GROWTH OF SOUND IDEAS IN GAME MANAGEMENT 



615 



MOOSE ON THE SUPERIOR NATIONAL FOREST 



The National Forests, enormous in extent and containing the 

 choicest range for big game in America, offer an unexampled 

 opportunity for rational game management. But before such 

 management can be put into effect, the Federal Government 

 must have the power of creating game refuges on the National 

 Forests. 



motive ; its purpose is production for use. The small 

 refuge not only preserves the breeding-stock in a hunt- 

 ing country, but by providing a suri)lus for hunting 

 it meets an insistent public demand and at the same time 

 wins public support by its practical economic usefulness. 

 Between the preserve and the refuge there is the same 

 distinction as that between the National Forest, whose 

 purpose is economic and the National Park, whose 

 purpose is to gratify man's instinct for natural beauty. 

 Just as it would be futile to attempt to set aside the 

 great bulk of our forests as parks, so it would be unwise 

 to throw the bulk of the game range into game pre- 

 serves. In choosing between the preserve and the refuge, 

 the object in view is of the utmost importance ; yet their 

 wide contrast of purpose has rarely been clearly per- 

 ceived and acted on. 



Rut game refuges and game preserves do not answer 

 the whole problem of game range. As the private owner- 

 ship of game range restricts the public regulation of the 

 game on that range, it is essential both in the interest of 

 public and scientific game management and of the pres- 

 ervation of democracy in sport to maintain public shoot- 

 ing grounds. These in the future will be confined more 

 and more to public forests, a fact which overwhelmingly 

 emphasizes the need not only of greater interest in game 

 by foresters, but of sound game management by public 

 agencies. 



These new tools of game management, however, will 

 be ineffective without a radical reform in the machinery 

 of administration. Almost without exception, the Ameri- 

 can States have attempted to regulate game by detailed 

 statutes, fixing open and closed sea,sons, bag limits, etc. 

 This is a clumsy method, for legislatures are not fitted 

 for administration. They are slow to act, have ineffective 

 means of gathering information, and are usually unable 

 to follow a consistent administrative policy. The State 

 game wardens and commissions have usually been merely 

 police agents, empowered to prosecute poachers. What is 

 needed is the delegation of fu'.l administrative j)Ower to 

 competent wardens or commissions power to deal 

 promptly and effectively with the multitudinous prob- 

 lems met in managing a great natural resource. 



How far is modern legislation meeting these prin- 

 ciples of sound management the safeguarding of the 

 breeding stock, the preservation of game range, and a 

 sane, flexible system of administration? The Federal 

 migratory bird law is one of the best of the modern laws, 

 and points the right way. It delegates to the Secretary 

 of Agriculture the business of preserving migratory 

 birds. He accomplishes this end by fixing the seasons 

 and bag limits, by prohibiting shooting in the breeding 

 season, by closing certain species against hunting, by 

 prosecuting poachers, and by other means. This law, 

 therefore, meets two of the three essential requirements 



DUCKS UNDER PROTECTION 



These ducks are on the Wichita Game Preserve in the Wichita 

 National Forest. The migratory bird law protects the breeding 

 stock. The urgent need now is protection of breeding grounds, 

 which are being rapidly drained. 



