WHERE AUTOMATIC GUNS ARE BARRED OUT BY LAW

PENNSYLVANIA, 1907 NEW JERSEY, 1912 SASKATCHEWAN, 1906 NEW BRUNSWICK, 1907 BRITISH COLUMBIA, 1911 ONTARIO, 1907 MANITOBA, 1909 ALBERTA, 1907 PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, 1906

SPORTSMEN'S CLUBS WHEREIN THEY ARE BARRED BY CODES OF ETHICS AND RULES

Adirondack League Club, New York Blooming Grove Park Hunting and Fishing Club, Penn. Greenwing Gun Club, Ottawa, Ill. Western Ducking Club, Detroit, Minn. Bolsa Chica Club, Los Angeles, Cal. Westminster Club, Los Angeles, Cal. Los Patos Club, Los Arigeles, Cal. Pocahontas Club, Va. Tobico Hunting Club, Kawkawlin, Mich. Turtle Lake Club, Turtle Lake, Mich. Au Sable Forest Farm Club, Mich. Wallace Ducking Club, Wild Fowl Bay, Mich. Lomita Club, Los Angeles, Cal. Golden West Club, Los Angeles, Cal. Recreation Club, Los Angeles, Cal.

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A MODEL BILL TO PROHIBIT THE USE OF AUTOMATIC AND REPEATING SHOT GUNS IN HUNTING

Section 1. It shall be unlawful to use in hunting or shooting birds or animals of any kind, any automatic or repeating shot gun or pump gun, or any shot-gun holding more than two cartridges at one time, or that may be fired more than twice without removal from the shoulder for reloading.

Section 2. Violation of any provision of this act shall be punished by a fine of not less than twenty-five nor more than one hundred dollars for each offence; and the carrying, or possession in the woods, or in any field, or upon any water of any gun or other weapon the use of which is prohibited, as aforesaid, shall be prima facie evidence of the violation of this act.

The English 3-barrel "Scatter Rifle," for Ducks.—All gunners who find machine guns good enough for them will be delighted by the news that an Englishman whose identity is concealed under the initials "F.M.M." has invented and manufactured a 3-barreled rifle specially intended to kill ducks that are beyond the reach of a choke-bore shotgun. The weapon discharges all three barrels simultaneously. In the London Field, of Dec. 9, 1911, it is described by a writer who also thoughtfully conceals his identity under a nom-de-plume. After a trial of 48 shots, the writer declares that "the 3-barreled is a really practicable weapon," and that with it one could bag wild-fowl that were quite out of reach of any shot-gun. Just why a Gatling gun or a Maxim should not be employed for the same purpose, the writer fails to state. The use of either would be quite as sportsmanlike, and as fair to the game. There are great possibilities in ducking mortars, also.

The "Sunday Gun."—A new weapon of peculiar form and great deadliness to song birds, has recently come into use. Because of the manner of its use, it is known as the "Sunday gun." It is specially adapted to concealment on the person. A man could go through a reception with one of these deadly weapons absolutely concealed under his dress coat! It is a weapon with two barrels, rifle and shot; and it enables the user to kill anything from a humming-bird up to a deer. What the shot-barrel can not kill, the rifle will. It is not a gun that any sportsman would own, save as a curiosity, or for target use.

The State Ornithologist of Massachusetts, Mr. E.H. Forbush, informs me that already the "Sunday gun" has become a scourge to the bird life of that state. Thousands of them are used by men and boys who live in cities and towns, and are able to get into the country only on Sundays. They conceal them under their coats, on Sunday mornings, go out into the country, and spend the day in shooting small birds and mammals. The dead birds are concealed in various pockets, the Sunday gun goes under the coat, and at nightfall the guerrilla rides back to the city with an innocent smile on his face, as if he had spent a day in harmless enjoyment of the beauties of nature.

The "Sunday gun" is on sale everywhere, and it is said to be in use both by American and Italian killers of song-birds. It weighs only two pounds, eight ounces, and its cost is so trifling that any guerrilla who wishes one can easily find the money for its purchase. There are in the United States at least a million men and boys quite mean enough to use this weapon on song-birds, swallows, woodpeckers, nuthatches, rabbits and squirrels, and like other criminals, hide both weapon and loot in their clothing. So long as this gun is in circulation, no small bird is safe, at any season, near any city or town.

Now, what are the People going to do about it?

My recommendation is that each state enact a law in the following terms:

Be it enacted, etc.—That from and after the passage of this act it shall be unlawful for any person to use in hunting, or to carry concealed on the person, any shotgun, or rifle, or combination of shotgun and rifle, with a barrel or barrels less than twenty-eight inches in length, or with a skeleton stock fixed on a hinge.

The carrying of any rifle or shotgun concealed on the person shall constitute a felony.

The penalties for hunting with any gun specially adapted to concealment should be not less than $50 fine or two months imprisonment at hard labor, and the carrying of such weapons concealed should be $100 or four months at hard labor.

Incidentally, we wonder what will be the next devilish device for the destruction of wild life that American inventive genius will produce.



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CHAPTER XVI

THE PRESENT AND FUTURE OF NORTH AMERICAN BIG GAME

The subject of this chapter opens up a vast field of facts and conclusions, quite broad enough to fill a whole volume. In the space at our disposal here it is possible to offer only a summary of the subject, without attempting to prove our statements by the production of detailed evidence.

To say that all over the world, the large land mammals are being destroyed more rapidly than they are breeding, would not be literally true, for the reason that there are yet many areas that are almost untouched by the destroying hand of civilized man. It is true, however, that all the unspoiled areas rapidly are growing fewer and smaller. It is also true that in all the regions of the earth that are easily penetrable by civilized man, the wild life is being killed faster than it breeds, and of necessity it is disappearing. This is why the British are now so urgently bestirring themselves to create game preserves in all the countries that they own.

It is one of the inexorable laws of Nature, to which I know of not one exception, that large hoofed animals which live on open plains, on open mountains, or in regions that are thinly forested, always are easily found and easily exterminated. All such animals have a weak hold on life. This is because it is so difficult for them to hide, and so very easy for man to creep up within the killing range of modern, high-power, long-range rifles. Is it not pitiful to think of animals like the caribou, moose, white sheep and bear trying to survive on the naked ridges and bald mountains of Yukon Territory and Alaska! With a modern rifle, the greatest duffer on earth can creep up within killing distance of any of the big game of the North.

The gray wolf is practically the only large animal that is able to hide successfully and survive in the treeless regions of the North; but his room is always preferable to his company, because he, too, is a destroyer of big game.

I am tempted to try to map out roughly what are to-day the unopened and undestroyed wild haunts of big game in North America. In doing this, however, I warn the reader not to be deceived into thinking that because game still exists in those regions, those areas therefore constitute a permanent preserve and safe breeding-ground for large mammals. That is very, very far from being the case. The further "opening up" of the wilderness areas, as I shall call them for convenience, can and surely will quickly wipe out their big game; for throughout nine-tenths of those areas it holds to life by very slender threads.

To-day the unopened and undestroyed wilderness areas of North America, wherein large mammals still live in a normal wild state, are in general as follows:

THE ARCTIC BARREN GROUNDS, or Arctic Prairies, north of the limit of trees, embracing the Barren Grounds of northern Canada, the great arctic archipelago, Ellesmere, Melville and Grant Lands and Greenland. This region is the home of the musk-ox and three species of arctic caribou.

THE ALASKA-YUKON REGION, inhabited by the moose, white mountain sheep, mountain goat, four species of caribou, and half a dozen species of Alaska brown, grizzly and black bears.

NORTHERN ONTARIO, QUEBEC, LABRADOR AND NEWFOUNDLAND, inhabited by moose, woodland caribou, white-tailed deer and black bear.

BRITISH COLUMBIA, inhabited by a magnificent big-game fauna embracing the moose, elk, caribou of two species, white sheep, black sheep, big-horn sheep, mule deer, white-tailed deer, mountain goat, grizzly, black and inland white bears.

THE SIERRA MADRE OF MEXICO, containing jaguar, puma, grizzly and black bears, mule deer, white-tailed deer, antelope, mountain sheep and peccaries.

I have necessarily omitted all those regions of the United States and Canada that still contain a remnant of big game, but have been literally "shot to pieces" by gunners.

In the United States and southern Canada there are about fifteen localities which contain a supply of big game sufficient that a conscientious sportsman might therein hunt and kill one head per year with a clear conscience. All others should be closed for five years! Here is the list of availables; and regarding it there will be about as many opinions as there are big-game sportsmen:

* * * * *

HUNTING GROUNDS IN AND NEAR THE UNITED STATES AND SOUTHERN CANADA WHEREIN IT IS RIGHT TO HUNT BIG GAME

THE MAINE WOODS: Well stocked with white-tailed deer.

NEW BRUNSWICK: Well stocked with moose; a few caribou, deer and black bear.

WHITE MOUNTAINS OF NEW HAMPSHIRE AND VERMONT: For deer.

