IVHAT SHALL BE DONE? 609 



of the game preserve system, which within a few years 

 has become so extensive, is doing something to protect 

 the birds, yet, in the nature of things, it cannot affect 

 them much. Each year the ducks become less and less. 

 Occasionally there are periods when, as in the autumn 

 of 1899, some special cause — as a great drought pre- 

 vailing over much of the country — concentrates the 

 ducks where water can be had, and makes for those 

 regions an apparent abundance; but it is quite certain 

 that the greater numbers found there mean an abso- 

 lute dearth somewhere else. Something radical must 

 be done. Fewer fowl must be killed in order that more 

 breeders may be left, and the stock of birds thus in- 

 creased. 



If for five years gunning were stopped all over the 

 country February ist, the shooting at the end of that 

 time would be so much better than it has been at any 

 time for the last fifteen years that gunners throughout 

 the land would be practically unanimous to have such 

 a law made permanent for all time. 



The action, first advocated years ago by Forest and 

 Stream, and since then made law in a number of 

 States, that the sale of game should be forbidden, is a 

 long step in the right direction. This would put an end 

 to shooting for the market, and would thus cut off one 

 serious cause of the destruction of fowl. If such a law 

 should meet with general favor, if the shooting after 

 the 1st of January or ist of February should be for- 

 bidden, if the bags should be limited to twenty-five or 

 thirty birds a day, new conditions would soon greet the 



