344 State Horticultural Society. 



As it took generations to make people see the wrong in slavery, so 

 will it lake generations lo induce all people to look at linnting from this 

 point of view, but it is nndonbtedl)' one of the aims of higher culture and 

 will finally prevail in spite of all that is done and said by the defenders 

 of the hunt, though their disciples are found in all walks of life, even in 

 the highest. 



In condemning hunting as a popular sport it is not meant that wc 

 should not kill those wild animals which damage our crops or are in au\ 

 way injurious to our property or incompatible with our well-being and 

 enjoyment of life. On the contrary the law of self-preservation makes 

 it our duty to use all means to reduce their number or even extermin- 

 ate them. The extermination of the rabbit would be almost as great 

 a boon for the horticulturist as it would be to the world at large to 

 get rid of the mice, rats, gophers, squirrels and prairie dogs. The 

 damage all these rodents do far outweighs the benefit we derive from 

 the little poor meat we find on them, and it would be foolish to de- 

 mand their preservation simply for the fun of killing them. 



It will only be a question of a few years when deer and wild turkey 

 have disappeared from our State ; this will be the inevitable result of the 

 deforestation and cultivation of the country ; they will go the way the 

 buffalo, the puma, the bear and the w-olf went. With the extermination 

 of the smaller predatory mamals, such as fox, racoon, opossum, mink, 

 skunk and weasel, it will require many years yet, but their entire re- 

 moval from the State at the present time would not even be desirable in- 

 asmuch as we need their good services in checking the increase of ro- 

 dents, which without them would become a real danger to husbandry. 



Quails are still considered legitimate game, but, if farmers did un- 

 derstand what is good for them, they would long ago have stopped the 

 killing of this useful bird, a large part of whose feed consists in such 

 insects as do most injury to the growing crops, while the vegetable part 

 of their diet comprises all kinds of seeds of obnoxious weeds and stray 

 kernels of grain of no value to the farmer. Plovers and snipes are also 

 of great benefit as insect destroyers, as anybody can convince himself by 

 opening the stomach of one killed on his field or meadow. 



All these birds should in the future be taken from the list of game 

 birds, especially since it becomes more and more apparent that some 

 species of plovers are already reduced to a stage where annihilation is 

 threatened. 



Of all the birds ordinarily hunted there are only the ducks and geese 

 wdiich could be; recommended as legitimate game, and if the hunters 

 w^ould confine their efforts to these birds in the season set apart for their 

 execution it would not do any particular harm as they are with us only a 



