106 RKI'(tRT OF THE FISH AND GAME COMMISSION. 



Handicapped hy a scanty leoislative appropriation that was hope- 

 lessly inadequate, no one dared hope to ever finance conservation work 

 upon a scale adequate to handh^ the nia,2:nitude of the jol), that even 

 then had made itself manifest to tliose whose lives are devoted to this 

 public .'■•ervice. 



The luuiting license was then a new, untried thinu'; its possibilities 

 problematical, so much so that Senator II. M. Willis, himself a southern 

 Califoniian. s:ensing something of the local need proposed and indeed 

 (lid, for a time, succeed in limiting the use of revenues thereunder aris- 

 ing to the introduction and propagation of alien species of game. From 

 that early day to this, when conservation lU) longer asks support from 

 the general public, is indeed a far cry. But now that tlie sportsmen 

 have, through an enlightened popular sentiment, come to consider their 

 hunting and angling license investments as virtually a contribution to 

 the general good of game and fish, there has been a steady increase year 

 by year, not only from immigration, but internally as well. 



GAME CONDITIONS. 



Some years after the establishment of the hunting license the Fish 

 and rjaine Commission concluded, somewhat hastily, that propagation 

 of game birds aiul introduction of alien species did not pay. It was 

 then felt that careful conservation of indigenous species was more pro- 

 ductive than experimenting with exotics. Whether that conclusion was 

 entirely sound has for some time appeared debatable. Increasing cul- 

 tivation involved changing conditions for game, development of water, 

 and different crops. But of all developments questioning that conclu- 

 sion, nothing could have a more unsettling effect than the phenomenal 

 success attendant upon the artificial propagation and introduction of 

 Chinese pheasants in the Owens Valley of Inyo County. This alone is 

 unquestionably werth every penny this state ever s])ent u[>on the prop- 

 agation of game. To such extended range and in such considerable 

 numbers have these traditional game birds of royalty increased that a 

 short open season with low bag limits is only a matter of time, meaning 

 thus the actual addition of these magnificent fowl to the already long 

 list of California's game. Today, a hundred of them may be seen in 

 driving through the extent of their range in Owens Valley from the salt 

 lake to the foot of Long Valley, delighting the motor tourist with their 

 gorgeous display of coloring as the.y strut about the stubble fields 

 and run or fly across the road, quite tame, usually in pairs, but often 

 in considerable family parties. 



At present, a plan made eight years ago by Commissioner Connell 

 for sending a well equipped expedition into southern and southeast- 

 ern Mexico in cpiest of the Grayson bob-white is held in abeyance await- 



