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Dorset Natural history and Antiquarian Field Club.

TREASURER'S ACCOUNT FOR THE YEAR ENDING DECEMBER 31ST, 1917.

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Two Affiliated Libraries

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New Members' Entrance Fees and Subscriptions Dividends on £500 21% Consols (less tax)

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Sale of Volumes and Publication

EXPENDITURE.

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May 6th, 1918.-We certify that we have examined the foregoing Statement of Account and find the same correct.→ EDWARDS and EDWARDS, Incorporated Accountants, Cornhill Chambers, Dorchester. JOHN E. ACLAND, Hon. Treasurer.

Anniversary

Address of the President.

By NELSON MOORE RICHARDSON, Esq., B.A.

(Read May 14th, 1918.)

IN

N presenting to you my 14th Annual Address I should like in the first place to offer the sympathy of both myself and the Club to all those members who have suffered the loss of relations and friends in the War; and I fear that there are few of us to whom these bereavements have not come. As regards the members who have passed away from us, the oldest one is the Rev. Frederick Webster Maunsell, who joined the Club in 1879, and is best known for his work and life at Symondsbury, near Bridport, where he was Rector for 33 years, and where I had the pleasure of meeting him on one of our excursions many years ago. Mr. Hugh Carl Forrester was elected in 1893 and occasionally attended our meetings. Mr. W. Neville Sturt joined us in 1898, and a paper by him will appear, I believe, in the next volume (Vol. XXXIX.) of our Proceedings. He was much interested in archæology, but

through residence abroad was unable often to be present at our meetings. Colonel Storer, elected in 1900, Mrs. A. T. Brinsley Sheridan (1903), Mr. Theo. Michell (1907), Lieut.Colonel W. H. Baxter (1910), and Mr. Aubrey Edwards (1913), all attended our Meetings occasionally, and a paper by the last-named is printed in Vol. XXXV. of our Proceedings.

ZOOLOGY.

Though we are very fortunate in this country in being practically free from the insect bearers of disease germs which are found in so many parts of the world, especially warm climates, it has lately been estimated that no less than 226 different disease organisms are carried by various insects either to man or animals. Sleeping sickness, which is conveyed by the tsetse fly, has been greatly diminished in French and Belgian Congoland, but is unfortunately spreading in Nyasaland and North Rhodesia. It seems proved that the trypanosomes are spread amongst animals by Tabanidae and other biting flies in areas free from the tsetse. The malaria-carrying mosquito, Anopheles maculipennis, has been found to be capable of carrying malaria in France, though I am not aware that cases of that disease of local origin have ever occurred either there or in this country, where the insect is also found sparingly. Government investigations are now being made as to its distribution in view of possible future danger from this source, which seems to be improbable, though of course possible. A useful illustrated pamphlet on this and other species of disease-bearing mosquitoes is published by the British Museum of Natural History. The wonderful immunity of our troops from typhoid and other similar diseases during the present war, compared with former wars, is the best testimony to the strides which bacteriological science has made of late years. Had it not been for this our losses would have been far greater. In the early days of natural history there was a tendency to regard any specimens that differed from the type as distinct species.

In very many cases, by breeding and otherwise, it has been shown that some species vary in an extraordinary degree, so that one hardly gets two specimens exactly alike. It has lately been shewn from a long series of Rhizopods dredged in the N. Sea and N. Atlantic that a number of forms, hitherto classed as species under two genera, are all varieties of one species, Thurammina papillata, Brady. Luminous earthworms have been observed in S. Africa on Table Mountain, the light proceeding from a viscid substance emitted by the worm. I think that a similar phenomenon has been seen in England; but I am not sure of this. Some curious experiments have been made in training water-snails. Food is presented to the snail, which causes it to move its mouth parts, and its body is at the same time touched with a rod. After 48 hours training (whether continuous or not is not stated) the snail responds in the same way to the rod alone; but after a period of 96 hours or less it ceases to respond, having by that time unlearnt its lesson, and discovered that the rod does not mean food. A plague of moths (Charcas graminis) appeared last year from Cumberland to Derbyshire; but, though in enormous numbers, the larvæ confined their depredations to bent grass (Nardus stricta), and therefore did little damage. The Isle of Wight disease has been most destructive of late years amongst honeybees; and in my own neighbourhood, as in many others, they have been so scarce that hardly a bee has been seen in my garden, except some recently imported Ligurians, distinguished by their banded bodies. There seems still to be some uncertainty as to the cause of this disease and its nature, the bacillus, Nosema apis, usually considered as a necessary accompaniment of it, being often absent in apparent cases of it. Icerya Purchasi, a sort of scale insect, a native of Australia, which does much damage to orange trees, has spread to other parts of the world, such as Ceylon and N. America. An entomologist sent by the Government to Australia has brought back to California a number of ladybirds, which have been most effectual in destroying the pest. Earwigs seem not to be

much eaten by birds, as out of 128 species of British birds examined only 10 were found to contain their remains in their alimentary canal. Starlings and sparrows eat them occasionally. The severe and long-continued winter of 1916-7 was very destructive to many birds all through the country. In my own garden no blue tits, generally common, were seen, and some other birds were scarcer than usual. Government has taken some steps for the destruction of the house sparrow, which, though it may have some redeeming qualities, nevertheless consumes a vast amount of corn, of which the country is at present specially in need. Pheasants, on the contrary, when not artificially fed with corn, seem to be distinctly useful, consuming large numbers of insects, slugs, &c., and very little grain. An interesting migration of the white-winged black tern (Hydrochelidon leucoptera) has taken place in the west of Australia, where about Easter, 1917, it was found in great numbers as far south as Freemantle, about 1,000 miles south of its usual limits, having previously been very rare in that continent. It is suggested that the birds followed a swarm of dragonflies on which they were feeding. Whether the insects also migrated to the same extent is apparently not known, but seems improbable. The unusual spectacle of a cuckoo carrying an egg in its beak while flying low was observed in Cornwall last early summer, the bird being accompanied by its mate, which was uttering its usual cry. In these days of shortness of food it is interesting to learn that whale meat has been tried in America with very satisfactory results. The only trouble is that so few whales are stranded on our coasts that the amount of food yielded by them will make little difference to the general population; but as it has not yet been rationed, should one come, it should provide a local feast! It will be a satisfaction to the members of our Club to feel that the very valuable collection of spiders from all parts of the world made by our late distinguished VicePresident, the Rev. O. Pickard-Cambridge, and containing more than 1,000 types, which was bequeathed by him to the

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