THE ADIRONDACKS, NEW YORK: Well stocked with white-tailed deer, only.

PENNSYLVANIA MOUNTAINS: Contain many deer and black bears, and soon will contain more.

NORTHERN MINNESOTA: Deer and moose.

NORTHERN MICHIGAN AND WISCONSIN: White-tailed deer.

NORTHWESTERN WYOMING: Thousands of elk in fall and winter; a few deer, grizzly and black bears, but no sheep that it would be right to kill.

WESTERN AND SOUTHWESTERN MONTANA: Elk in season, mule and white-tail deer; no sheep that it would be right to kill.

NORTHWESTERN MONTANA: Mule and white-tailed deer, only. No sheep, bear, moose, elk or antelope to kill!

WYOMING, EAST OF YELLOWSTONE PARK: A few elk, by migration from the Park; a few deer, and bear of two species.

NORTHERN WOODS OF ONTARIO AND QUEBEC: Moose; deer.

SOUTHERN BRITISH COLUMBIA: Goat, a few sheep and deer; grizzly bear. Moose, caribou and elk should not be killed.

NORTHERN BRITISH COLUMBIA: Six fine species of big game.

NORTHWESTERN ALBERTA: Grizzly bear, big-horn and mountain goat.

Under existing conditions I regard the above-named hunting grounds as nearly all in which it is right or fair for big-game hunting now to be permitted, even on a strict basis. Nearly all others should immediately be closed, for large game, for ten years.

Of course such a proceeding, if carried into effect, would provoke loud protests from sportsmen, gunners, game-hogs, pot-hunters and others; but I only wish to high heaven that we had the power to carry such a program as that into effect! Then we would see some game in ten years; and our grand-children would thank us for some real big-game protection at a critical period.

Except in the few localities above-mentioned, I regard the big-game situation in the United States and southern Canada as particularly desperate. Unless there is an immediate and complete revolution in this country from an era of slaughter to an era of preservation, as sure as the sun rises on the morrow, outside of the hard and fast game preserves, and places like Maine and the Adirondacks, this generation of Americans and near-Americans will live to see our country swept clean of big game!

Two years ago, I did not believe this; but I do now. It is impossible to exaggerate the wide extent or the seriousness of this situation. In a country where any and every individual can rise and bluster, "I'm-just-as-good-as-you-are," and bellow for his "rights" as a "tax-payer," there is no stopping the millions who kill whenever there is an open season. And to many Americans, no right is dearer than the right to kill the game which by even the commonest law of equity belongs, not to the shooter exclusively, but partly to two thousand other persons who don't shoot at all!

Unless we come to an "About, face!" in quick time, all our big game outside the preserves is doomed to sure and quick extermination. This is not an individual opinion, merely: it is a fact; and a hundred thousand men know it to be such.

Last winter (1911-12), because the deer of Montana were driven by cold and hunger out of the mountains and far down into the ranchmen's valleys, eleven thousand of them were ruthlessly slaughtered. State Game Warden Avare says that often heads of families took out as many licenses as there were persons in the family, and the whole quota was killed. Such people deserve to go deerless into the future; but we can not allow them to rob innocent people.

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OUR SPECIES OF BIG GAME

THE PRONG-HORNED ANTELOPE, unique and wonderful, will be one of the first species of North American big game to become totally extinct. We may see this come to pass within twenty years. They can not be bred in protection, save in very large fenced ranges. They are delicate, capricious, and easily upset. They die literally "at the drop of a hat." They are quite subject to actinomycosis (lumpy-jaw), which in wild animals is incurable.

Already all the states that possess wild antelope, except Nevada, have passed laws giving that species long close seasons; which is highly creditable to the states that have done their duty. Nevada must get in line at the next session of her legislature!

In 1908, Dr. T.S. Palmer published in his annual report of "Progress in Game Protection" the following in regard to the prong-horned antelope:

"Antelope are still found in diminished numbers in fourteen western states. A considerable number were killed during the year in Montana, where the species seems to have suffered more than elsewhere since the season was opened in 1907.

"A striking illustration of the decrease of the antelope is afforded by Colorado. In 1898 the State Warden estimated that there were 25,000 in the state, whereas in 1908 the Game Commissioner places the number at only 2,000. The total number of antelope now in the United States probably does not exceed 17,000, distributed approximately as follows:

Colorado 2,000 Yellowstone Park 2,000 Idaho 200 Other States 2,000 Montana 4,000 ——- New Mexico 1,300 Saskatchewan 2,000 Oregon 1,500 ——- Wyoming 4,000 19,000

To-day (1912), Dr. Palmer says the total number of antelope is less than it was in 1908, and in spite of protection the number is steadily diminishing. This is indeed serious news. The existing bands, already small, are steadily growing smaller. The antelope are killed lawlessly, and the crimes of such slaughter are, in nearly every instance, successfully concealed.

Previously, we have based strong hopes for the preservation of the antelope species on the herd in the Yellowstone Park, but those animals are vanishing fearfully fast. In 1906, Dr. Palmer reported that "About fifteen hundred antelope came down to the feeding grounds near the haystacks in the vicinity of Gardiner." In 1908 the Yellowstone Park was credited with two thousand head. To-day, the number alive, by actual count, is only five hundred head; and this after twenty-five years of protection! Where have the others gone? This shows, alas! that perpetual close seasons can not always bring back the vanished thousands of game!



Here is a reliable report (June 29, 1912) regarding the prong-horned antelope in Lower California, from E.W. Nelson: "Antelope formerly ranged over nearly the entire length of Lower California, but are now gone from a large part of their ancient range, and their steadily decreasing numbers indicate their early extinction throughout the peninsula."

In captivity the antelope is exasperatingly delicate and short-lived. It has about as much stamina as a pet monkey. As an exhibition animal in zoological gardens and parks it is a failure; for it always looks faded, spiritless and dead, like a stuffed animal ready to be thrown into the discard. Zoologists can not save the prong-horn species save at long range, in preserves so huge that the sensitive little beast will not even suspect that it is confined.

Two serious attempts have been made to transplant and acclimatize the antelope—in the Wichita National Bison Range, in Oklahoma, and in the Montana Bison Range, at Ravalli. In 1911 the Boone and Crockett Club provided a fund which defrayed the expenses of shipping from the Yellowstone Park a small nucleus herd to each of those ranges. Eight were sent to the Wichita Range, of which five arrived alive. Of the seven sent to the Montana Range, four arrived alive and were duly set free. While it seems a pity to take specimens from the Yellowstone Park herd, the disagreeable fact is that there is no other source on which to draw for breeding stock.

The Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan, in Canada, still permit the hunting and killing of antelope; which is wholly and entirely wrong.

THE BIG-HORN SHEEP.—Of North American big game, the big-horn of the Rockies will be, after the antelope, the next species to become extinct outside of protected areas. In the United States that event is fast approaching. It is far nearer than even the big-game sportsmen realize. There are to-day only two localities in the four states that still think they have killable sheep, in which it is worth while to go sheep-hunting. One is in Montana, and the other is in Wyoming. In the United States a really big, creditable ram may now be regarded as an impossibility. There are now perhaps half a dozen guides who can find killable sheep in our country, but the game is nearly always young rams, under five years of age.

That Wyoming, Montana, Idaho and Washington still continue to permit sheep slaughter is outrageous. Their answer is that "The sportsmen won't stand for stopping it altogether." I will add:—and the great mass of people are too criminally indifferent to take a hand in the matter, and do their duty regardless of the men of blood.

The seed stock of big-horn sheep now alive in the United States aggregates a pitifully small number. After twenty-five years of unbroken protection in Colorado, Dillon Wallace estimates, after an investigation on the ground, that the state possesses perhaps thirty-five hundred head. He credits Montana and Wyoming with five hundred each—which I think is far too liberal a number. I do not believe that either of those states contains more than one hundred unprotected sheep, at the very utmost limit. If there are more, where are they?

In the Yellowstone Park there are 210 head, safe and sound, and slowly increasing. I can not understand why they have not increased more rapidly than they have. In Glacier Park, now under permanent protection, three guides on Lake McDonald, in 1910, estimated the number of sheep at seven hundred. Idaho has in her rugged Bitter Root and Clearwater Mountains and elsewhere, a remnant of possibly two hundred sheep, and Washington has only what chemists call "a trace." It has recently been discovered that California still contains a few sheep, and in southwestern Nevada there are a few more.

In Utah, the big-horn species is probably quite extinct. In Arizona, there are a few very small bands, very widely scattered. They are in the Santa Catalina Mountains, the Grand Canyon country, the Gila Range, and the Quitovaquita Mountains, near Sonoyta. But who can protect from slaughter those Arizona sheep? Absolutely no one! They are too few and too widely scattered for the game wardens to keep in touch with them. The "prospectors" have them entirely at their mercy, and the world well knows what prospectors' "mercy" to edible big game looks like on the ground. It leads straight to the frying-pan, the coyotes and the vultures.

