In 1938, when I took over the Sibasa reserve on the borders of the Kruger National Park, I found that professional native poachers had established their kraals and lands all along and just outside its boundary. There were miles of cultivated lands, all with massive bush fences. In these, gaps were left at intervals of five to twenty yards, and in every gap was placed a steel wire snare. During the night when all was quiet the animals would leave the park to raid the native lands. Sometimes the poachers' catch would be so great that the snared animals could not be dealt with before the vulture and hyaenas had completely devoured the carcases. The wanton waste was terrific.

Problems of nature preservation in British territories of central America may be clearly divided between continental countries, British Honduras and British Guiana on the one hand, and the islands on the other; although the fauna of Trinidad and Tobago has much in common with that of the South American continent. The islands of the Greater and Lesser Antilles have been separated long enough from the mainland and from each other, for them to have developed their own plants and animals. Common to continental and island countries, however, are the migratory shore birds of the western hemisphere.

On the 18th June, 1958, Lieutenant-Colonel E. H. Cobb, O.B.E., gave our Society a most interesting lecture on The Markhor, Capra falconeri, the Great Goat of the Himalayas. He illustrated his lecture with his own slides and with films most kindly lent by Sir Claremont Skrine and Count Krasicki.

Hydro-electric schemes and their effect on landscape and habitat loom large in the view of nature conservators to-day. During the latest meeting of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature at Edinburgh in June, 1956, those attending were able to see something of the work of the North of Scotland Hydro-Electric Board, and to judge for themselves its effect on the countryside.

The number of species in danger of disappearing from the earth increases every year. Nevertheless, even the brief story of the two species belonging to the genus of bison cannot fail to evoke a striking picture of the two different ways in which man proceeds with his destruction of the animal world. One of these ways is obvious: the other may be almost imperceptible.

In their Checklist of Palacarctic and Indian Mammals, 1758 to 1946, issued in 1951, J. R. Ellerman and T. C. S. Morrison-Scott regard the true sheep of the Old World as all belonging to the genus Ovis and, except for the Bighorn Sheep of Siberia and Canada, all to the sub-genus Ovis also. They allow four species: Ovis ammon, the Argali; Ovis orientalis, the Asiatic Mouflon; Ovis laristanica, the Laristan Sheep, and Ovis musimon, the Mouflon.

Wild life preservation in Africa and the national park system has as its foundation the 1933 London Convention for the Protection of African Fauna and Flora. Article 2 of this international convention reads: “The expression national park shall denote an area … set aside for the propagation, protection and preservation of wild animal life and vegetation for the benefit, advantage and enjoyment of the general public …” and … “facilities shall, so far as possible, be given to the general public for observing the fauna and flora in national parks.”

Ecology may be called the science of the relations of animals and plants to their environment and to one another. But this is only true if we remember that the word “animals” includes man.

We like to think of man as in a class by himself, spiritually or intellectually. But as an influence on the earth, man's role is that of an animal that has managed to multiply enormously, both in numbers and in capacity to affect other parts of nature, usually for the worse, and usually without noticing it.