CALIFORNIA FISH AND GAME. 89 



]854 they were nearly all driven to the tiiles, ])nt the finding of horns 

 of six to eight prongs, all over the hills proved how plentiful they had 

 been. 



"I found no difference in size between these elk and the Oregon, 

 Washington, W^yoming, and Colorado elk, and felt sure that the bulls 

 would weigh 700 to 800 pounds. They struck me as weighing about as 

 much as an average steer and their horns were fully as big as any elk 

 I have ever killed or seen in other states. Dikeman shot the last cow 

 and calf about 1863, just west of the Sargent ranch on the North Fork 

 of the San Joaquin near the IMokelumne River. The rest of the animals, 

 so far as I know, ranged in the tules and willows between Buena Vista 

 and Tulare lakes, and only on the south side of Tulare Lake, ranging 

 also west into the footliills. I never heard of any except south of the 

 Sacramento Eiver, and as far south as Buena Vista Lake. 



"I killed some antelope on the San Joaquin in 1856, running one 

 well-grown fawn down (6 months old), but both horse and fawn died 

 from effects of the run. The antelope were scarce at this time, and 

 finally drifted around Tulare Lake. I never heard of them coming 

 further west than Byron Springs * * * I killed elk at Tulare Lake 

 in 1856 and found them the same as those that ranged up as far as 

 IMartinez. Antelope, tule elk and wild horses were plentiful in the 

 Tulare Lake country and in the vicinity of the present site of Fresno 

 at this time. * * * We hunted in the tules with a sloop, using a ladder 

 lashed to the mast for a lookout. When elk were sighted we would 

 break cur way through the tules to them, usually finding them on grass 

 land between sloughs. In one instance in Whisky Slough I cleaned 

 up a band of eight single-handed, keeping out of sight. Five were 

 taken with the rifle and I returned to the boat, loaded my shotgun with 

 heavy charge of buckshot and on returning, found the three remaining 

 yearlings still in the vicinity near the carcasses. Following them, I got 

 all three single file, and, as they turned their heads, I got all three at 

 (me shot, at an angle, being kicked over by the charge in the bargain. 

 I never heard of another instance of this kind." 



There is some evidence that seems reliable that elk once occurred in 

 Santa Cruz and San Benito counties. Mr. J. W. Miller of Watsonville 

 writes that one of the old settlers of that region, Mr. Frank Mauk, says 

 that when he was a boy his father and oldest brother hunted elk in 

 Santa Cruz County, also in the Salinas Valley. Mr. Boutell, a stage 

 driver in San Benito County, says that elk were plentiful in that 

 county in 1864, their favorite range being section 16, range 11 east. 



In a letter recently received from INIr. Mauk he says : " In the early 

 fifties my people lived some six or eight miles from Gilroy at the mouth 

 of Bodfish Caiion. I remember quite well of my father, my brother 

 George. Captain Adams (afterwards sheriff of Santa Clara County), 

 and a Texan ranger named Bob Poore, coming over the mountain to 

 the Pajaro Valley to hunt elk and returning with wagon loaded. At 

 times the trip extended down to the Salinas plains. In 1882 I took 

 charge of the railroad station at Pajaro (now Watsonville Junction). 

 My watchman was a Frenchman named Joe Pillesier, who came to 

 California in 1843 or 1846. He married a daughter of Salvador Vallejo, 

 a brother of General Vallejo. Mr. Pillesier often spoke of the sport he 

 had in killing elk here, saying that on occasions the vaqueroes would 



