410 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



with legislatures on the rabbit and bob-white seasons, or take to trap- 

 shooting. Daniel Boone, if he should revisit his old hunting grounds, 

 might die of starvation if he depended on game for his food. 



These old principles of game protection compare with scientific 

 game management as a rough diameter limit in logging compares with 

 forestry. Just as various species of trees in various localities demand 

 varying silvicultural treatment, so the dififerent species of game, sub- 

 jected to all degrees of persecution in their various ranges, need varying 

 degrees and modes of protection. 



New Mexico has gone, in for a new method of game protection. It 

 has created a game commission with broad regulatory powers, so that 

 the slow, laborious processes of legislation are not needed in order 

 to applv protection when and where it is needed. This commission is 

 empowered to create game refuges, to purchase lands for refuges or 

 pu'blic shooting grounds, to establish closed seasons on any species of 

 game or fish at any time or place, to close the hunting season during 

 times of extreme forest fire danger, to establish rest grounds for migra- 

 tory birds, to establish and operate fish hatcheries, to propagate, buy, 

 sell and plant any species of game or fish, and to establish such service 

 as may be necessary to carry out these powers within the limitations of 

 its financial resources. 



The establishment of game refuges and of local closed seasons where 

 game is badly depleted are the two essential factors in maintaining a 

 breeding-stock, and the maintenance of a breeding-stock on every range 

 suitable for game is the very foundation of game management. Be- 

 cause it failed to maintain a breeding-stock, the old system of game 

 management signally failed to perpetuate game. One of its most con- 

 spicuous failures was with migratory birds. The conspicuous success 

 of the Federal migratory bird law lies in its insistence on maintaining 

 the breeding-stock by eliminating spring-shooting, when the birds are 

 mated and preparing to rear their young. That, however, is only half 

 the problem ; for the next danger to waterfowl lies in the destruction 

 of their breeding-grounds through drainage, and this danger the United 

 States Biological Survey is seeking to avert through Federal acquisition 

 of breeding grounds by a tax on migratory bird licenses. 



What the migratory bird law is accomplishing for waterfowl by rec- 

 ognizing this fundamental principle. State game laws have largely 

 failed to achieve for other game by ignoring or slighting the principle, 

 or at least by failing to create effective means for putting it into efifect. 



