FOREST AND STREAM. 



511 



Now. what ean those of us wno obey tho law do to 

 stop this state of things? You ought to know. Tell us. 

 I have myself offered .*.J5 reward for evidence which W\R 

 convict any one of killing birds out of season, but the 

 constables, the only officers, so far as T know, who have 



-power to arrest: on suspiclo ; :owardly to 



attempt to make arrests or too lazy to take the trouble 

 to Look out for law breakers. 3Iy on n occupation will 

 not admit of my taking time to catch these fellows myself. 

 Now. when the officers of the law wont do their duty 

 what is to be clone ? 



f have a tine long list of names of sportsmen, so-called. 

 who have taken a hand at this poaching, which I will 

 send you for publication if this I hinggoes on much longer. 

 In the mean time pray giveusyour idea on the subjei I 



A WOULD-BE Game Protector. 



We confess that we are at a loss what counsel to give 

 our perplexed and discouraged game protector. We might 

 adopt his suggestion to publish the names of the Offenders, 

 and w uld willingly do 80, did we see any beneficial re- 

 sult likely to \\ How. But it is probable that these so-called 

 sportsmen poa hers who do riot hesitate to brag of their 

 lawless exploits would be little affected by the wider 

 notoriety i it newspaper posting, The only way to enforce 

 these la W3 in Connecticut, and the only way to enforce 

 any laws in any part of the world, is simply to enforce 

 theni. If our correspondent lias the evidence of trans- 

 gression of the law, let hitn prefer complaints against 

 the trapflgressors, substantiate the complaints with his 

 evidence, and fight the thing through.. If he has evidence 

 of criminal neglect of duty on the part of game constables 

 he may, by the proper methods, punish them also for 

 such malfeasance. Butoui • Would-be Game Protector'' 

 says he has not tune for this. Cntil some willing conser- 

 vator, of Conne cticut game does find time to follow up such 

 cases the abuse; will go unremedied. The best game laws 

 in the world are of no more avail than no laws at all so 

 long as there is no power to enforce, them. Game pro- 

 tective associations should provide this authority. When 

 the members of the associations themselves join forces 

 with, the pot hunters and butchers the law must go to the 

 dogs. 



The above is our ruling and charge under the laws us 

 they now stand : but we are free to say that we long since 

 became convinced that our whole method of protection is 

 radically wrong, even were the laws consistent and 

 fundamentally right. We know of no better niethod of 

 reaching poachers and violators of close seasons than 

 through the trespass laius. If we can inculcate in the 

 minds of our farmers that these sumptuary game laws are 

 very proper and based upon true principles of economy, 

 and induce them to respect and obey these laws themselves, 

 then each fanner becomes a special constable, and each 

 farm a police district directly under Iris own personal sur- 

 veillance. Sportsmen found si looting On his land out of 

 season or with Qiepr&aa faioie evidence of a gun in their 

 hands, would be prosecuted without any trouble what- 

 ever, and brought to summary punishment. 



FLORIDA. — The Legislature of Florida, passed in March 

 187!) an act to protect the food fishes of that State, as 

 follows : Sec. 1 provides that no gill nets for shad shall 

 be used with a mesh less than five inches — penalty, thirty 

 dollars. 



Sec 3. Xo shad shall bo taken in nets between the loth of April 

 and the 18th of December— penalty, twenty-five dollsrrs and the 

 confiscation of all nets, seines, boats, and tackle. 



Sec 3. No f ykes, or purse nets, shall be erected in any of the 

 waters of the State— penalty, forty dollars. 



Sec 4. No person who has not resided six months in the State, 

 shall engage in the capture of any food fishes in the public waters 

 of the State, for the purpose of selling or exporting them— pen- 

 alty, seventy-five dollars, and confiscation of all nets, boats, and 

 tackle. 



