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GAME-PRESERVING IN THE UNITED STATES. 



so abundant in the land. The care of the United 

 States at the Yellowstone and Yosemite Parks 

 has, however, been set at naught by lawless poach- 

 ing in spite of their military police. The buf- 

 falo and elk herds there will soon be annihilated, 

 and it has been recommended that the buffaloes es- 

 pecially shall be distributed among the private 

 parks, where they can be more effectively guarded. 

 So, after all, it will be to private enterprise in game- 

 preserving that valuable results will be due in the 

 augmentation of the finer types of wild animals ; and 

 that enterprise has been very encouraging within 

 the last decade especially, though something had 

 been done previously. Deer parks had been by no 

 means uncommon on the country estates of the 

 wealthy in all times of our history, but the first 

 well-planned attempt at game-preserving seems to 

 have been made about forty years ago by the late 

 Judge J. D. Caton at Ottawa, 111. An enthusiastic 

 naturalist and sportsman, he brought together in 

 one park nearly all the varieties of our native game 

 except the moose and caribou, which only thrive 

 under conditions of a wooded country and an ex- 

 tended range. This experiment was imitated in a 

 small way, but it was not till the magnificent results 

 of the late Austin Corbin's enterprise in the estab- 

 lishment of the Blue Mountain Forest at Newport, 

 N. II., were made evident that there was a notice- 

 able movement in this direction. 



Blue Mountain Forest is not surpassed in extent 

 by any preserve in the United States. In the num- 

 ber and variety of its game, the care with which all 

 the rightful conditions of habitat are reproduced, 

 and the vigilant interest which watches every detail 

 of the wild life harboring there, it ranks, though 

 only eight years old, among the foremost game pre- 

 serves of the world. It lies near Newport, N. H., 

 and consists of 36,000 acres inclosed by a woven- 

 wire fence 8 feet high. The tract, obiong, about 

 12 miles by 5, is nearly bisected by a mountain 

 range which rises to an altitude of 3,000 feet. The 

 densely wooded slopes and the second-growth for- 

 ests of the lowlands furnish an admirable covert for 

 the more timid game, while in the extensive mead- 

 ows graze the buffalo and elk herds under happy 

 conditions. The environment is so natural and ex- 

 tensive that all the animals live as in their native 

 wilds, unconscious of captivity, and the range is 

 such that many of them probably never have looked 

 on the face of man. This may be specially said of 

 the moose, which is one of the shyest of all wild ani- 

 mals and secludes itself on the mountain acclivi- 

 ties amidst the most obscure thickets. The inhab- 

 itants of the park get their own living as in a state 

 of aboriginal Nature, the buffalo only excepted. 

 The moose and elk feed on grass, leaves, and 

 twigs in summer, while in winter they eke out sub- 

 sistence by devouring bark and moss. On the 

 other hand, the buffalo (properly the bison) is fed 

 during the extreme cold season with hay and green 

 cornstalks from the silo. Shelter, too, is provided 

 for the buffalo alone, but the well-grown animal 

 disdains the winter shed, preferring to stand all the 

 fury of the elements. The deer herds, including 

 the red deer or stag and the roe and fallow deer of 

 Europe, as well as the white-tailed or Virginian va- 

 riety, find no difficulty in securing their own food 

 in winter. The same may also be said of the wild 

 swine, which were originally imported from the 

 German Black Forest. It has been the funda- 

 mental idea of the management of this great pre- 

 serve to give its denizens the most favorable ad- 

 vantages of a wild life and protection against the 

 violence of man ; otherwise to leave them absolutely 

 to themselves. The wisdom of this treatment has 

 been shown in the immense increase of the wild 

 stock in all its kinds. The forest was inclosed in 



1889, and the original progenitors put in it con- 

 sisted of 25 buffalo, 60 elk, 12 moose, 70 deer of 4 

 varieties, 18 wild hogs, 6 caribous, and 6 antelopes. 

