to a mixture of sand and clay, which, owing either to the proportion of the ingredient, or to the size of the constituent particles, is looser and less compact than clay itself. When wet it is not so sticky and upon drying does not bake and crack. As the proportions of clay and sand differ, varieties are distinguished which graduate into one another, and into other types of soil. Narrow strips of this soil occur along the margins of the clay and sand belts where the two have become mechanically mixed through the action of wind and water. When the plant food products are present it forms an ideal soil, because of the ease with which it can be worked, and of its ability to conserve just the proper amount of moisture for plant growth. The fourth type of soil alluded to, is Silt; along the margins of all the streams constituting their food plains is a deposit very similar in its physical properties to loam. It differs from it, usually, in having a much greater variety of material present, since it represents the surface wash from all the regions drained by each particular stream. It is distinctly stratified and contains the shells of both water and land snails and other molluscs. Owing to its great fertility it supports an abundant vegetation, which gives it a dark color. The larger streams furnish the broader areas of this type of soil, and in some localities dykes have been constructed around the fields to shut out the streams completely, at times of flood. In composition the typical river silt consists of 50 to 70 per cent of sand and about 10 per cent each of alumina and organic matter, with varying quantities of iron, calcium magnesium, potash, soda and phosphorus. This general nature is shown by two analyses, given below from the bottom lands of the Raisin, just over the western boundary of the county at Deerfield. The first, (No. 1) analysis is of silt which had been under cultivation for forty years without artificial fertilization; the second (No. 2) represents "virgin soil." The timber in both cases is ash, basswood, hickory, walnut and oak. The fifth and last of the soils of Monroe county, alluded to, is muck, to which the geological authorities and agricultural writers attach much importance and of interest to our county. The following excerpt from the Geological Report on Monroe county by Prof. W. H. Sherzer ably discourses upon the matter in an interesting paper as follows: "One characteristic of a glaciated region is the presence of innumerable basin like depressions, in which spring and surface water may accumulate, but from which it cannot readily escape, except by evaporation. Many such spots are found in the sand belts, where the sand is thin and underlain by clay. Small lakes are here formed in which plants, drawing their sustenance from the water and air, get a foothold and eventually add their remains to the soil of the bottom and margin. Coarse varieties of moss presently start, which dying beneath and growing above prepare a bed for the rushes, the water lilies, and the waterliving shrubs. Through the agency of water fowl animal life might be introduced, the decay of which would furnish other ingredients to the soil accumulation upon the bottom. Some clay and sand would be washed in from the surrounding region, so that through all these agencies the lake would be slowly filled and converted into a marsh. New types of plant life would now find suitable conditions, the filling process would continue and a meadow finally result, capable of cultivation. The black, spongy, carbonaceous mass, resulting from the alteration and partial preservation of the organic matter, is called peat when practically pure. Usually it is mixed with clay and sand and is then known as muck. It is rich in nitrogen and phosphorous, but does not contain sufficient body to serve as a soil for most plants. The total amount of such soil in the county is not great although small areas are numerous in certain regions. A cranberry marsh covering 112 acres is located in the S. E. 14, Sec. 24 of Summerfield township. This is flooded in the spring, but is drained and later irrigated by numerous wells, from which the water is pumped by windmills. An extensive peat bed occurs in Sec. 9 of London township, 60 acres of which belong to the Ilgenfritz Nursery Co., of Monroe. A crop of sphagnum, the moss concerned mainly in the production of peat, is harvested from it each season and used in packing about the roots of nursery stock for shipment. It holds moisture well, is light and does not 'heat.' In 1838 Hubbard reported a soil of fibrous peat one to two feet thick as covering 18 section in Ida, 9 in Summerfield and 5 in Whiteford.' The failure of a soil to produce certain crops in not due necessarily to the absence of essential constituents in available form, but may be due to some physical disability. Some harmful ingredient may be present in disastrous amount, as an acid in the case of muck. FRUIT GROWING FAVORED The soils of Monroe county are rich in calcium carbonate, owing to the prevalence of limestone in this county and to the north of it with the favorable climatic conditions, the grape grows luxuriantly in such soils and in a high degree of richness. One variety especially, the Concord, appears to thrive better than most others, and it is grown extensively in almost every township in the county, but more abundantly in those lying along the River Raisin. |