STATE FOREST AS GAME PRESERVE 



343 



Elk Arriving at Itasca State Park. 



this carload of elk was shipped from jackson hole, wyoming, to itasca park in minnesota and 



will be used to stock the park. 



STATE FOREST AS GAME PRESERVE 



By Ernest O. Buhler 



THE arrival at Itasca Park, Min- 

 nesota, of a carload of elk from 

 Jackson Hole, Wyoming, marks 

 the beginning of a plan under 

 which, it is hoped, these magnificent ani- 

 mals will be restored to the Minnesota 

 forests in something like their former 

 numbers. Once they roamed over Min- 

 nesota's wilds by thousands. But the 

 hunter's rifle reduced them year after 

 year, until there was danger that they 

 would soon be added to the list of ex- 

 tinct animals. 



Then the Yellowstone Park came to 

 the rescue. To it the remaining elk 

 gathered from the mountain ranges 

 around, and there — amid just such an 

 environment of forest, lake, meadow, 

 swamp and snow-capped mountains as 

 was most favorable for their multipli- 

 cation — they have bred in such num- 

 bers that the Government has recently 

 deemed the time ripe for their distribu- 



tion among such States as would pro- 

 vide for them the necessary protection 

 in a forest refuge. 



State Forester W. T. Cox, of Minne- 

 sota, saw the value of the opportunity, 

 and Itasca Park offered an ideal spot 

 for a refuge. It was only necessary to 

 surround with an eight-foot wire fence 

 an area about a mile square, timber 

 land, meadow and lake, and the refuge 

 was ready. 



The elk were very wild and difficult 

 to catch, but a deep snow, while hinder- 

 ing their rapid flight, made it possible 

 to tire them out by a persistent pursuit 

 on snowshoes, and capture them by the 

 use of the lasso. From Jackson Hole, 

 where Howard Eaton obtained them, 

 they were hauled over the rugged Teton 

 Mountains to Victor, Idaho ; thence they 

 were taken by rail to Butte, to Wadena, 

 to Park Rapids and Itasca State Park. 

 While being driven through Teton Pass, 



