in our markets will make most of the people friendly to those 

 who shoot it. The amount of game which now is being reared 

 throughout the country indicates that good sport soon will be 

 restored for all hands during a long open season, beginning 

 with the prairie grouse in August and ending with the wild 

 fowl before the nesting season in the spring. 



All of the grouse and quails or partridges are best reared in a 

 wild state on protected areas. It is by such methods that the 

 European grouse and gray partridges have been made tre- 

 mendously plentiful everywhere and are kept so although the 

 markets are fully supplied. Wild bred birds are the cheapest, 

 since they find much of their food in the fields. They are more 

 easily reared, since they are more free from diseases than hand- 

 reared birds. They are better for sport on account of their 

 wildness and better for the table, on account of their flavor, 

 than the hand-reared birds. 



There are two kinds of game keeping and two kinds of game 

 keepers. The beat game keepers simply look after the wild 

 breeding birds on the areas or beats assigned to them, usually 

 from 1000 to 1500 acres. They control the enemies of the 

 birds, see that their natural covers and foods are adequate 

 and when the game becomes abundant as it will quickly when 

 so protected, additional foods often are provided, especially 

 during the winter. The hand-rearing keepers are similar to 

 poultry-rearers. Their methods will be referred to fully in 

 the chapters on the pheasants and the wild ducks which are the 

 birds handled by these keepers. 



'Co no j n# Jbac 



