Mr. TERRELL. We sell the seeds as planting material. Another important source of revenue that we developed was the sale of hunting privileges on this land. Naturally, the waterfowl came in there. and the people wanted to come in and hunt them. For years past we have sold hunting rights on this marsh, and are receiving more than enough from that source to pay the taxes on the marsh and on the other lands.

Mr. CANNON. That would be considered in the nature of baiting, more than hunting, would it not? Do you consider that in the nature of baiting, or in what respect does it differ from baiting?

Mr. TERRELL. It differs from baiting in this way: Baiting, as the term is understood, is putting out grain in small areas near blinds, or something of that kind. The planting of natural foods provides something that is necessary for waterfowl during the breeding season, out side of the time when the hunting goes on.

Mr. GORDON. This is scattering the food supply all over the area, rather than concentrating it at one place.

Mr. TERRELL. Yes, sir. It provides necessary food for the waterfowl, not only during the hunting season, but throughout the entire

year.

Mr. GORDON. Is this true, that you have helped the waterfowl situation all over the country by furnishing planting material to other people who want to do the same thing that you did originally? In other words, you are furnishing planting materials to other people. Mr. TERRELL. Yes, sir. I might say that, not only are those plantings made in that way, but, also, in many refuges that are established by the Audobon society, and other organizations. I think the production of food for wild fowls is just as essential as the production of other kinds of food.

Mr. GORDON. There was another auxiliary crop that you did not mention, and that is the fur crop.

Mr. TERRELL. Yes, sir. Another thing that we developed, through the advice and assistance of the division of the Biological Survey that has to do with the production of fur-bearing animals, was a fur business. With their assistance, we developed this business so that it produces from 1,200 to as much as 2,600 muskrats annually. That has been an important source of revenue.

Mr. CANNON. That does not interfere with the migratory bird supply, does it?

Mr. TERRELL. The food habits of the muskrats are quite different from those of waterfowl. They feed on cat tail, something that the ducks and geese do not eat at all.

Mr. GORDON. Let me ask you this question: Is it true that this method of development of food plants of various kinds is a comparatively new science, and that there is no other agency in the United States, except the Biological Survey, that has attempted to give service and advice to people who want to improve their marsh areas in this way?

Mr. TERRELL. The Biological Survey is practically the only Department in this country, or is the only Government division, that has done work of this kind.

Mr. GORDON. It is the only agency today that is capable of giving that kind of advice?

Mr. TERRELL. Yes, sir; it is something that is required, and it is something that the average man cannot do for himself. They have

accumulated records of the food habits of our birds and animals, and they are available to all the people of this country. I might say that, as we begin to get money from these other crops, we do not have to raise so much corn, garden truck, and livestock. I think it is important that the fact-finding investigations on the part of the Biological Survey shall continue to help the farmers of this country to find new crops and new uses for their land, or for land that is worthless for farm purposes.

Mr. GORDON. It is really water-farming.

Mr. TERRELL. Yes, sir. I make an earnest appeal to you, gentlemen, to continue this work, at least in skeleton form, on some of these important investigations in regard to food habits, food resources, and so forth, but for which under this budget they have been given a goose egg. I think that is very important.

I thank you.

Mr. CANNON. We are glad to hear you. I believe that concludes the statements of the out-of-town witnesses, and, if it is agreeable, we will hear the others at a later date.

Mr. GORDON. Mr. Collingwood and myself would prefer to appear after the presentation of the other statements. We want to summarize some of the things that have been brought out and add a few new angles that should be brought to the attention of the committee.

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1934.

DIVISION OF FOOD HABITS OF BIOLOGICAL SURVEY

STATEMENT OF HON. GEORGE W. BLANCHARD, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF WISCONSIN

Mr. SANDLIN. We will be glad to have your statement.