 The latest report (1896) shows buffalo, 75, with an 

 expectation of 100 at the spring colony ; elk. about 

 1,200; deer, 1,200; moose, about 150; and wild 

 swine, 1,000. The antelopes and caribous died, 

 though there appeared to be no reason for their 

 failure to thrive. But on the whole the increase 

 has been so extraordinary as to justify the belief 

 that we can multiply all the types of our native 

 fauna ad libitum. The Corbin buffalo herd alone 

 has shown itself so healthy and prolific that it 

 would be able gradually to spare breeding stock for 

 all the other parks asking for them. During the 

 winter of 1896 indeed it contributed 20 of these 

 animals to Van Cortlandt Park, New York city. 

 Aside from the breeding of indigenous varieties, 

 the fruitful adaptation of some that belong to the 

 Old World, such as the stag or red deer and the 

 German wild boar, a type of swine markedly differ- 

 ent from our domestic pig, promises interesting re- 

 sults in animal stirpiculture and increase in the 

 kinds of our large game. 



Other Preserves. Shortly after the declared 

 success of the Austin Corbin experiment at Blue 

 Mountain Forest, similar enterprises were begun on 

 a goodly scale and in different sections of the coun- 

 try, undoubtedly inspired by that noble project. 

 Among these a few may be mentioned. Litchfield 

 Park (named for its owner, Mr. E. II. Litchfield) 

 is an inclosure of 9,000 acres near Tupper Lake, in 

 the Adirondacks, established in 1893. This pictur- 

 esque tract is diversified by 5 small lakes and the 

 preserve is mostly devoted to the cervine tribes, 2 va- 

 rieties of the smaller American deer and the wapiti 

 or elk. There are at present somewhat more than 

 200 animals in the park, so far as can be estimated, 

 and the number is rapidly increasing. Dr. W. Sew- 

 ard Webb has also a game preserve of 9,000 acres 

 in the Adirondacks known as He-ha-sa-ne Park, 

 founded about five years ago, which has a present 

 showing of 16 moose, 35 elk, and 275 deer, all varie- 

 ties breeding well. Besides the many club pre- 

 serves in the Adirondacks, there is a noble park of 

 30,000 acres belonging to the Adirondack Timber 

 and Mineral Company, which since its inclosure a 

 year ago has increased its stock by 500 through 

 purely natural laws. The presence of a fenced 

 animal park seems at once to attract to it the wild 

 inhabitants of the woods for many miles about. 



In the Catskills, New York, Mr. George J. Gould's 

 preserve of 600 acres at Furlough Lodge confines 

 about 70 elk and as many deer, and the herds are 

 swiftly and healthily increasing. Mr. Rutherford 

 J. Stuyvesant's game park at Allamuchy, N. J.. 

 includes 4,000 acres under fence, and is stocked 

 with 40 elk and 200 Virginian and black-tailed 

 deer, which are propagating their numbers rapidly, 

 while the same story can be told of his interesting 

 colony of beavers. Another notable New Jersey 

 preserve is that of Mr. C. C. Worthington, who has 

 3.500 acres in a ring fence near Delaware Water 

 Gap, which has within its bounds more than 600 

 deer, besides a small colony of elk. Among other 

 enterprises that may be cited is that recently in- 

 augurated by M. Menier, of chocolate fame, at An- 

 ticosti island, off the eastern coast of Maine. A tract 

 has been fenced off 40 miles by 35 miles, and this is 

 now stocking with moose, elk, caribou, deer, and 

 buffalo. In other parts of the United States parks 

 specially worth notice are those of the Page Fence 

 Company at Adrian, Mich., where a small buffalo 

 herd is steadily growing in numbers, and of the Si . 

 Louis Park and Agricultural Company at Spring- 

 field, Mo., an enterprise of very recent inauguration. 

 This preserve of 5,000 acres already makes a splen- 



