78 CALIFORNIA FISH AND GAME 



(d) Any person who shall oountorfcit any hunting script issiu'd by the game 

 coniniissiou or who shall alter same shall he deemed guilty of a felony and, upon eon- 

 viction thereof, shall be senteuced to pay a fine of not less than one hundred dollars 

 (,$100) nor more than five thousand dollars ($5,000), or to imprisonment in the 

 penitentiary for a period of time not oxceetling five years or by both such tine and 

 imprisonment. 



Here in California, our present game laws require no legislative 

 action to permit the operation of the sportsman-landowner cooperative 

 shooting system. Legal advice has micd that the existing Pish and 

 Game Code contains authority for the Pish and Game Comniissioii 

 to undertake similar contracts to those above described. 



Several sportsmen's organizations, notably the Associated Sports- 

 men of California and numerous chapters of the Izaak Walton League, 

 are vitally interested in the development and working out of a similar 

 plan in this State. 



The state-w4de Fish and Game Committee of the California State 

 Chamber of Commerce has had functioning for some time a subcom- 

 mittee on quail projects which has particularly concerned itself with 

 the possibility of developing the sportsman-lanclowner cooperative plan 

 in our State. Progress toward the end of preparing a workable scheme 

 for use in California is reported by this subcommittee. 



The Fish and Game Development Association is another California 

 organization that is intensely interested in the possibilities of the sports- 

 man-landowner movement for the improvement of upland game bird 

 shooting in our State. This progressive organization has continuously 

 advocated the establishment of "trial areas" in which to test out the 

 mechanics of operation of the system. It is hoped that actual operation 

 of at least one trial area may be effected within the near future in 

 order that we may have early proof of the adaptability of the system 

 to California conditions. — James Mofitt, Division of Fish and Game, 

 San Francisco, December 4, 1933. 



WATERFOWL ABUNDANCE IN CALIFORNIA IN 1933 



In spite of dire prophesies to the contrarj^, the 1933 fall flight of 

 waterfowl in California seems to have been considerably in excess of 

 the 1932 flight. At the time this note is written, there yet remain ten 

 days of the 1933 season and, in the absence of reports from other 

 areas, it is therefore too early to draw definite conclusions. Perhaps 

 the large numbers of ducks and geese that have been observed in Cali- 

 fornia this fall present a concentration here, but this fact can not be 

 determined until reports are available from other Pacific Coast States. 



There seems, however, to be no doubt whatever that ducks were 

 more abundant in California during the present season than in the 

 previous year. The Division has made particular eflFort to secure 

 reports from reliable individuals in the various waterfowl concentra- 

 tion areas of the State, and in most instances these reports indicate more 

 birds in 1933 than in 1932. 



The writer was at Tule Lake, Siskiyou County, November 28, when 

 this body of water was still open, and in fact just commencing to 

 freeze at its margin. No doubt, a similar open condition existed in most 

 of the lakes of that vicinity and eastern Oregon. This fact, the result 

 of a warm fall in contrast to an unusually cold one a year ago, per- 



