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Preface The widening public interest in speleology has brought to the Society increased responsibility for disseminating ,knowledge in this field. Facts concerning speleology are sought by a variety of consumers -hobbyists, naturalists, and scientists. In order to serve beLter the needs of such different groups, the Society last year increased the n um ber of its officers. Ther.e are now four vice-presidents, responsible respectively for administration, sci ence, public relations, and publications. The good results of their specialized labors are already becoming evident. A proposal to enlarge the publication program, to mention one, has been approved by the Board of Governors. In reviewing the de velopment of the present-day NEWS and BULLETIN ) the Board gave its support to pleas that every effort be made to further improve the NEWS by budgeting a larger amount for it. This will permit the use of more pictures and the printing of more extra-page issues. Also more timely news stories will be sought from the gTOLtOeS and individual members. The NEWS will continue to be the Society's best medium of timely in formation. Since many of' its items are of lasting in'terest, an index is being prepared. The BULLETIN) from now on to be known as THE AMERICAN CAVER) will continue to bring to the members and to an expanding group of non-member readers popularly written articles on a large variety of speleological subjects. These will include articles on explor ation of caves at home and abroad, interpretation of the findings of scientists as they apply to caves, and the descriptions of caves and cave regions of general interest. The finest available photographs will be a feature of each issue. '-Vith this number a new regular feature is being added: a sec tion for General Notes. Under this category are included items too short to justify their use as general articles, but nevertheless of sufficient importance to warrant the wider attention that publication here will bring. The notes may be of a more technical nature, but strictly tech nical papers, long or short, will not be published here. Instead, reports on substantial research in the field of speleology will be published in a new series of OCCASIONAL PAPERS. Published at irregular intervals, they will be distributed only to members who re quest them. To non-members they ,vill be priced according to the cost of publication of the individual papers. Scientists, graduate students, and amateur speleologists, whether members of the Society or not, are invited to submit material for the OCCASIONAL PAPERS. A more detailed description of the scope of the new publication will be mailed upon request. Serious concern has been expressed over the decline in the num ber of published reports in the field of American speleology. The dearth of papers has been attributed to the lengthened work week of (co li/inlier! O T! illside bach cover) I'-:) z ;.. --l o Z ;.. r' (Jl ~ r' t"'1o r' ?l'"' n ;.. r' (Jl Ph o to I'." ThOll/as 1' . Milia, Jr, o n This photograph, entitled " First G limpse of a New World ," received the First Award in the Fifth Internatio na l Photographic Sa lon ( 1952) of the Nationa l Speleolog ical Society. It was taken by a photographe r for the Lou isvill e C ou ri e r-Journ a l in the so-c al led "New ~ Discovery" of Mammoth C ave, Kentucky, and ably po rtrays the effect he soug ht which , in his own wo rd s, was to depict " 0 feeli ng of -< mystic ism, of wo nder, of enchantment, of a we." ASurvey of Bat Banding in North America, ]932-1951 By CHARLES E. MOHR Direc tor, A ucilllJOn Center, Greenwich . CUllllaticllt A /I /)IIO/os by lite author ProlJauly few ca ve en thll siast~ reahze the ex telll to wlt ich uat bandi1lg Itas ueen can ied on b)1 scien tisls in th e last twenty y (: (1 "1"5. During tlt at lime n early 70,000 bats have ueen banded (nearly Ih ree quarters of tlt em from Cfmes) for tlt e Inn/Jose of studying th eir life III's tury and habits. Tlte ex ten t uf tltis banding activity; its 1I1 et/lOds, jJrocedl l1" es, objectives and 1'esli lt s is tuld It ere fur tlt e first time by one of "t Il e nation's top ranking cltirojJ terists. T he marking of bats bega n in 1916 when using bird bands in a summer roost