BIG GAME OF THE CANADIAN ROCKIES 111 



AH wild animfils are liable to destruction by natural causes and 

 there is little reason to think that the advent of settlement has any 

 material influence on these factors. Even though predatory animals 

 are greatly reduced, there are certain diseases and some insect pests 

 introduced by settlement that may tend to offset the smaller mortality 

 resulting from the elimination of the natural enemies of the herbivorous 

 animals. 



Disturbance of game on breeding grounds and breaking up of 

 winter range may have a very destructive effect, but is more or less 

 an unavoidable accompaniment of settlement and commercial exploita- 

 tion, and must be provided for in any project for the conservation of 

 game. 



Hunting, alone of these destructive agents, is, on the^one hand, 

 directly responsible for the decrease in game and, on the other, wholly 

 within the power of the nation to control without conflicting with any 

 fundamental rights. This brings us naturally to a consideration of 

 the kind of hunting and the class of hunters found in the western 

 game country, especially the Rocky mountains. Briefly, there are three 

 principal classes. 



1. Transient big-game hunters from outside the mountains. 



2. Residents of local communities, mostly coal-mining villages. 



3. Stoney Indians. 



The first are a minor element in the problem.. The 

 Big-game decline in the more characteristic big game of this 



region has resulted in a corresponding decrease in 

 hunting parties from far distant places. No doubt there has been an 

 increase in the number of hunters from nearby localities, but except 

 in the immediate vicinity of the transcontinental railways, it is very 

 seldom that a party is encountered even during the hunting season. 

 Moreover, nearly all such hunters have a reasonable regard for the 

 game laws which, if enforced as successfully against all classes, would 

 make a remarkable change in conditions. 



The resident miners are a much more difficult class. 

 Miners"* They are mostly Europeans with no very great respect 



for the law, except as they see it embodied in force in 

 the person of a Northwest Mounted policeman. But the police, 

 although ex officio game wardens, are few in number and have other 

 duties that largely prevent them from taking an important part in game 

 protection. On the entire East slope, outside the Parks, there are only 

 five policemen, and none of these ever gets away from the villages in 



