GROWTH OF SOUND IDEAS IN GAME MANAGEMENT 



By Ward Shepard 



T^HE primary purpose of game protection is to save 

 -* from destruction species of harmless wild animals 

 that we have no moral right to exterminate. It is the 

 species that we protect and seek to perpetuate. The sec- 

 ondary purpose of game protection is to produce game 

 for hunting, and it so happens that in the world of today 

 this is the object that appeals most strongly to most men 

 who have sufficient interest to act. The two fundamental 

 branches of the subject then are wild life preservation 

 and game production. This article will deal chiefly with 

 game production and with game production in the wild 

 state rather than with game farming, which is an en- 

 tirely different subject. 



The relation between 

 forestry and game produc- 

 tion is intimate; in truth. 

 game production is a part 

 of forestry. Forestry is 

 more than tree culture ; it 

 is forest culture. It seeks 

 to perpetuate the forest as 

 an integral unit, so that 

 game production takes its 

 rightful place alongside 

 the other branches of for- 

 estry. Foresters must 

 therefore decipher the prin- 

 ciples of game management 

 as they decipher the prin- 

 ciples of silviculture. Both 

 activities have this in com- 

 mon, also, that each deals 

 with a wild stock that is 

 never in reality domesti- 

 cated, but that still yields 

 a manifold increase under 

 intelligent care. There is 

 no more need that game 

 should be exterminated 

 than there is that forests 

 should be. 



Granted a proper system 

 of game administration, 

 there are two essentials to game production; first, the 

 breeding stock, and, second, game range. This is so 

 obvious as to need no comment ; yet, in America some 

 species of animals have been exterminated, some are peril- 

 ously near extermination, and others lead a precarious 

 life in remote parts of their former wide ranges. The 

 preservation and upbuilding of the breeding stock and 

 the safeguarding of the game ranges are the two vital 

 problems of American game management. 



The ominous reduction of the breeding stock of game 

 is a perfectly natural result of the methods of game 

 protection practiced for the last century. With a few 



exceptions of comparatively recent date, which will be 

 noted later, traditional game protection in America has 

 revolved round three ideas : the bag limit, the length of 

 the open season, and the closed season of several years' 

 duration. The bag limit was supposed to limit the num- 

 ber of animals that each person could kill ; but it never 

 limited the number of persons that could kill, or the 

 region in which they could kill. Consequently, as popu- 

 lation increased, as firearms were perfected, and as 

 means of travel were vastly improved, the bag limit be- 

 came almost a negligible factor as a means of preserving 

 the breeding stock of gme. Likewise, the gradual re- 

 duction in the length of the 

 open season has not appre- 

 ciably offset the effects of 

 the ever-increasing army of 

 hunters and the ever-in- 

 creasing ease of killing. To 

 the waning power of these 

 two methods was added the 

 closed season extending 

 through several seasons, an 

 expedient usually invoked, 

 only when a species had 

 become alarmingly scarce. 

 I do not wish to depre- 

 ciate either the bag limit, 

 the short open season, or 

 the universal closed season 

 as useful means of game 

 protection; but as the sole 

 means they were doomed to 

 failure once America had 

 ])assed out of the pioneer 

 stage. 



Fortunately, more prom- 

 ising principles are coming 

 into play here and there 

 principles that aim con- 

 sciously at the heart of the 

 problem, at the questions 

 of breeding-stock and game 

 range. Among these, one 

 of the most prominent is the breeding refuge a com- 

 paratively small sanctuary in the heart of a game range 

 where animals can live and breed unmolested, replenish- 

 ing the adjacent hunting grounds. This principle is ex- 

 tremely flexible, for the number of refuges and conse- 

 quently the amount of the breeding stock can be ad- 

 justed to the intensity of hunting on the adjoining 

 ranges. Its purpose is the production of game for use. 

 Pennsylvania has made notable progress in this direc- 

 tion, and only recently New Mexico has embarked on 

 a thoroughgoing policy of developing a great system 

 of small refuges throughout her magnificent game ranges. 



VALUABLE LAND FOR GAME REFUGES 



Country like tliis will not raise crops or hardly even live-stock, 

 but it will raise deer and other game. Millions of acres of wild, 

 rough land throughout the country ought to be devoted to raising 

 game. 



