520 GAME BIRDS, WILD-FOWL AND SHORE BIRDS. 



whole family was wiped out, and there was no law then on 

 our statute books to prevent it. Five years ago, when spring 

 shooting was permitted in Connecticut, Snipe shooters drove 

 Black Ducks from their nests in the meadows and killed them 

 as they rose. 



Spring shooting exterminates the birds. Fall shooting, if 

 not excessive, may be said to take only the annual interest of 

 this great natural resource; but if shooting is continued in 

 winter and spring it wipes out the principal. No one would 

 think of advocating to-day a law legalizing the killing of the 

 Grouse or Bob-whites in the winter, when they are struggling 

 against the inclemency of the season, or in spring, when they 

 are mating and breeding. If any man should propose such 

 legislation his sincerity or his sanity would be doubted. Never- 

 theless, hundreds and thousands of gunners advocate and 

 support similar legislation which, if enacted, takes away 

 practically all protection from wild-fowl. 



The argument often is made that it is futile for any one 

 State to pass laws prohibiting spring shooting until other con- 

 tiguous States pass similar laws. Experience with such laws, 

 however, shows that the results of even the most local protec- 

 tion are often immediate and very marked. A gentleman iu 

 Rhode Island, who has a small pond on his place, prohibited 

 shooting there, and Black Ducks came at once and bred 

 there annually. Another in INIassachusetts owns all the land 

 on one side of a large pond, and allows no spring shooting. 

 In August, 1909, I saw about seventy-five Black Ducks at 

 one time on his side of the pond, all of which and probably 

 more were reared there. By the first of September about two 

 hundred birds were gathered there, but none could be found 

 on the other side, where they were unprotected. In the San 

 Luis valley. Col., protection given Ducks in a small enclosure 

 about an artesian well resulted in the birds resorting to it in 

 large and increasing numbers year by year. 



A local law in Jefferson County, N. Y., prohibiting spring 

 shooting and night shooting, soon showed its effect. Teal, 

 Wood Ducks, Mallards and Black Ducks began breeding there 

 at once. The increase and tameness of the Ducks and Geese 