Secs. 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th, provide for the enforcement of this 

 Act, 



The law was needed, as much damage had been done 

 to the Shad fisheries of the St. John's River by reckless 

 fishermen from other States, and at the very time of pass- 

 ing the act, a schooner was seining at Indian River Inlet, 

 and another at Mosquito inlet, for fish to take to Charles- 

 ton and Savannah. 



This law, if enforced, will preserve a full supply of fish 

 in Florida waters. No amount of hook fishing will do 

 harm ; but seines, pounds, and traps, are able to destroy 

 any fishery, as we know from their effects on the North- 

 ern coa3t, and also Upon the great lakes, Vhere, twenty 

 years ago, 100,000 barrels of white fish were put up in a 

 year. Now it is difficult to get ('resit fish for the markets 

 of the lake cities. 



Lewis County Sportsmen's Association.— We pre- 

 dicted, at the time of its organization, that this Associa- 

 tion would be effective in securing proper observance of 

 the game law hi a region where its strict enforcement 

 is so much to be desired. We are glad to hear from Mr. 

 H W. Hayt, of Lowville, that the Lewis County sports- 

 men are in earnest, Under date of July 19, he writes : 



The Lewis County Sportsmen's Association upon the 

 passage of the new game law, determined to d« \ ote I K 

 time and resources to its enforcement against all offend- 

 ers (even although the law might not fully please them in 

 all its particulars). \ Iter considerable expense, they have 

 obi anted the most positive and direct evidence against 

 quite a number of parties for killing deer out of season, — 

 often recklessly throwing meat and fish away. Others 

 have been guilty of using nets in taking trout. " The most 

 of these, upon taking good legal counsel, have paid the 

 costs and penalties without further useless expense. 



^smj§h 



SHOOTING PROSPECTS. 



SOLOMON has the lame of having been a very 

 wise man in his day and generation, but had he ever 

 attempted to harmonize thirty-nine game laws, as unlike 

 one another in each individual section, as were the odors 

 which the poet discovered in Cologne, we fear the old 

 King would ha've included game protection among 

 the things whiehho had tried and found to be al- 

 together vanity. Now, in this Nineteenth Century, is 

 there any one enough wiser than Solomon to telJ Why the 

 : i i ii season for woodcock begins to-morrow in three so 

 widely separated sections of this broad land as Vermont. 

 New York and Oregon, and in no one of the other thirty- 

 seven states and territories having game laws? And if 

 tibia be satisfactorily explained, will the necessity for a 

 discrepancy between the laws for quail, and the laws for 

 ruffed grouse, etc., and so on, be likewise expounded? 



But we are not about to discuss game laws now; rather 

 are we reminded by the beginning of the shooting season 

 and by the "booming" of our own State campaign, that 

 in due time will come the open seasons in other States : 

 and that soon the sportsmen of the whole land will g< i 

 forth to bring to bag the quail, grouse and woodcock, and 

 other birds whose mission upon this terrestrial sphere it is 

 to be shot at. Without consulting the game statutes, a 

 word or two about the prospects of the coming sport will 

 now be in order. Front the outlook before us, we find' 

 that, despite the decimation of game birds in many sec- 

 tions of the country, during the extreme cold weather and 

 the heavy fall of snow last winter, the prospects for an 

 abundance of game are generally very promising. Those 

 of our readers who have from week to week noted tfa. 

 reports published in our columns have learned that the 

 spring-broods have been numerous and large, making 

 ample the after supply of grown birds. Many an inter- 

 ested reader knows for himself a certain choice spot, the 

 secret of whose location he jealously guards in his own 

 breast, where he has watched the birds, old and young, 

 and in fancy brought them to bag time and time again. 

 Nor is there any adage forbidding a man thus to count his 

 chickens after they are hatched. Others, who cannot 

 themselves watch the multiplication and growth of the 

 birds, manage to keep pretty well posted by correspondence 

 with friends and acquaintances, or with men whose names 

 and whereabouts they leam through the Forest and 

 Stream. To gentlemen who thus go long distances in 

 search of sport we wish to give a word of caution, and we 

 do this with all due deference to the integrity and good 

 intent of our numerous correspondents whose reports go 

 so far toward making up the sum total of the excellence 

 of the paper. When an abundance of game is reported, 

 it is well for the reader to remember that the word " abun- 

 dance," used in connection with game, has a variable sig- 

 nificance. What, to one man ttnused to game-abounding 

 lands, may seem an extraordinary supply of birds, nitty to 

 a more favored sportsman be but a beggarly pittance. 