Mr. BLANCHARD. The situation which will develop if this proposed elimination is carried out has been brought forcibly to my attention by many citizens from Wisconsin and elsewhere. I have previously called to the committee's attention a statement prepared by Mr. Clyde Terrell, of Oshkosh, Wis., and I now direct your attention to the statement made before the committee by Mr. Wallace Grange, of Ephriam, Wis. I believe that Mr. Grange has thoroughly covered the subject, and I cannot too strongly urge the committee to provide at least a reasonable amount of money for the continuation of this necessary work. To eliminate it at a time when the United States Governa ent proposes to embark upon a very ambitious conservation program, would undo years of scientific investigation that has a very distinct bearing upon an intelligent understanding and handling of wild-life conservation.

TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1934.

APPROPRIATIONS FOR BUREAU OF BIOLOGICAL SURVEY

STATEMENT OF SETH GORDON, PRESIDENT AMERICAN GAME ASSOCIATION AND MEMBER OF NATIONAL COMMITTEE ON WILD LIFE LEGISLATION

Mr. GORDON. Mr. Chairman, and gentlemen of the committee, I have two gentlemen with me who desire to be heard, but I shall first speak for the American Game Association and the National Committee on Wild Life Legislation.

For 50 years the United States Biological Survey has been our only central Federal storehouse of scientific information concerning the economic and recreational value of our song and insectivorous birds, and of our game and fur resources. No other Federal agency has been or is now equipped to supply such information on this important subject.

President Roosevelt recently evidenced his intense interest in wildlife restoration by appointing a special committee to develop a program which dovetails into his agricultural land elimination program, principally to aid our rural people. The President realizes that wild life can be made one of our most important land crops.

The Biological Survey must be depended upon as never before if this plan is to succeed. It is, therefore, unthinkable that President Roosevelt was conversant with the effect of proposed eliminations of essential services of the Biological Survey when the Budget for 1935 was laid before him. It would seem that the Director of the Budget was misled by those who would destroy the Biological Survey because they have been unable to control it.

To destroy the basic machinery of the Biological Survey now would be like building a big network of electrified railroads and then to blow up the central power plant which supplies the vital energy to run the trains.

The Survey's scientific staff must not be dismantled or impaired. It must be continued and enlarged to carry out the President's proposed program. We implore Congress to restore the necessary appropriations for the Biological Survey at once, thereby removing the uncertainty which is paralyzing activities in this vital Federal agency. Mr. SINCLAIR. Will you just briefly explain what the difference is between the classes of birds you mentioned? You referred to migratory birds as distinct from the others; I thought they all migrated.

Mr. GORDON. No; they do not. We have resident upland game birds and we have migratory song and insectivorous birds and migratory waterfowl.

The Biological Survey has been the agency which has been studying the economic benefits to the farmers and to the public of the migratory song and insectivorous birds, as well as the migratory water fowl.

Mr. SINCLAIR. They know the field of operation of the different classes?

Mr. GORDON. Through banding operations, and through studies on the ground, and through stomach-content analyses, they know

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not only how far those birds are distributed but also what they eat; what their benefit is to the farmer and what their benefit is to the fruit grower.

I would like to speak briefly about two or three of these items. The Biological Survey in 1932 had an appropriation of $2,229,000: in 1933 it had an appropriation of $1,756,000; and in 1934, $1,356,000, which was reduced to $1,017,000, as the cash withdrawal allowed. The 1935 Budget allows only $582,741, or approximately one quarter of what this agency had in 1932. Among the agencies that are to be eliminated entirely from the Biological Survey set-up are food habits, research units, which last year had $71,640 and has no allocation at all; none at all is provided for that agency.

There is no question about the value of that particular unit; that is the unit that had had charge of all the stomach-content analyses. that has directed the basic scientific research work necessary to learn what the economic benefits of the birds have been to the farmers and to the public.

Mr. SINCLAIR. Is that activity at Denver?

Mr. GORDON. No; the office in Denver is a unit concerned with the study of diseases, mostly. The central office in Washington, under the direction of Mr. McAtee, one of the best-known scientists in the Bureau; that is the unit which has prepared a series of bulletins on the economic benefits of the birds, on game farming, on game management, etc., the latest of which is Bulletin No. 1719, which is entitled, "Improving the Information for Wild Life on the Farm." They planned to have 25,000 of that little bulletin printed, and the orders have already increased to 50,000. The purpose is to show the farmer how he can provide a game crop and cash in on it, and how he can provide a fur crop, and cash in on it, and, at the same time, benefit the general public, including the sportsmen. We do not appear for the sportsmen alone. Many thousands of these various bulletins have been distributed. That happens to be the unit which has directed such studies as those of Herbert Stoddard, covering the bob-white quail; that is the unit which has directed the special investigative studies in connection with a number of experimental products, and how to produce a game crop on this marginal land.

