ECOLOGY AND WILD LIFE CONSERVATION 485 



the federal government has the right to do this. Local courts ruled that 

 only federal wardens could be used to kill this excess, not hunters. 



Farm Habitats 



With so much of our country under cultivation or in pastures, the 

 only hope of increasing our wild life, according to game technicians, is 

 for the farmer to consider it an additional crop. However, the practice 

 on many modern farms is to remove all the brush from their fence rows, 

 stream banks, and odd corners — the "clean farming" policy. This leaves 

 no cover for rabbits, no browse for deer, and no nesting sites for quail 

 and insectivorous birds. To bring back the game, wild life experts are 

 recommending that natural fence rows be made by planting multiflora 

 rose. This remarkable plant grows so rapidly that it will turn a -cow 

 in three years and a pig in five, and it will last for many years without 

 cost to the farmer. This hedge not only furnishes nesting sites and 

 cover but also an abundance of rose fruits (called hips). The farmer 

 is further urged to keep cattle out of his wood lot to improve both the 

 timber and the wild life habitat. When erosion is a problem, he is urged 

 to plant such shrubby plants as bicolor lespedeza, coralberry, indigo 

 plant, and Siberian pea-tree which will furnish wild life foods as well as 

 control erosion. In many states the division of Fish and Game or Con- 

 servation will furnish the farmer these plants either free or for a very 

 small cost. 



Another important habitat is the farm pond which can have many 

 uses other than watering stock if properly constructed. An acre of farm 

 pond will furnish eight to ten times as many pounds of fish as an acre 

 of land will furnish in pounds of beef if the water is fertilized regularly 

 with a balanced fertilizer. If the pond is stocked at the farmer's ex- 

 pense, he can seine it from time to time, store as many pounds of fish as 

 he has need for in his deep freeze, and throw back a few of the large fish 

 for breeders and the small fish for greater growth. He can maintain 

 a proper ratio of rough fish to food fish. If he prefers, he can use 

 the pond for recreation and catch the fish on rod and reel. Such ponds 

 can now be built in a day or two with a bulldozer, but they should be 

 carefully fenced against cattle who usually ruin them in a few years by 

 trampling their banks and polluting the water. These ponds are a 

 great boon to wild life which will increase in any area where water was 

 scarce. 



Overgrazing is another bad practice which hurts both the owner 

 and the wild life. A recent study in Arizona has shown that this 

 will destroy the valuable perennial grasses and allow cholla cactus, 