The Lower California peninsula contains about five hundred mountain sheep, without the slightest protection save low, desert mountains, heat and thirst. But that is no real protection whatever. Those sheep are too fine to be butchered the way they have been, and now are being butchered. In 1908 I strongly called the attention of the Mexican Government to the situation; and the Departmento de Fomento secured the issue of an executive order forbidding the hunting of any big game in Lower California without the written authority of the government. I am sure, however, that owing to the political and military upheaval it never stopped the slaughter of sheep. In such easy mountains as those of Lower California, it is a simple matter to exterminate quickly all the mountain sheep that they possess. The time for President Madero and his cabinet to inaugurate serious protective measures has fully arrived.

Both British Columbia and Alberta have even yet fine herds of big-horn, and we can count three large game preserves in which they are protected. They are Goat Mountain Park (East Kootenay district, between the Elk and Bull Rivers); the Rocky Mountains Park, near Banff, and Waterton Lakes Park, in the southwestern corner of Alberta.

In view of the number of men who desire to hunt them, the bag limit on big-horn rams in British Columbia and Alberta still is too liberal, by half. One ram per year for one man is quite enough; quite as much so as one moose is the limit everywhere. To-day "a big, old ram" is regarded by sportsmen as a much more desirable and creditable trophy than a moose; because moose-killing is easy, and the bagging of an old mountain ram in real mountains requires five times as much effort and skill.

The splendid high and rugged mountains of British Columbia and Alberta form an ideal home for the big-horn (and mountain goat), and it would be an international calamity for that region to be denuded of its splendid big game. With resolute intent and judicial treatment that region can remain a rich and valuable hunting ground for five hundred years to come. Under falsely "liberal" laws, it can be shot into a state of complete desolation within ten years, or even less.

OTHER MOUNTAIN SHEEP.—In northern British Columbia, north of Iskoot Lake, there lies a tremendous region, extending to the Arctic Ocean, and comprehending the whole area between the Rocky Mountain continental divide and the waters of the Pacific. Over the southern end of this great wilderness ranges the black mountain sheep, and throughout the remainder, with many sheepless intervals, is scattered the white mountain sheep.

Owing to the immensity of this wilderness, the well-nigh total lack of railroads and also of navigable waters, excepting the Yukon, it will not be thoroughly "opened up" for a quarter of a century. The few resolute and pneumonia-proof sportsmen who can wade into the country, pulling boats through icy-cold mountain streams, are not going to devastate those millions of mountains of their big game. The few head of game which sportsmen can and will take out of the great northwestern wilderness during the next twenty-five years will hardly be missed from the grand total, even though a few easily-accessible localities are shot out. It is the deadly resident trappers, hunters and prospectors who must be feared! And again,—who can control them? Can any wilderness government on earth make it possible? Therefore, in time, even the great wilderness will be denuded of big game. This is absolutely fixed and certain; for within much less than another century, every square rod of it will have been gone over by prospectors, lumbermen, trappers and skin-hunters, and raked again and again with fine-toothed combs. A railway line to Dawson, the Copper River and Cook Inlet is to-day merely the next thing to expect, after Canada's present railway program has been wrought out.

Yes, indeed! In time the wilderness will be opened up, and the big game will all be shot out, save from the protected areas.

THE MOUNTAIN GOAT.—Even yet, this species is not wholly extinct in the United States. It survives in Glacier Park, Montana, and the number estimated in that region by three guide friends is too astoundingly large to mention.

This animal is much more easily killed than the big-horn. Its white coat renders it fatally conspicuous at long range during the best hunting season; it is almost devoid of fear, and it takes altogether too many chances on man. Thanks to the rage for sheep horns, the average sportsman's view-point regarding wild life ranks a goat head about six contours below "old ram" heads, in desirability. Furthermore, most guides regard the flesh of the goat as almost unfit for use as food, and far inferior to that of the big-horn. These reasons, taken together, render the goats much less persecuted by the sportsmen, ranchmen and prospectors who enter the home of the two species. It was because of this indifference toward goats that in 1905 Mr. John M. Phillips and his party saw 243 goats in thirty days in Goat Mountain Park, and only fourteen sheep.

Unless the preferences of western sportsmen and gunners change very considerably, the coast mountains of the great northwestern wilderness will remain stocked with wild mountain goats until long after the last big-horn has been shot to death. Fortunately, the skin of the mountain goat has no commercial value. I think it was in 1887 that I purchased, in Denver, 150 nicely tanned skins of our wild white goat at fifty cents each! They were wanted for the first exhibit ever made to illustrate the extermination of American large mammals, and they were shown at the Louisville Exposition. It must have cost the price of those skins to tan them; and I was pleased to know that some one lost money on the venture.



At present the mountain goat extends from north-western Montana to the head of Cook Inlet, but it is not found in the interior or in the Yukon valley. Whenever man decides that the species has lived long enough, he can quickly and easily exterminate it. It is one of the most picturesque and interesting wild animals on this continent, and there is not the slightest excuse for shooting it, save as a specimen of natural history. Like the antelope, it is so unique as a natural curiosity that it deserves to be taken out of the ranks of animals that are regularly pursued as game.

THE ELK.—The story of the progressive extermination of the American elk, or wapiti, covers practically the same territory as the tragedy of the American bison—one-third of the mainland of North America. The former range of the elk covered absolutely the garden ground of our continent, omitting the arid region. Its boundary extended from central Massachusetts to northern Georgia, southern Illinois, northern Texas and central New Mexico, central Arizona, the whole Rocky Mountain region up to the Peace River, and Manitoba. It skipped the arid country west of the Rockies, but it embraced practically the whole Pacific slope from central California to the north end of Vancouver Island. Mr. Seton roughly calculated the former range of canadensis at two and a half million square miles, and adds: "We are safe, therefore, in believing that in those days there may have been ten million head."

The range of the elk covered a magnificent domain. The map prepared by Mr. Ernest T. Seton, after twenty years of research, is the last word on the subject. It appears on page 43, Vol. I, of his great work, "Life Histories of Northern Animals," and I have the permission of author and publisher to reproduce it here, as an object lesson in wild-animal extermination. Mr. Seton recognizes (for convenience, only?) four forms of American elk, two of which, C. nannodes and occidentalis, still exist on the Pacific Coast. The fourth, Cervus merriami, was undoubtedly a valid species. It lived in Arizona and New Mexico, but became totally extinct near the beginning of the present century.

In 1909 Mr. Seton published in the work referred to above a remarkably close estimate of the number of elk then alive in North America. Recently, a rough count—the first ever made—of the elk in and around the Yellowstone Park, revealed the real number of that largest contingent. By taking those results, and Mr. Seton's figures for elk outside the United States, we obtain the following very close approximation of the wild elk alive in North America in 1912:

LOCALITY NUMBER AUTHORITY

Yellowstone Park and vicinity 47,000 U.S. Biological Survey. Idaho (permanently), 600 Washington 1,200 Game Warden Chris. Morgenroth. Oregon 500 California 400 New York, Adirondacks 400 State Conservation Commission. Minnesota 50 E.T. Seton. Vancouver Island 2,000 E.T. Seton. British Columbia (S.-E.) 200 E.T. Seton. Alberta 1,000 E.T. Seton. Saskatchewan 500 E.T. Seton In various Parks and Zoos 1,000 E.T. Seton. ——— Total, for all America. 54,850

In 1905, a herd of twenty of the so-called dwarf elk of the San Joaquin Valley, California, were taken to the Sequoia National Park, and placed in a fenced range that had been established for it on the Kaweah River.

The extermination of the wapiti began with the settlement of the American colonies. Naturally, the largest animals were the ones most eagerly sought by the meat-hungry pioneers, and the elk and bison were the first game species to disappear. The colonists believed in the survival of the fittest, and we are glad that they did. The one thing that a hungry pioneer cannot withstand is—temptation—in a form that embraces five hundred pounds of succulent flesh. And let it not be supposed that in the eastern states there were only a few elk. The Pennsylvania salt licks were crowded with them, and the early writers describe them as existing in "immense bands" and "great numbers."

Of course it is impossible for wild animals of great size to exist in countries that are covered with farms, villages and people. Under such conditions the wild and the tame cannot harmonize. It is a fact, however, that elk could exist and thrive in every national forest and national park in our country, and also on uncountable hundreds of thousands of rough, wild, timbered hills and mountains such as exist in probably twenty-five different states. There is no reason, except man's short-sighted greed and foolishness, why there are not to-day one hundred thousand elk living in the Allegheny Mountains, furnishing each year fifty thousand three-year-old males as free food for the people.

The trouble is,—the greedy habitants could not be induced to kill only the three-year-old-males, in the fall, and let the cows, calves and breeding bulls alone! By sensible management the Rocky Mountains, the Sierra Nevadas and the Coast Range would support enough wild elk to feed a million people. But we Americans seem utterly incapable of maintaining anywhere from decade to decade a large and really valuable supply of wild game. Outside the Yellowstone Park and northwestern Wyoming, the American elk exists only in small bands—mere remnants and samples of the millions we could and should have.

