Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 May 1896 — FOOD THAT WAS DEADLY. [ARTICLE]

FOOD THAT WAS DEADLY.

Fate of Some Animals That Bit Off More than They Could Chew. A curious tragedy in nature’s life was told about in the Deutsche FischereiZeitung recently. A twenty-five-pound pike was found dead near the Villa Scholz. at Horn. On examination, a trout, weighing four and a half pounds ■was found stuck in the pike’s mouth in such a way as to choke it to death. Various animals have died of suffocation in this manner. Especially is this true of herons, grebes, bitterns and

other fish-eaten,which have been found dead with fish in their throats. A gull, up in Massachusetts Bay, waa seen acting in a way that caused two boys to take a rowboat and go out and see what the matter was. The gull would fly away, then tumble into the water, struggle awhile, then fly again, each flight being shorter than the one before, and at last the bird merely skimmed the surface heavily. When the boys got to it the bird’s head was under water and the wings were flapping slightly. They pulled the bird into the boat and it was seen that on the end of the bill was a clam shell. The gull had tried to get the clam; the clam bad closed his shell upon the bill, and the scared bird had tried to fly off over the water, but, breathing being hard, it was soon exhausted. A wild turkey was found one time In the Tennessee bottom lands. The turkey, in jumping up to get some berries, came down with its neck through a fork of the bush. The bird, being unable to pull his head through the fork, was choked to death, but not until it had covered the ground with feathers for ten feet on all sides. Some of the birds that use strings or hairs in the construction of their nests —swallows, sparrow's, etc.—become entangled in the material every spring and are choked to death. A man named Allard was coming down the Columbia River from Astoria, Ore., to another Hudson Bay Fur "Company post at Van couver. He had a crew of Indians for his canoe, and all were pretty hungry, having been living on dried salmon and hard bread. As they rounded a point one day they put up a flock of swans, which flew past them. The Indians had never seen a man shoot a bird flying, and the trader and had no ammunition to spare, although they offered a splendid shot, especially the leader, which was a bird of unusual size. It was so fine a mark that the trader lifted up his paddle, and, taking imaginative aim, said “Bang!” in a loud voice. What followed made the Indians gasp. The big swan at the word went tumbling head over heels to the water, struck with a loud splash, and by the time the canoe was alongside had ceased its struggles and was dead. There was not a mark on the bird, and as the Indians looked over it they nodded toward the trader with looks of amazement and fear on their faces. The trader calmly loaded his pipe and puffed away as unconcernedly as if he was not wondering how it had happened. That night, while the Indians were pulling out the canoes, the trader had a private autopsy of the swan, and found a large bulb of the swan’s favorite food, the “wappato,” or Sagittaria variaDilis, as it is known to botanists, stuck in the swan’s throat in such a way that the bird had choked to death. The man removed the bulb' and on the return of the Indians said nothing of it. That night the party feasted on the swan, but not until the trader had made w’eird sounds over the carcass and had impressed the Indians wonderfully. Thereafter that trader was the most respected, almost-worshipped man, among the Indians, who ever after called him, “The-man-who-shoots-fly-iug-swans-with-a-paddle.”