CENSUS OF ANIMALS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 74, 29 March 1938, Page 5

CENSUS OF ANIMALS.

BRITAIN'S BIRDS AND BEASTS

The International Cat Society ii counting the world's cats, and has mad< the discovery that there are 120,000.001 cats in the United States, 7,000,000 ii New York alone. That is roughly tin same as the human population. Dogs are taxed, and just over 2.900,001 rlo;; licenses are issued in a year ii Britain. We also know how man; horses, cows, sheep, pigs and goats the; had in Great Britain at the last census There were 902,000 horses, 6.621.001 rattle, 18,085.300 sheep, and 3.064.001 pigs. Of fowls the total is .just ove (51,000,000, which is almost exactly th< same as Canada's chickens. The peopli af the United States own 459,000,001 fowls. It is comparatively simple t( ?ollect statistics of domestic animals ind birds, but very difficult to get igureA of wild creatures. Yet British >rnithologists were busy for years on a •ensus of British wild birds, and in 1932 hev published their conclusion that the tverajre bird population of Great Britain ias 80,000,000. They also gave us the urprising information that the house parrow was not the commonest bird. Phis distinction probably belongs to the it-lark.