If they could be protected, and the surplus presently killed according to some rational, working system, then every national forest in the United States should be stocked with elk! In view of the awful cost of beef (to-day 10-1/2 cents per pound in Chicago on the hoof!), it is high time that we should consider the raising of game on the public domain on such lines that it would form a valuable food supply without diminishing the value of the forests.

Just now (1912) the American people are sorely puzzled by a remarkable elk problem that each winter is presented for solution in the Jackson Hole country, Wyoming. Driven southward by the deep snows of winter, the elk thousands that in summer graze and grow fat in the Yellowstone Park march down into Jackson Hole, to find in those valleys less snow and more food. Now, it happens that the best and most of the former winter grazing grounds of the elk are covered by fenced ranches! As a result, the elk that strive to winter there, about fifteen thousand head, are each winter threatened with starvation; and during three or four winters of recent date, an aggregate of several thousand calves, weak yearlings and weakened cows perished of hunger. The winters of 1908, 1909 and 1910 were progressively more and more severe; and 1911 saw about 2500 deaths, (S.N. Leek).

In 1909-10, the State of Wyoming spent $7,000 for hay, and fed it to the starving elk. In 1911, Wyoming spent $5,000 more, and appealed to Congress for help. Thanks to the efforts of Senator Lodge and others, Congress instantly responded with a splendid emergency appropriation of $20,000, partly for the purpose of feeding the elk, and also to meet the cost of transporting elsewhere as many of the elk as it might seem best to move. The starving of the elk ceased with 1911.

Outdoor Life magazine (Denver, Colo.) for August, 1912, contains an excellent article by Dr. W.B. Shore, entitled, "Trapping and Shipping Elk." I wish I could reprint it entire, for the solid information that it contains. It gives a clear and comprehensive account of last spring's operations by the Government and by the state of Montana in capturing and shipping elk from the Yellowstone Park herd, for the double purpose of diminishing the elk surplus in the Park and stocking vacant ranges elsewhere.

The operations were conducted on the same basis as the shipping of cattle—the corral, the chute, the open car, and the car-load in bulk. Dr. Shore states that the undertaking was really no more difficult than the shipping of range cattle; but the presence of a considerable proportion of young and tender calves, such as are never handled with beef cattle, led to 8.8 per cent of deaths in transit. The deaths and the percentage are nothing at which to be surprised, when it is remembered, that the animals had just come through a hard winter, and their natural vitality was at the lowest point of the year.

The following is a condensed summary of the results of the work:

Number of Hours on Killed or Died After Destination Elk Road Died in Car Unloading

1 Car. Startup, Washington 60: calves, 94 11 7 yearlings and two-year olds 1 " Hamilton, Montana 43: cows & 30 4 1 calves 1 " Thompson Falls, Montana 40 — 2 O 1 " Stephensville, Montana 36 — 1 1 1 " Deer Lodge, Montana 40 24 2 O 1 " Hamilton, Montana 40 — O O 1 " Mt. Vernon, Washington 46 4 days; 7 O unloaded & fed twice —- — - 305 27 9

The total deaths in transit and after, of 36 elk out of 305, amounted to 11.4 per cent.

All those shipped to Montana points were shipped by the state of Montana.

In order to provide adequate winter grazing grounds for the Yellowstone-Wyoming elk, it seems imperative that the national government should expend between $30,000 and $40,000 in buying back from ranchmen certain areas in the Jackson valley, particularly a tract known as "the swamp," and others on the surrounding foothills where the herds annually go to graze in winter, A measure to render this possible was presented to Congress in the winter of 1912, and without opposition an appropriation of $45,000 was made.

The splendid photographs of the elk herds that recently have been made by S.N. Leek, of Jackson Hole, clearly reveal the fact that the herds now consist chiefly of cows, calves, yearlings and young bulls with small antlers. In one photograph showing about twenty-five hundred elk, there are not visible even half a dozen pairs of antlers that belong to adult bulls. There should be a hundred! This condition means that the best bulls, with the finest heads, are constantly being selected and killed by sportsmen and others who want their heads; and the young, immature bulls are left to do the breeding that alone will sustain the species.



It is a well-known principle in stock-breeding that sires should be fully adult, of maximum strength, and in the prime of life. No stockbreeder in his senses ever thinks of breeding from a youthful, immature sire. The result would be weak offspring not up to the standard.

This inexorable law of inheritance and transmission is just as much a law for the elk, moose and deer of North America as it is for domestic cattle and horses. If the present conditions in the Wyoming elk herds continue to prevail for several generations, as sure as time goes on we shall see a marked deterioration in the size and antlers of the elk.

If the foundation principles of stock-breeding are correct, then it is impossible to maintain any large-mammal species at its zenith of size, strength and virility by continuous breeding of the young and immature males. By some sportsmen it is believed that through long-continued killing of the finest and largest males, the red deer of Europe have been growing smaller; but on that point I am not prepared to offer evidence.

In regard to the in-breeding of the elk herds in large open parks and preserves throughout North America, there are positively no ill effects to fear. Wild animals that are closely confined generation after generation are bound to deteriorate physically; but with healthy wild animals living in large open ranges, feeding and breeding naturally, the in-breeding that occurs produces no deterioration.

In the twin certainties of over-population, and deterioration from excessive killing of the good sires, we have to face two new problems of very decided importance. Nothing short of very radical measures will provide a remedy. For the immediate future, I can offer a solution. While it seems almost impossible deliberately to kill females, I think that the present is a very exceptional case, and one that compels us to apply the painful remedy that I now propose.

Premises:

1.—There are at present too many breeding cows in the Yellowstone herds.

2.—There are far too few good breeding bulls.

Conclusion:—For five years, entirely prohibit the killing of adult male elk, and kill only females, and young males. This would gradually diminish the number of calves born each year, by about 2,500, and by the end of five years it would reduce the number, and the annual birth, of females to a figure sufficiently limited that the herds could be maintained on existing ranges.

Corollary.—At the end of five years, stop killing females, and kill only young males. This plan would permit a large number of bull elk to mature; and then the largest and strongest animals would do the breeding,—just as Nature always intends shall be done.

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SOUTH AMERICA

Of all the big-game regions of the earth, South America is the poorest. Of hoofed game she possesses only a dozen species that are worth the attention of sportsmen; and like all other animal life in that land of little game, they are desperately hard to find. In South America you must work your heart out in order to get either game or specimens that will be worth showing.

At present, we need not worry about the marsh deer, the pampas deer, the guemal, or the venado, nor the tapir, jaguar, ocelot and bears. All these species are abundantly able to take care of themselves; and to find and kill any one of them is a man's task. In Patagonia the natives do wastefully slaughter the guanacos; and there are times also when great numbers of guanacos come down in winter to certain mountain lakes, presumably in search of food, and perish by hundreds through starvation. (H. Hesketh Prichard.)

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MEXICO

About ten years more will see the extinction of the mountain sheep of Lower California,—in the wake of the recently exterminated Mexican sheep of the Santa Maria Lakes region. In 1908, I solemnly warned the government of President Diaz, and at that time the Mexican government expressed much concern.

It is a great pity that just now political conditions are completely estopping wild-life protection in Mexico; but it is true. If the code of proposed laws that I drew up (by request) in 1908 and submitted to Minister Molina were adopted, it would have a good effect on the fauna of Mexico.

In Mexico there is little hoofed game to kill,—deer of the white-tail groups, seven or eight species; the desert mule deer; the brocket; the prong-horned antelope, the mountain sheep and the peccary. The deer will not so easily be exterminated, but the antelope and sheep will be utterly destroyed. They will be the first to go; and I think they can not by any possibility last longer than ten years. Is it not too bad that Mexico should permit her finest species of hoofed and horned game to be obliterated before she awakens to the desirability of conservation! The Mexicans could protect their small stock of big game if they would; but in Lower California they are leasing huge tracts of land to cattle companies, and they permit the lessees to kill all the wild game they please on their leased lands, even with the aid of dogs. This is a vicious and fatal system, and contrary to all the laws of nations.

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CHAPTER XVII

PRESENT AND FUTURE OF NORTH AMERICAN BIG GAME

(Concluded)

THE WHITE-TAILED DEER.—Five hundred years hence, when the greed and rapacity of "civilized" man has completed the loot and ruin of the continent of North America, the white-tailed deer will be the last species of our big game to be exterminated. Its mental traits, its size, its color and its habits all combine to render it the most persistent of our large animals, and the best fitted to survive. It neither bawls nor bugles to attract its enemies, it can not be called to a sportsman, like the moose, and it sticks to its timber with rare and commendable closeness. When it sees a strange living thing walking erect, it does not stop to stare and catch soft-nosed bullets, but dashes away in quest of solitude.

