38 



WILD LIFE PROTECTION FUND 



CONDITION OF WILD LIFE 



WEST OF THE GREAT 



PLAINS* 



No one can visit the states west of 

 the great plains and come in touch with 

 twelve state game commissioners and 

 other friends of wild life, without ac- 

 quiring some very definite impressions 

 regarding the present status of wild life 

 in those states. From facts and figures 

 thus obtained on the spot there is small 

 chance to appeal. 



Summed up in a few words, I have 

 returned from my tour of the far-west- 

 ern states with a feeling of profound 

 depression, and the conviction that out- 

 side of the actual game sanctuaries the 

 wild game of the West now is being 

 swept away, by guns and automobiles, 

 so fast that in a few brief years those 

 plains, mountains and forests will be 

 swept as clear of killable game as the 

 Desert of Sahara. 



Nowhere, outside of the game pre- 

 serves, is there the slightest indication 

 that any game which can legally be 

 hunted is breeding as rapidly as it is 

 being killed. For every man who will 

 say that "the game is holding its own," 

 there are at least ten who will say : "The 

 game is going, fast !" 



In Colorado, as late as 1900 teeming 

 with what seemed to be an inexhaustible 

 supply of deer, all deer shooting is now 

 prohibited. The people of Colorado 

 have been forced to give their remnant 

 of deer a long close season, to ward off 

 their complete extermination ! 



Everywhere, save in two localities that 

 we will not name, the small remnant 

 herds of prong-horned antelope are re- 

 ported to be "decreasing all the time"; 

 and this in spite of the fact that no an- 

 telope hunting is permitted anywhere in 

 the^ United States. The decrease is due 

 to illegal killing, and to the wolves and 

 coyotes. 



Although the sage grouse now exists 

 only in pitiful remnants (in all save 

 three or four spots), no state has yet 

 given that fast-vanishing species a long 



^Reprinted from Bulletin No. 1 Wild Life Pro- 

 tection Fund, pp. 15-18, issued December 10. 1915. 



close season. In each one of the states 

 that still contains a few of these fine 

 birds, we demanded the enactment at 

 the the next legislative session of a 10- 

 year close season law. In some states 

 the sage grouse is certain to be exter- 

 minated, at an early date; for only a 

 few of the states will accord the long 

 close season in time to save the rem- 

 nant. The automobiles of the hunters 

 are now a great curse to these birds and 

 to others. 



Three states — Wyoming, Idaho and 

 Washington — still permit mountain sheep 

 hunting. Unless long close seasons are 

 granted at once, the mountain sheep will 

 totally disappear from those states, and 

 very quickly. 



In 1914 about 14,000 deer were killed 

 in California, and only a confirmed op- 

 timist can believe that that number of 

 fawns were born in that year. From 

 California the deer and quail are rap- 

 idly going; and the disgrace and curse 

 of the sale of game is Over all the state. 



Throughout my entire journeyings 

 through the great Plains, the Rocky 

 Mountain and Pacific states, I did not 

 see more than 2,000 wild birds, all told, 

 and only 35 wild mammals. Of the 

 latter 19 were jack rabbits, and the re- 

 mainder were small burrowing rodents, 

 mostly ground-squirrels. Although I 

 made a zoological reconnaisance of sev- 

 en days by automobile through about 

 300 miles of the Sonoran Desert, in 

 southern Arizona, I saw not one deer, 

 antelope, wolf, coyote or fox. In a ride 

 of 30 miles through the National Forest 

 above Golden, near Denver, I saw only 

 one wild mammal — a chipmunk, and 7 

 birds. 



Along the railways of Minnesota, 

 Iowa, Nebraska, Montana, Colorado, 

 Idaho, Washington, Oregon and Cali- 

 fornia the absence of wild birds (in 

 August and September) was horrible ! 

 Even the magpie has not escaped. 



At the last moment, I am in receipt 

 of the following confirmatory letter from 

 Mr. Henry W. Shoemaker, a subscriber 

 to this Fund, who has recently com- 

 pleted a long tour through the West: 



"I note what you say regarding the de- 

 crease of wild life throughout the West. 

 As collector and compiler of unwritten 



