

OF WILD ANIMALS 59 



timber and thick brush. This is why it so successfully resists 

 the extermination that has almost swept the mule deer, ante- 

 lope, white goat, moose and elk from all the hunting-grounds 

 of the United States. Thanks to its alertness in seeing its 

 enemies first, its skill and quickness in hiding, and its mental 

 keenness in recognizing and using deer sanctuaries, the white- 

 tailed or "Virginia" deer will outlive all the other hoofed 

 animals of North America. In Pennsylvania they know enough 

 to rush for the wire-bounded protected area whenever the 

 hunters appear. That state has twenty-six such deer sanc- 

 tuaries, — well filled with deer. 



The moose and caribou dwell upon open or half-open 

 ground, and are at the mercy of the merciless long-range rifles. 

 Their keenness does not count much against rifles that can 

 shoot and kill at a quarter of a mile. In the rutting season the 

 bull moose of Maine or New Brunswick is easily deceived by 

 the "call" of a birch-bark megaphone in the hands of a moose 

 hunter who imitates the love call of the cow moose so skilfully 

 that neither moose nor man can detect the falsity of the lure. 



The mountain sheep is wide-eyed, alert and ready to run, 

 but he dwells in exposed places from the high foothills up to 

 the mountain summits, and now even the most^bungling 

 hunter can find him and kill him at long range. In the days 

 of black powder and short ranges the sheep had a chance to 

 escape; but now he has none whatever. He has keener vision 

 and more alertness than the goat, but as a real life-saving 

 factor that amounts to nothing! Wild sheep are easily and 

 quickly exterminated. 



The mountain goat has no protection except elevation and 

 precipitous rocks, and to the hunter who has the energy to 

 climb up to him he, too, is easy prey. Usually his biped 

 enemy finds him and attacks him in precipitous mountains, 

 where running and hiding are utterly impossible. When 

 discovered on a ledge two feet wide leading across the face 

 of a precipice, poor Billy has nothing to do but to take the 



