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 Mar.,1908 SOME HINTS ON PREPARATION OF AN OOLOGICAL COLLECTION 87 of bird lovers and students, who while they realized the necessity of judicious col- lecting in all lines of scientific work, entered a strenuous objection against the col- lecting of vast numbers of nests and eggs, most of which found their way into the dusty drawers of private collections, far from the reach of the public or of research work along oological lines. So pronounced has this feeling against "egg-collect- ing" become within the past few years, that many collectors have stopped entirely and many others have become much less active. In the case of the many very large private collections it is to be hoped that the great destruction to bird life caused in amassing the collections may be counteracted to some extent, at least, thru their donation to some public institution where their educational value would be of some importance, while a great many of the smaller collections will probably be disposed of in a similar manner or else made a part of larger private collections. It is to be hoped that egg-collecting as a fad will continue to receive the dis- approval of bird-protectionists and of the public in general, but it is equally desir- able that in their zealous espousal of the cause, they do not burden the true oolo- gist with the unpleasant term "egg-collector"; for the judicious collecting of nests and eggs is just as important and just as necessary a part of the study of ornithology today as it was forty years ago (altho possibly on a somewhat smaller scale) and the student of birds' nests, eggs and their breeding habits who has nothing left to learn need only proclaim the fact and we will hail him as the peer of all our revered pioneer ornithologists. But in order that a collection of birds' eggs, either public or private, may be of any scientific or educational value it must be arranged and labeled in a thoroly comprehensive manner. No other class of specimens requires careful labeling so much as eggs, for where is the man who can tell the difference between eggs of the Rough-winged and Violet-green Swallow, or between those of the Oven-bird and the Long-tailed Chat in a strange cabinet, and of what possible use can a collection be put to unless the observer knows definitely what he is looking at? The writer has spent some ten years in experimenting with the many different ways of labeling eggs in the cabinet, and what at first seemed a very simple thing indeed, has thru repeated trials and much studying grown to be a rather compli- cated proposition. It is therefore the purpose of this paper to set forth some of the re.suits of these experiments, with the hope that some of the Co;I)OR readers may find some hints herein that Will be of use to them. Many of the ideas will prob- ably prove old and hackneyed to some of the readers, but if benefit derives to even a few the purpose of the paper will be fulfilled. The question of proper housing for the collection is far too broad a question to deal with at length. I have used several designs of cabinets, all of which have proven more or less satisfactory, provided the vertical spacing of the drawers was economized and the drawers ran smoothly. I have also experimented with the Cambridge Cans: metal boxes with a tongue and groove flange on the cover and clasps which make the case air tight. These cans are fitted with tin runners which are adjustable according to the depth of the drawers or trays, but while the theory may be correct the mechanical imperfections of all of these cans I have seen make them impossible for a finely prepared collection. By far the finest case I have seen is the one being adopted by many museum and private collectors and is giving perfect satisfaction. It is of metal strongly cased in wood with a swinging door which closes air-tight by means of binding clasps and a rubber pad. The drawer runners are of hard wood and very smooth and the trays are of hard wood with compo-board bottoms. Taken in all it is an ideal cabinet (in everything but gen-