The worst shooting that I ever did or saw done at game was at running white-tailed deer, in the Montana river bottoms.

For the reasons given, the white-tail exists and persists in a hundred United States localities from which all other big game save the black bear have been exterminated. For example, in our Adirondacks the moose were exterminated years and years ago, but the beloved wilderness called the "North Woods" still is populated by about 20,000 deer, and about 8,000 are killed annually. The deer of Maine are sufficiently numerous that in 1909 a total of 15,879 were killed. With some assistance from the thin sprinkling of moose and caribou, the deer of Maine annually draw into that state, for permanent dedication, a huge sum of money, variously estimated at from $1,000,000 to $2,000,000. In spite of heavy slaughter, and vigorous attempts at extermination by over-shooting, the deer of northern Michigan obstinately refuse to be wiped out.

There is, however, a large group of states in which this species has been exterminated. The states comprising it are Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and adjacent portions of seven other states.

As if to shame the people of Iowa, a curious deer episode is recorded. In 1885, W.B. Cuppy, of Avoca, Iowa, purchased five deer, and placed them in a paddock on his 600-acre farm. By 1900 they had increased to 32 head; and then one night some one kindly opened the gate of their enclosure, and gave them the freedom of the city. Mr. Cuppy made no effort to capture them, possibly because they decided to annex his farm as their habitat. When a neighbor led them with a bait of corn to their owner's door, he declined to impound them, on the ground that it was unnecessary.

By 1912, those deer had increased to 400, and the portion of this story that no one will believe is this: they spread all through the suburbs and hinterland farms of Avoca, and the people not only failed to assassinate all of them and eat them, but they actually killed only a few, protected the rest, and made pets of many! Queer people, those men and boys of Avoca. Nearly everywhere else in the world that I know, that history would have been ended differently. Here in the East, 90 per cent of our people are like the Avocans, but the other 10 per cent think only of slaying and eating, sans mercy, sans decency, sans law. Now the State of Iowa has taken hold, to capture some of those deer, and set them free in other portions of the state.

Elsewhere I shall note the quick and thorough success with which the white-tailed deer has been brought back in Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and southern New York.

No state having waste lands covered with brush or timber need be without the ubiquitous white-tailed deer. Give them a semblance of a fair show, and they will live and breed with surprising fecundity and persistence. If you start a park herd with ten does, soon you will have more deer than you will know how to dispose of, unless you market them under a Bayne law, duly tagged by the state. In close confinement this species fares rather poorly. In large preserves it does well, but during the rutting season the bucks are to be dreaded; and those that develop aggressive traits should be shot and marketed. This is the only way in which the deer parks of England are kept safe for unarmed people.

Dr. T.S. Palmer has taken much pains to ascertain the number of deer killed in the eastern United States. His records, as published in May, 1910, are as follows:

STATE 1908 1909 1910 Maine 15,000 15,879 15,000 New Hampshire (a) (a) (a) Vermont 2,700 4,736 3,649 New York 6,000 9,000 9,000 New Jersey (a) 120 Pennsylvania 500 500 800 Michigan 9,076 6,641 13,347 Wisconsin 11,000 6,000 6,000 Minnesota 6,000 6,000 3,147 West Virginia 107 51 49 Maryland 16 13 6 Virginia 207 210 224 North Carolina (a) (a) (a) South Carolina 1,000 (a) (a) Georgia (a) 367 369 Florida 2,209 2,021 1,526 Alabama 152 148 132 Mississippi 411 458 500 Louisiana 5,500 5,470 5,000 Massachusetts 1,281 ——— ——— ——— Total 59,878 57,494 60,150

(a) No statistics available.

At this date deer hunting is not permitted at any time in Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas,—where there are no wild deer; nor in Rhode Island, Connecticut, Delaware, Tennessee or Kentucky. The long close seasons in Massachusetts, Connecticut and southern New York have caused a great migration of deer into those once-depopulated regions,—in fact, right down to tide-water.

THE MULE DEER.—This will be the first member of the Deer Family to become extinct in North America outside of the protected portions of its haunts. Its fatal preference for open ground and its habit of pausing to stare at the hunter have been, and to the end will be, its undoing. Possibly there are now two of these deer in the United States and British Columbia for every 98 that existed forty years ago, but no more. It is a deer of the bad lands and foothills, and its curiosity is fatal.

The number of sportsmen who have hunted and killed this fine animal in its own wild and picturesque bad-lands is indeed quite small. It has been four-fifths exterminated by the resident hunter and ranchman, and to-day is found in the Rocky Mountain region most sparingly. Ten years ago it seemed right to hunt the so-called Rocky Mountain "black-tail" in northwestern Montana, because so many deer were there it did not seem to spell extermination. Now, conditions have changed. Since last winter's great slaughter in northwestern Montana, of 11,000 hungry deer, the species has been so reduced that it is no longer right to kill mule deer anywhere in our country, and a universal close season for five years is the duty of every state which contains that species.

THE REAL BLACK-TAILED DEER, of the Pacific coast, (Odocoileus columbianus) is, to most sportsmen of the Rocky Mountains and the East actually less known than the okapi! Not one out of every hundred of them can recognize a mounted head of it at sight. It is a small, delicately-formed, delicately-antlered understudy of the big mule deer, and now painfully limited in its distribution. It is the deer of California and western Oregon, and it has been so ruthlessly slaughtered that today it is going fast. As conditions stand to-day, and without a radical change on the part of the people of the Pacific coast, this very interesting species is bound to disappear. It will not be persistent, like the white-tailed deer, but in the heavy forests, it will last much longer than the mule deer.

My information regarding this deer is like the stock of specimens of it in museum collections,—meager and unsatisfactory. We need to know in detail how that species is faring to-day, and what its prospects are for the immediate future. In 1900, I saw great piles of skins from it in the fur houses of Seattle, and the sight gave me much concern.

THE CARIBOU, GENERALLY.—I think it is not very difficult to forecast the future of the Genus Rangifer in North America, from the logic of the conditions of to-day. Thanks to the splendid mass of information that has been accumulated regarding this group, we are able to draw certain conclusions. I think that the caribou of the Canadian Barren Grounds and northeastern Alaska will survive in great numbers for at least another century; that the caribou herds of Newfoundland will last nearly as long, and that in fifty years or less all the caribou of the great northwestern wilderness will be swept away.

The reasons for these conclusions are by no means obscure, or farfetched.

In the first place, the barren-ground caribou are to-day enormously numerous,—undoubtedly running up into millions. It can not be possible that they are being killed faster than they are breeding; and so they must be increasing. Their food supply is unlimited. They are protected by two redoubtable champions,—Jack Frost and the Mosquito. Their country never will contain a great human population. The natives are so few in number, and so lazy, that even though they should become supplied with modern firearms, it is unlikely that they ever will make a serious impression on the caribou millions. The only thing to fear for the barren-ground caribou throngs is disease,—a factor that is beyond human prediction.

It is reasonably certain that the Barren Grounds never will be netted by railways,—unless gold is discovered over a wide area. The fierce cold and hunger, and the billions of mosquitoes of the Barren Grounds will protect the caribou from the wholesale slaughter that "civilized" man joyously would inflict—if he had the chance.

The caribou thousands of Newfoundland are fairly accessible to sportsmen and pot-hunters, but at the same time the colonial government can protect them from extermination if it will. Already much has been done to check the reckless and wicked slaughter that once prevailed. A bag limit of three bull caribou per annum has been fixed, which is enforced as to non-residents and sportsmen, but in a way that is much too "American" it is often ignored by residents in touch with the game. For instance, the guide of a New York gentleman whom I know admitted to my friend that each year he killed "about 25" caribou for himself and his family of four other persons. He explained thus: "When the inspector comes around, I show him two caribou hanging in my woodshed, but back in the woods I have a little shack where I keep the others until I want them."

The real sportsmen of the world never will make the slightest perceptible impression on the caribou of Newfoundland. For one thing, the hunting is much too tame to be interesting. If the caribou of that Island ever are exterminated, it will be strictly by the people of Newfoundland, themselves. If the government will tighten its grip on the herds, they need never be exterminated.

The caribou of New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario are few and widely scattered. Unless carefully conserved, they are not likely to last long; for their country is annually penetrated in every direction by armed men, white and red. There is no means by which it can be proven, but from the number of armed men in those regions I feel sure that the typical woodland caribou species is being shot faster than it is breeding. The sportsmen and naturalists of Canada and New Brunswick would render good service by making a close and careful investigation of that question.

The caribou of the northwestern wilderness are in a situation peculiarly their own. They inhabit a region of naked mountains and thin forests, wherein they are conspicuous, easily stalked and easily killed. Nowhere do they exist in large herds of thousands, or even of many hundreds. They live in small bands of from ten to twenty head, and even those are far apart. The region in which they live is certain to be thoroughly opened up by railways, and exploited. Fifty years from now we will find every portion of the now-wild Northwest fairly accessible by rail. The building of the railways will be to the caribou—and to other big game—the day of doom. In that wild, rough region, no power on earth,—save that which might be able to deprive all the inhabitants and all visitors of firearms,—can possibly save the game outside of a few preserves that are diligently patroled.

