No. 4.] DECREASE OF BIRDS. 527 



throughout the continent, it would be, in time, either exter- 

 minated or rendered so rare that hunting it would be un- 

 profitable. Admitting that such bounty laws, if uniformly 

 adopted, would be effective, let us first see why their results 

 are, in general, pernicious. 



The main object of all bird legislation is to protect the 

 birds. This can be done by restricting both the number of 

 shooters and the time during which shooting is allowed. 

 Bounty laws have precisely the opposite effect. They en- 

 courage boys, foreigners and unemployed persons to roam 

 with guns in their hands through the woods and fields at all 

 seasons of the year. This is sure to result in the destruc- 

 tion of game birds and insectivorous birds at all seasons, to 

 say nothing of the poultry and other property of the farm- 

 ers that, perforce, must suffer. Probably every State that 

 has offered bounties in recent years has had this experience. 



Bounty laws always put a premium upon dishonesty. 

 Under the so-called scalp act of 1885, in Pennsylvania, up- 

 wards of two thousand dollars were realized for a buffalo 

 hide and a mule skin in one county, by a party of hunters. 

 These hides were cut up and " fixed " to resemble the scalps 

 or ears of predatory mammals. Whether the magistrates 

 also were "fixed " is not recorded. A red fox was slain in 

 one of the mountainous districts and its pelt cut into sixty- 

 one parts, for which the hunter received sixty-one dollars. 

 Bounties were paid on the heads of domestic fowls, grouse, 

 cuckoos, and even English sparrows, which were supposed 

 to have been palmed off on the authorities as the heads of 

 hawks and owls. Birds and mammals were killed in other 

 States and shipped into Pennsylvania, and large amounts of 

 money were thus fraudulently obtained.* This but repeats 

 the history of local and State bounty laws everywhere. 



A bounty on cats, foxes, crows, hawks, owls, English spar- 

 rows, weasels and skunks would be very expensive to the 

 State. Pennsylvania paid out during one year not less than 

 one hundred and fifty thousand dollars for bounties on birds 

 and mammals. Montana paid out within six months in 1887 



* " Birds of Massachusetts," Dr. B. H. Warren, annual report Massachusetts 

 State Board of Agriculture, 1890, p. 45. 



