160 Game Survey of the North Central States 



Management Program. Insufficient knowledge is of course no excuse 

 for not applying what knowledge we have. We know that for sporting qualities 

 the ruffed grouse shares with bobwhite the top place in our list of small upland 

 game. 



We know that fire, the axe, cow, plow, and gun determine his future, and 

 are of our own wielding. 



We know that we must either own the land, or control the use of these 

 agents on the land owned by others, to produce a grouse crop. 



Public acquisition of grouse land is started in many forestry departments, but 

 is as yet receiving inadequate support from sportsmen. 



A tax differential on ungrazed woodlots is in effect in Indiana, but few 

 sportsmen, there or elsewhere, think of it as fundamental to grouse conservation 

 in all farming regions. 



Petroleum, coal, and steel are rapidly making the woodlot a useless ap- 

 pendage to the farm, which must be grazed grouseless to pay its "keep." Sports- 

 men should realize that a wood-burning gas plant for farms, or even an efficient 

 wood-burning furnace, would do more to keep woodlots, and hence grouse, on the 

 map of rural America than many new laws or sermons on conservation. Indus- 

 trialization can only be fought with its own weapons. 



These fundamental counter-moves can well be gotten under way while we 

 are learning the biology of grouse. Then when we know just what to do, we 

 shall have some coverts to do it in, and tools wherewith to work. 