The big game of the northwest region, in which I include the interior of Alaska, will go! It is only a question of time. Already the building of the city of Fairbanks, and the exploitation of the mining districts surrounding it, have led to such harassment and slaughter of the migrating caribou that the great herd which formerly traversed the Tanana country once a year has completely changed its migration route, and now keeps much farther north. The "crossing" of the Yukon near Eagle City has been abandoned. A hundred years hence, the northwestern wilderness will be dotted with towns and criss-crossed with railways; but the big game of it will be gone, except in the preserves that are yet to be made. This will particularly involve the caribou, moose, and mountain sheep of all species, which will be the first to go. The mountain goat and the forest bears will hold out longer than their more exposed neighbors of the treeless mountains.

THE MOOSE.—In the United States the moose is found in five states,—Maine, Minnesota, Montana, Wyoming and Idaho. There are 550 in the Yellowstone Park. In Maine and Minnesota only may moose be hunted and killed. In the season of 1909, 184 moose were killed in Maine,—a large number, considering the small moose population of that state. In northern Minnesota, we now possess a great national moose preserve of 909,743 acres; and in 1908 Mr. Fullerton, after a personal inspection in which he saw 189 moose in nine days, estimated the total moose population of the present day at 10,000 head. This is a moose preserve worth while.

Outside of protected areas, the moose is the animal that is most easily exterminated. Its trail is easily followed, and its habits are thoroughly known, down to three decimal places. As a hunter's reward it is Great. Strange to say, New Brunswick has found that the moose is an animal that it is possible, and even easy, to protect. The death of a moose is an event that is not easily concealed! Wherever it is thoroughly understood that the moose law will be enforced, the would-be poacher pauses to consider the net results to him of a jail sentence.

In New Brunswick we have seen two strange things happen, during our own times. We have seen the moose migrate into, and permanently occupy, an extensive area that previously was destitute of that species. At the same time, we have seen a reasonable number of bull moose killed by sportsmen without disturbing in the least the general equanimity of the general moose population! And at this moment, the moose population of New Brunswick is almost incredible. Every moose hunter who goes there sees from 20 to 40 moose, and two of my friends last year saw, "in round numbers, about 100!" Up to date the size of adult antlers seem to be maintaining a high standard.

In summer, the photographing of moose in the rivers, lakes and ponds of Maine and New Brunswick amounts to an industry. I am uneasy about the constant picking off of the largest and best breeding bulls of the Mirimachi country, lest it finally reduce the size and antlers of the moose of that region; but only the future can tell us just how that prospect stands to-day.

In Alaska, our ever thoughtful and forehanded Biological Survey of the Department of Agriculture has by legal proclamation at one stroke converted the whole of the Kenai Peninsula into a magnificent moose preserve. This will save Alces gigas, the giant moose of Alaska, from extermination; and New Brunswick and the Minnesota preserve will save Alces americanus. But in the northwest, we can positively depend upon it that eventually, wherever the moose may legally be hunted and killed by any Tom, Dick or Harry who can afford a twenty-dollar rifle and a license, the moose surely will disappear.

The moose laws of Alaska are strict—toward sportsmen, only! The miners, "prospectors" and Indians may kill as many as they please, "for food purposes." This opens the door to a great amount of unfair slaughter. Any coffee-cooler can put a pan and pick into his hunting outfit, go out after moose, and call himself a "prospector."

I grant that the real prospector, who is looking for ores and minerals with an intelligent eye, and knows what he is doing, should have special privileges on game, to keep him from starving. The settled miner, however, is in a different class. No miner should ask the privilege of living on wild game, any more than should the farmer, the steamboat man, the railway laborer, or the soldier in an army post. The Indian should have no game advantages whatever over a white man. He does not own the game of a region, any more than he owns its minerals or its water-power. He should obey the general game laws, just the same as white men. In Africa, as far as possible, the white population wisely prohibits the natives from owning or using firearms, and a good idea it is, too. I am glad there is one continent on which the "I'm-just-as-good-as-you-are" nightmare does not curse the whole land.

THE MUSK-OX.—Now that the north pole has been safely discovered, and the south pole has become the storm-center of polar exploration, the harried musk-ox herds of the farthest north are having a rest. I think that most American sportsmen have learned that as a sporting proposition there is about as much fun and glory in harrying a musk-ox herd with dogs, and picking off the members of it at "parade rest," as there is in shooting range cattle in a round-up. The habits of the animal positively eliminate the real essence of sport,—difficulty and danger. When a musk-ox band is chased by dogs, or by wolves, the full-grown members of it, bulls and cows alike, instantly form a close circle around the calves, facing outward shoulder to shoulder, and stand at bay. Without the aid of a gunner and a rifle, such a formation is invincible! Mr. Paul Rainey's moving pictures tell a wonderful story of animal intelligence, bravery and devotion to the parental instinct.

For some reason, the musk-ox herds do not seem to have perceptibly increased since man first encountered them. The number alive to-day appears to be no greater than it was fifty years ago; and this leads to the conclusion that the present delicate balance could easily be disturbed the wrong way. Fortunately, it seems reasonably certain that the Indians of the Canadian Barren Grounds, the Eskimo of the far north, and the stray explorers all live outside the haunts of the species, and come in touch only with the edge of the musk-ox population as a whole. This leads us to hope and believe that, through the difficulties involved in reaching them, the main bodies of musk-ox of both species are safe from extermination.

At the same time, the time has come for Canada, the United States and Denmark to join in formulating a stiff law for the prevention of wholesale slaughter of musk-ox for sport. It should be rendered impossible for another sportsman to kill twenty-three head in one day, as once occurred. Give the sportsman a bag of three bulls, and no more. To this, no true sportsman will object, and the objections of game-hogs only serve to confirm the justice of the thing they oppose.

THE GRIZZLY BEAR.—To many persons it may seem strange that anyone should feel disposed to accord protection to such fierce predatory animals as grizzly bears, lions and tigers. But the spirit of fair play springs eternal in some human breasts. The sportsmen of the world do not stick at using long-range, high-power repeating rifles on big game, but they draw the line this side of traps, poisons and extermination. The sportsmen of India once thought,—for about a year and a day,—that it was permissible to kill troublesome and expensive tigers by poison. Mr. G.P. Sanderson tried it, and when his strychnine operations promptly developed three bloated and disgusting tiger carcasses, even his native followers revolted at the principle. That was the alpha and omega of Sanderson's poisoning activities.

I am quite sure that if the extermination of the tiger from the whole of India were possible, and the to-be or not-to-be were put to a vote of the sportsmen of India, the answer would be a thundering "No!" Says Major J. Stevenson-Hamilton in his "Animal Life in Africa:" "It is impossible to contemplate the use against the lion of any other weapon than the rifle."

The real sportsmen and naturalists of America are decidedly opposed to the extermination of the grizzly bear. They feel that the wilds of North America are wide enough for the accommodation of many grizzlies, without crowding the proletariat. A Rocky Mountain without a grizzly upon it, or at least a bear of some kind, is only half a mountain,—commonplace and tame. Put one two-year-old grizzly cub upon it, and presto! every cubic yard of its local atmosphere reeks with romantic uncertainty and fearsome thrills.

A few persons have done considerable talking and writing about the damage to stock inflicted by bears, but I think there is little justification for such charges. Certainly, there is not one-tenth enough real damage done by bears to justify their extermination. At the present time, we hear that the farmers (!) of Kadiak Island, Alaska, are being seriously harassed and damaged by the big Kadiak bear,—an animal so rare and shy that it is very difficult for a sportsman to kill one! I think the charges against the bears,—if the Kadiak Islanders ever really have made any,—need to be proven, by the production of real evidence.

In the United States, outside of our game preserves, I know of not one locality in which grizzly bears are sufficiently numerous to justify a sportsman in going out to hunt them. The California grizzly, once represented by "Monarch" in Golden Gate Park, is almost, if not wholly, extinct. In Montana, outside of Glacier Park it is useless to apply for wild grizzlies. In the Bitter Root Mountains and Clearwater Mountains of Idaho, there are grizzlies, but they hide so effectually under the snow-bent willows on the "slides" that it is almost impossible to get a shot. Northwestern Wyoming still contains a few grizzlies, but there are so many square miles of mountains around each animal it is now almost useless to go hunting for them. British Columbia, western Alberta and the coast mountains at least as far as Skaguay, and Yukon Territory generally, all contain grizzlies, and the sportsman who goes out for sheep, caribou and moose is reasonably certain to see half a dozen bears and kill at least one or two. In those countries, the grizzly species will hold forth long after all killable grizzlies have vanished from the United States.