on Cape ornithologist Arthur A. Allen (192 1) atlached Coel , and in 193-1 undertook the banding of ba ts bird bands to the legs of fiv c bats. In Califor hiberna ting in ca ,"Cs in Ne,,' Engla nd a nd 1\"cw nia in 1922, A. B. H owell bandcd 'J bats, and in York. W ith the aid o[ ,,·e ll ·organized ba nding 1923, Luther Little banded 37 (H owell a nd teams, hl: was e"cntuall y to ba nd a bout 8,500 LillIe, 1924). Harold ' ,Vood in Pcnnsy h 'ania b at~ in GI\'l:S a nd mincs, and about 5,000 in used two bird bands on bats in 1929 and in the summcr colonies in buildings. sallie yea r H . B. Sherman (1937) banded 7G Not unli! 19% did banding actil'itics spread juvenile bats in Florida. 010 ne of these pcrsons to other states. In Septembcr J936, ?\I ary Guth continucd banding howe' ·er. ri e (1937) ba ndcd 7:) ! bats in :\fan 'el a nd R ochcport Ca\'es , Misso uri, a nd thc late ' '\T. A. In 1932, Donald Griffin (193-1) in Ne'" Eng \Velter, in A.pril J937, banded 2,000 in Bat la nd, and Earl L. Poole (1932) and 1 (]\Johr, Ca"e, in eastern Kentucky. In 1938, H . 1. 1933) in Pcnnsy lva nia, began banding actiyities Shreve bega n banding a series of 242 bats in which proved to be the first sustained endca"ors ' Vest Virginia caves. in this field in .-\merica. T hese studics were car In 1939, G. N. R ysgaard (19..J2) in M inne ried out alniost simultancously. In both areas sota , initia tcd a study of ..JG..J caye ba ts, and in there had bccn cxperimentation " 'ith marking Ne,,' J crsey and Pennsy h 'a nia, H arold T rapido me thods, including thc use of histological stains banded the first of some 5,300 bats, using m any and tattooing. In both areas aluminum bird o[ thcm in a sc ri es of homing experiments. :\.Iso ba nds were finall y se lected as thc best marking in 1939, H arold B. Hilchcock la unched an ex m edium. tensi" e program " 'hi ch , by 195 1, resulted in the On the e"ening o[ May 21, 1932, I ca plllred ba nding o[ 13, 125 bats. In Tcxas, N icholson a nd tagged a serics o[ 14 ba ts of three species banded 200 free-ta il cd ba ts but ne,'er cO l1linued as thcy fl ew into Schorcr Ca ,'e, near Ku tztOW ll , wit h additional opera ti ons. Fiyc banders Pennsylvania. T his a ppears to be thc first timc (Caglc, Cockrum, Elder, Engler, and Greeley) that cave bats were marked so that indi"iduals rccei" ecl banding permits in 19-W, and fo ur ad could b e rccognized ! lOne of the P ennsylvania ditional (Llewell yn, Riney, Southam, and projects was the banding of 763 bats of four Storer) in j 9-J I. spccies in sevcn abandoncd, incomplete tunnels During the war ba nding acltnues ,,"ere of the South P cnn Railroad as enginecrs bcgan greatly curtail ed . No new permi ts wcrc granted to tra nsform th'cm into Pennsy h 'ania T urnpike until 194-8. From that time until the present, T unnels (Mohr 1942). 30 ba nders h ayc been supplied with bands by On Septcmber 7, J932, Griflln (1934) bcga n the U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service. 1 C. A. R . Campbell (192-1) wrote o[ capturing 2004 free· T h e ba t banding records were in charge of tailed bats ill a Texas cave daubing them with white Dr. H. H. T. J ackson until la te in 19-17, a nd wash and releasi ng them 30 miles awa y. He reported Ih a t they new directly to the cave in about one hour. since then have been under the supervision of B ULLETIN N Ul'vIBE R 14, S EPT EM BER) 1952 3 Stanley P. Young until September of 1951. In 1939 Trapido adopted wing banding During this rflon th the Section referred to as (Trapido and Crowe, 1946), introduced in Ger Biological Surveys was combined with the Sec many in 1932 by the pioneer European bat tion of Distribution and Migration of Birds, bander, Eisentraut (1934). This method quickly and is now known as the Section of Distribution supplanted leg banding since it has the advant of Birds and Mammals, under the supervision age of making the bands more visible as the of Dr. J01111 W. Aldrich. bats hang in clusters. Like leg bands, however, In October 1951 , in an effort to ascertain the they will cause irritation if dosed unevenly or current status of bat banding activities, I sent too tightly. As pointed out by Trapido and a questionnaire to all persons to whom the Crowe, " the bands should be closed around the U.