We recommend that that unit be given at least $71,640, and, in view of the fact that this additional burden is to come in the way of the work connected with the President's special program, I would say an allocation of $85,000 would not be unreasonable at all.

The next unit on which a great reduction was made was the predatory-animals unit. That, I understand, the Director of the Budget, through representations made by delegations from the West has sent over an additional allocation of $29,100, making a total about the same as the cash withdrawals last year.

Mr. SANDLIN. That is true.

Mr. GORDON. It so happens that that was brought about through an organized effort on the part of the folks in the West who wanted to see predatory-animal and rodent-control work continued. If other work applies to the country at large, and not only to that western country, and I can see no reason why it would not be good business to maintain the basic scientific machinery for the Biological Survey to do the things that benefit the country at large, if we can afford to put back $29,000-then certainly we ought to be able to find $125,000 to carry on these basic services of the Survey.

One other unit is the protection of fur-bearing animals. That is eliminated entirely; $49,000 was the withdrawal allowance last year, and that unit really ought to have an allocation of not less than $56,000 to operate efficiently, or at least the same amount that it got last year.

You have had the testimony from others, but I should like to call your attention to the fact that the fur crop of this country amounts to $50,000,000 to $70,000,000, depending on the values of the furs. It is a crop which is harvested by the country boys and is not harvested by the man in the city, and is not harvested, in the main, by the man who does nothing but run a trap line. It is a farm crop; it is a marginal crop of a character that means oftentimes the school clothes for hundreds and thousands of country lads who trap on the way to and from school and on Saturdays and who pick up considerable sums of money in that way. That happens to be the unit which shows the fur farmers of this country how to produce foxes and other fur-bearing animals in captivity. It is a side issue on farming of exactly the same character that the farm wives run in conducting a poultry ranch on the side, or similar to the business of producing on many wheat farms a little butter or milk or maybe a little fruit. Fur farming on most of the farms, particularly the smaller farms, is a side issue to general farming and is one of the ways in which we can help rehabilitate the farm industry in the northern half of the United States. This unit has been helpful in eliminating diseases from the fur-bearing animals.

Mr. THURSTON. It is not confined to the northern part.

Mr. GORDON. Not the rabbits; that is the area in which the great majority of the fur ranches are located.

Mr. SANDLIN. There are muskrats in Louisiana.

Mr. GORDON. There are muskrats in Louisiana and in the South and in Maryland, right here at our door. The other day, Mr. Tearle was speaking to you about muskrats on his place. I visited a marsh in Ohio where two women, one a Vassar graduate and the other a Smith College girl, inherited the farms and they take off of those farms 2,500 to 3,000 muskrats, and sometimes it runs to 25,000 and 30,000 in one year. That shows what can be done in there in those fur resources. In addition to the work referred to, and one which, in my estimation, is of greater value than practically any other, is the elimination of a lot of those gold-bricking enterprises that have been going on, by giving the people facts in connection with fur farming. Somebody writes in and asks us to investigate such proposals, and they are given the facts, and if that particular promoter is known to be unscrupulous, they are told about it. It has stopped a number of highbinders from stealing thousands of dollars from prospective investors under the assumption that they are going to get rich quick. It has stabilized that industry and weeded out the unscrupulous.

On the protection of migratory birds, the administration of the regulations under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act is one of the most difficult jobs in the hands of the Biological Survey. I happen to be a member of the Migratory Bird Advisory Board and I will say frankly, at the present time, the Biological Survey does not have enough investigative staff to get the facts concerning waterfowls and conditions in advance of the time that we must decide on regulations. Last year that board requested the Secretary of Agriculture to pro