I think that it is now time for California, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Wyoming to give grizzly bears protection of some sort. Possibly the situation in those states calls for a five-year close season. Even British Columbia should now place a bag limit on this species. This has seemed clear to me ever since two of my friends killed (in the spring of 1912) six grizzlies in one week! But Provincial Game Warden A. Bryan Williams says that at present it would be impossible to impose a bag limit of one per year on the grizzlies of British Columbia; and Mr. Williams is a sincere game-protector.

THE BROWN BEARS OF ALASKA.—These magnificent monsters present a perplexing problem, which I am inclined to believe can be satisfactorily solved by the Biological Survey only in short periods, say of three or four years each. Naturally, the skin hunters of Alaska ardently desire the skins of those bears, for the money they represent. That side of the bear problem does not in the least appeal to the ninety odd millions of people who live this side of Alaska. The skins of the Alaskan brown bears have little value save as curiosities, nailed upon the wall, where they can not be stepped upon and injured. The hunting of those bears, however, is a business for men; and it is partly for that reason they should be preserved. A bear-hunt on the Alaska Peninsula, Admiralty or Montagu Islands, is an event of a lifetime, and with a bag limit of one brown bear, the species would be quite safe from extermination.



In Alaska there is some dissatisfaction over the protection accorded the big brown bears; but those rules are right as far as they go! A governor of Alaska once said to me: "The preservation of the game of Alaska should be left to the people of Alaska. It is their game; and they will preserve it all right!"

The answer? Not by a long shot!

Only three things were wrong with the ex-governor's view:

1.—The game of Alaska does not belong to the people who live in Alaska—with the intent to get out to-morrow! It belongs to the 93,000,000 people of the Nation.

2.—The preservation of the Alaskan fauna on the public domain should not be left unreservedly to the people of Alaska, because

3.—As sure as shooting, they will not preserve it!

Congress is right in appropriating $15,000 for game protection in Alaska. It is very necessary that the regulations for conserving the wild life should be fixed by the Secretary of Agriculture, with the advice of the Biological Survey.

THE BLACK BEAR is an interesting citizen. He harms nobody nor anything; he affords good sport; he objects to being exterminated, and wherever in North America he is threatened with extermination, he should at once be given protection! A black bear in the wilds is harmless. In captivity, posed as a household "pet," he is decidedly dangerous, and had best be given the middle of the road. In big forests he is a grand stayer, and will not be exterminated from the fauna of the United States until Washington is wrecked by anarchists.

THE AMERICAN BISON.—I regard the American bison species as now reasonably secure against extermination. This is due to the fact that it breeds persistently and successfully in captivity, and to the great efforts that have been put forth by the United States Government, the Canadian Government, the American Bison Society, the New York Zoological Society, and several private individuals.

The species reached its lowest ebb in 1889, when there were only 256 head in captivity and 835 running wild. The increase has been as follows:

1888—W.T. Hornaday's census 1,300 1902—S.P. Langley's census 1,394 1905—Frank Baker's census 1,697 1908—W.T. Hornaday's census 2,047 1910—W.P. Wharton's census (in North America) 2,108 1912—W.P. Wharton's census (in North America) 2,907

To-day, nearly one-half of the living bison are in very large governmental parks, perpetually established and breeding rapidly, as follows:

IN THE UNITED STATES.

Yellowstone Park fenced herd, founded by Congress 125 Montana National Bison Range, founded by The American Bison Society 69 Wichita Bison Range, founded by The New York Zoological Society 39 Wind Cave Bison Range, S. Dakota, founded by Am. Bison Society To be stocked Niobrara (Neb.) National Bison Range, now in process of creation To be stocked

IN CANADA.

Buffalo Park, Wainwright, Alberta 1,052 Elk Island Park, Alberta 53 Rocky Mountains Park, Banff, Alberta 27

Total National and Provincial Preserves 1,365

Of wild bison there are only three groups: 49 head in the Yellowstone National Park, about 75 Pablo "outlaws" around the Montana Bison Range, and between 300 and 400 head in northern Athabasca, southwest of Fort Resolution, existing in small and widely scattered bands.

The efforts of man to atone for the great bison slaughter by preserving the species from extinction have been crowned with success. Two governments and two thousand individuals have shared this task,—solely for sentimental reasons. In these facts we find reason to hope and believe that other efforts now being made to save other species from annihilation will be equally successful.

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CHAPTER XVIII

THE PRESENT AND FUTURE OF AFRICAN GAME

Thanks to the diligence with which sportsmen and field naturalists have recorded their observations in the haunts of big game, it is not at all difficult to forecast the immediate future of the big game of the world. We may safely assume that all lands well suited to agriculture, mining and grazing will become populated by rifle-bearing men, with the usual result to the wild mammals and birds. At the same time, the game of the open mountains everywhere is thinly distributed and easily exterminated. On the other hand, the unconquerable forest jungles of certain portions of the tropics will hold their own, and shelter their four-footed inhabitants for centuries to come.

On the open mountains of the world and on the grazing lands most big game is now being killed much faster than it breeds. This is due to the attacks of five times too many hunters, open seasons that are too long, and bag limits that are far too liberal. As an example, consider Africa Viewed in any way it may be taken, the bag limit in British East Africa is appallingly high. Notice this astounding array of wild creatures that each hunter may kill under a license costing only $250!

2 Buffalo 2 Rhinoceros 2 Hippopotamus 1 Eland 2 Grevy Zebra 20 Common Zebra 2 Fringe-eared Oryx 4 Beisa Antelope 4 Waterbuck 1 Sable Antelope 1 Roan Antelope 1 Greater Kudu 4 Lesser Kudu 10 Topi 20 Coke Hartebeest 2 Neumann Hartebeest 4 Jackson Hartebeest 6 Hunter's Antelope 4 Thomas Kob 2 Bongo 4 Pallah 2 Sitatunga 3 Gnu 12 Grant Gazelle 4 Waller's Gazelle 10 Harvey's Duiker 10 Isaac's Duiker 10 Blue Duiker 10 Kirk's Dik-dik 10 Guenther's Dik-dik 10 Hinde's Dik-dik 10 Cavendish Dik-dik 10 Abyssinian Oribi 10 Haggard's Oribi 10 Kenya Oribi 10 Suni 10 Klipspringer 10 Ward's Reedbuck 10 Chanler's Reedbuck 10 Thompson Gazelle 10 Peters Gazelle 10 Soemmerring Gazelle 10 Bushbuck 10 Haywood Bushbuck

The grand total is a possible 300 large hoofed and horned animals representing 44 species! Add to this all the lions, leopards, cheetahs, cape hunting dogs and hyaenas that the hunter can kill, and it will be enough to stock a zoological garden!

Quite a number of these species, like the sable antelope, kudu, Hunter's antelope, bongo and sitatunga are already rare, and therefore they are all the more eagerly sought.

Into the fine grass-lands of British East Africa, suitable for crops and stock grazing, settlers are steadily going. Each one is armed, and at once becomes a killer of big game. And all the time the visiting sportsmen are increasing in number, going farther from the Uganda Railway, and persistently seeking out the rarest and finest of the game. The buffalo has recovered from the slaughter by rinderpest only in time to meet the onset of oversea sportsmen.

Mr. Arthur Jordan has seen much of the big game of British East Africa, and its killing. Him I asked to tell me how long, in his opinion, the big game of that territory will last outside of the game preserves, as it is now being killed. He said, "Oh, it will last a long time. I think it will last fifteen years!"

Fifteen years! And this for the richest big-game fauna of any one spot in the whole world, which Nature has been several million years in developing and placing there!

At present the marvelous herds of big game of British East Africa and Uganda constitute the grandest zoological spectacle that the world ever has seen in historic times. For such an area, the number of species is incredible, and until they are seen, the thronging masses of individuals are beyond conception. It is easy to say "a herd of 3,000 zebras;" but no mere words can give an adequate impression of the actual army of stripes and bars, and hoofs thundering in review over a grassy plain.

But the settlers say, "The zebras must go! They break through our best wire fences, ruin our crops, despoil us of the fruits of long and toilsome efforts, and much expenditure. We simply can not live in a country inhabited by herds of wild zebras." And really, their contention is well founded. When it is necessary to choose between wild animals and peaceful agriculture for millions of men, the animals must give way.

In those portions of the great East African plateau region that are suited to modern agriculture, stretching from Buluwayo to northern Uganda, the wild herds are doomed to be crowded out by the farmer and the fruit-grower. This is the inevitable result of civilization and progress in wild lands. Marauding battalions of zebras, bellicose rhinoceroses and murderous buffaloes do not fit in with ranches and crops, and children going to school. Except in the great game preserves, the swamps and the dense jungles it is certain that the big game of the whole of eastern Africa is foredoomed to disappear,—the largest and most valuable species first.

