THE LEGITIMATE USE OF GAME 113 



When the shoe of Necessity pinches hard enough, 

 let the people remember the great possibilities in 

 state and national deer farming. If there can be 

 created for this idea a foundation of sound public 

 sentiment, its success is absolutely assured. 



Of course every intelligent person knows full 

 well that the richest and the intensively cultivated 

 farming regions of the United States are not suited 

 to the production and maintenance of wild game 

 of any kind except quail. A state wherein every 

 acre is cultivated, where population is dense and 

 there is a destructive agent on every square rod of 

 earth, is no fit place for grouse, ducks or deer. We 

 do not demand impossibilities. But such regions 

 as I have described are rare. In at least seven- 

 tenths of our states, there is an abundance of woods, 

 swamps and brush-covered hills furnishing suitable 

 cover for quail, grouse and deer. In Massachu- 

 setts, Connecticut and New York, where there is 

 an abundance of waste lands, plenty of brush and 

 timber and stone walls instead of barbed-wire 

 fences, the white-tailed deer have enormously 

 increased during the past five years. From the 

 Berkshire Hills they have steadily spread south- 

 ward until they have reached New York City itself, 

 and the whole north shore of Long Island Sound. 

 I have seen that in Putnam County, New York, 

 the wooded Berkshire Hills and the Croton water- 

 sheds are actually becoming populated with deer; 