Five hundred years from now, when North America is worn out, and wasted to a skeleton of what it now is, the great plateau region of East Africa between Cape Town and Lake Rudolph will be a mighty empire, teeming with white population. Giraffes and rhinoceroses now are trampling over the sites of the cities and universities of the future. Then the herds of grand game that now make Africa a sportsman's wonderland will exist only in closed territory, in books, and in memory.



From what has befallen in South Africa, we can easily and correctly forecast the future of the big game of British East Africa and Uganda. Less than fifty years ago, Cape Colony, Natal, Zululand, and every country up to the Zambesi was teeming with herds of big wild animals, just as the northern provinces now are. As late as 1890, when Rhodesia was taken over by the Chartered Company, and the capital city of Salisbury was staked out, an American boy in the Pioneer Corps, now Honorable William Harvey Brown, of Salisbury, wrote thus of the Gwibi Flats, near Salisbury:

"That evening I beheld on those flats a sight which probably will never again be seen there to the end of the world. The variety deploying before me was almost incredible! There, within the range of my vision were groups of roan, sable and tsessebi antelopes, Burchell zebras, [now totally extinct!] elands, reedbucks, steinbucks and ostriches. It was like Africa in the days of Livingstone. As I sat on my horse, viewing with amazement this wonderful panorama of wild life, I was startled by a herd that came galloping around a small hill just behind me."—("On the South African Frontier," p. 114.)

That was in 1890. And how is it to-day?

Salisbury is a modern city, endorsed by two lines of railway. The Gwibi Flats are farms. There is some big game yet, in Rhodesia south of the Zambesi, but to find it you must go at least a week's journey from the capital, to the remote corners that have not yet been converted into farms or mining settlements. North of the Zambesi, Rhodesia yet contains plenty of big game. The Victoria Falls station is a popular starting point for hunting expeditions headed northeast and northwest. In the northwest the game is yet quite in a state of nature. Unfortunately the Barotse natives of that region can procure from the Portuguese traders all the firearms and ammunition that they can pay for, and by treaty they retain their hunting rights. The final result will be—extermination of the game.

Elsewhere throughout Rhodesia the natives are not permitted to have guns and gunpowder,—a very wise regulation. In Alaska our Indians are privileged to kill game all the year round, and they have modern firearms with which to do it.

And how is it with the game of that day?

The true Burchell's zebra is now regarded as extinct! In Cape Colony and Natal, that once teemed with big game in the old-fashioned African way, they are counting the individual wild animals that remain! Also, they are making game preserves, literally everywhere.

Now that the best remaining game districts of Africa are rapidly coming under British control, it is a satisfaction to observe that the governing bodies and executive officers are alive to the necessity of preserving the big game from actual extinction. Excepting German East Africa, from Uganda to Cape Colony the game preserves form an almost continuous chain. It is quite impossible to enumerate all of them; but the two in British East Africa are of enormous size, and are well stocked with game. South Africa contains a great many smaller preserves and a few specimen herds of big game, but that is about all. Except in a few localities the hunting of big game in that region is done forever.

The Western Districts Game and Trout Protective Association of South Africa recently, (1911), has made careful counts and estimates of the number of individual game animals remaining in Cape Colony, with the following result:

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BIG GAME IN THE CAPE PROVINCE

From information kindly placed at the disposal of the Association by the Government, it was found that the following varieties of big game are still found in the Province. The numbers, however, are only approximate:

Blesbok: About 400 in Steynsburg, and 35 in Queen's Town divisions.

Bontebok: About 30 in Bredasdorp and 45 in Swellendam divisions.

Buffalo: About 340 in Uitenhage, 120 in Alexandria, and 75 in Bathurst divisions.

Elephants: About 130 in Alexandria, 160 in Uitenhage, 40 in Bathurst, and 20 in Knysna divisions.

Gemsbok: About 2,450 in Namaqualand, 4,500 in Vryburg, 4,000 in Gordonia, and 670 in the Kenhardt, Mafeking and Barkly West divisions.

Koodoo: About 10,000, found chiefly in the divisions of Albany, Barkly West, Fort Beaufort, Hay, Herbert, Jansenville, Kuruman, Ladismith, Mafeking, Mossel Bay, Oudtshoorn, Riversdale, Steytlerville, Uitenhage, Victoria East and Vryburg.

Oribi: About 120, in the divisions of Albany and Alexandria.

Rietbok: About 170, in the Komgha division.

Zebra: About 560, most of which are to be found in the divisions of Cradock, George and Oudtshoorn. A few are to be found in the divisions of Uniondale and Uitenhage.

Springbok: Being migratory, it is difficult to estimate their number. In some years they are compelled by drought to invade the Province in large numbers. They are then seen as far south as Calvinia and Fraserburg. Large numbers are, however, fenced in on private estates in various parts of the Province.

Klipspringers: About 11,200, in the following divisions, viz.: Namaqualand, 6,559; Kuruman, 2,100; Steytlerville, 1,530; Oudtshoorn, 275; Hay, 250; Ladismith, 220; Graaff-Reinet, 119; Kenhardt, 66; and Cradock, 56.

Hartebeest: About 9,700, principally in the divisions of Vryburg, Gordonia, Kuruman, Mafeking, Kimberley, Hay and Beaufort West.

Wildebeest: About 3,450 in Vryburg, 80 each in Gordonia and Kuruman, 65 in Mafeking, 20 in Queen's Town, and a few in the Bredasdorp divisions.

Eland: About 12 in the Graaff-Reinet division, privately bred.

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The above showing of the pitifully small numbers of the specimens that constitute the remnant of the big-game of the Cape suggest just one thing:—a universal close season throughout Cape Colony, and no hunting whatever for ten years. And yet, what do we see?

The Report from which the above census was taken contains half a column of solid matter, in small type, giving a list of the open seasons all over Cape Colony, during which killing may be done! So it seems that the spirit of slaughter is the same in Africa that it is in America,—kill, as long as there is anything alive to kill!

This list is of startling interest, because it shows how closely the small remnants of big game are now marked down in South Africa.

In view of the success with which Englishmen protect their game when once they have made up their minds to do so, it is fair to expect that the herds now under protection, as listed above, will save their respective species from extinction. It is alarming, however, to note the wide territory covered by the deadly "open seasons," and to wonder when the bars really will be put up.

To-day, Mashonaland is a very-much-settled colony. The Cape to Cairo railway and trains de luxe long ago attained the Palls of the Zambesi, and now the Curator of the Salisbury Museum will have to search diligently in far off Nyassaland, and beyond the Zambesi River, to find enough specimens to fill his cases with representatives of the vanished Rhodesian fauna. Once (1892) the white rhinoceros was found in northern Rhodesia; but never again. In Salisbury, elands and zebras are nearly as great a curiosity as they are in St. Louis.

But for the discovery of white rhinoceroses in the Lado district, on the western bank of the Nile below Gondokoro, we would now be saying that Rhinoceros simus is within about ten specimens of total extinction.

From South Africa, as far up as Salisbury, in central Rhodesia, at least 99 per cent of the big game has disappeared before the white man's rifle. Let him who doubts this scan the census of wild animals still living in Cape Colony.

From all the other regions of Africa that are easily accessible to gunners, the animal life is vigorously being shot out, and no man in his senses will now say that the big game is breeding faster than it is being killed. The reverse is painfully true. Mr. Carl Akeley, in his quest for a really large male elephant for the American Museum found and looked over a thousand males without finding one that was really fine and typical. All the photographs of elephant herds that were taken by Kermit Roosevelt and Akeley show a striking absence of adult males and of females with long tusks. There are only young males, and young females with small, short tusks. The answer is—the white ivory hunters have killed nearly all the elephants bearing good ivory.

The slaughter of big game is going on furiously in British East Africa because the Uganda Railway opens up the entire territory to hunters. Anyone, man or woman, who can raise $5,000 in cash can go there and make a huge "bag" of big game. With a license costing only $250 he can kill enough big game to sink a ship.

The bag limit in British East Africa is ruinously extravagant. If the government desires the extermination of the game, such a bag limit surely will promote that end. It is awful to think that for a petty sum any man may buy the right to kill 300 head of hoofed and horned animals, of 44 species, not counting the carnivorous animals that also may be killed. That bag limit should immediately be reduced 75 per cent!

As matters stand to-day in British East Africa, the big game of the country, outside the three preserves, is absolutely certain to disappear, in about one-fourth of the time that it took South Africa to accomplish the same result. The reasons are obvious:—superior accessibility, more deadly rifles, expert professional guides, and a widespread craze for killing big game. With care and economy, British East Africa should furnish good hunting for two centuries, but as things are going on to-day, twenty years will see a tremendous change for the worse, and a disappearance of game that will literally astonish the natives.

German East Africa and Uganda will not exterminate their quotas of big game quite so soon. The absence of railways is a great factor in game-existence. The Congo Free State contains game and sporting possibilities—on the unexplored uplands between the rivers,—that are as yet totally unknown to sportsmen at large. We are accustomed to thinking of the whole basin of the Congo as a vast, gloomy and impenetrable forest.