 Numerous instances have come under our notice where 

 gentlemen have been disappointed in just this way, and 

 ready to heap abuse upon their hosts as organizers of 

 South Sea Bubbles. 



Another frequent and equally annoying mistake is 

 often made by eager sportsmen who read of a good game 

 country, genial host, excellent accomodations and other 

 requisites : and immediately set off post haste for a, strange 

 place and to go among strangers without telling any one 

 that they are coming. Such impetuous and improvident 

 would-be sportsmen, as a rule, return to their homes again 

 with then- full complement of ammunition, empty game 

 bags and wiser heads. Remember, then, always to write 

 before hand. Besides securing a pleasant reception and 

 a knowledge of what you are to expect in the way of 

 sport, the written assurance of abundant game will 

 come in handy if that game proves to be all in the land- 

 lord's eye. 



If these precautions are followed, the gentlemen 

 sportmen will not return wholly disappointed. We 

 use the expression " gentlemen sportsmen," because it is 

 to such we wotdd give instructions. It too often happens 

 that a sporting excursion is only a pretext for a grand 

 carouse. The men who find no higher enjoyment in the 

 "woods and fields than giving five play to their inherent 

 hoarishnesB, constitute a very huge class of sportsmen 

 whose incursion* are reasonably dreaded by farmers and 

 land-owners: for such an incursion means fences broken 

 down, crops trampled upon and sometimes stock sadly 

 peppered with shot. Besides being a pest to those whose 

 rights are invaded, these -sporting'' boors do great 

 damage to the fair fame of the fraternity of gentlemen 

 sportsmen. Misplaced and abused confidence is not 

 readily restored. The professional man, who seeks a week's 

 shooting, is rebuffed by the farmer, whose patience has 



been tiled by former guests ; and here the innocent must 

 suffer for the guilty. As year by year the area of avail- 

 able sporting territory is growing more antl more circum- 

 scribed., as the trespass placards appear more and more fre- 

 quently upon grounds heretofore free, and as the problem 

 ol' where to go to becomes more and more difficult of 

 satid'actory solution, it behooves the fraternity of gentle- 

 men sportsmen, on their side, to draw the lines closer and 

 closer, to discourage and denounce aught that compro- 

 mises the eourtsey and fair dealing which should hold 

 between gunner and proprietor. Remember always that 

 if a man accords you permission to shoot over his lands 

 you are in so far his guest. If this be not forgotten, the 

 same grounds will be open another season, and, our word 

 for it, the birds will be cared for meanwhile. 



SALMON FISHING IN CANADA. 



FIFTH PAPER. 



A River Godbout, Lower St. Lawrence, ) 



July, 1871). \ 



Editor Forest, and Stream: — 



My piscatotial jottings have now become mere remi- 

 niscences, for it is four weeks since I came off the river, 

 and I am chronologically far behind time. I remember 

 we gaffed our first, salmon on the 14th of June, a Im- 

 pounder, credited to Allan Gilmour, Esq. Seventeen 

 pounds is a good fish for the Godbout, though we have 

 the profile and specifications of a big one caught there, 

 which scaled thirty-four pounds. Iu the beginning of the 

 season they run large, and the average is perhaps full fif- 

 teen pounds, but as the season advances the fish diminish 

 in size, so that the average weight for the season is re- 

 duced to not more than eleven pounds. Fifteen years 

 ago the average was only a little more than nine pounds ; 

 so we are enabled to chronicle a steady gain. Fish of dif- 

 ferent rivers vary conspicuously in size. Xlie Restigouche, 

 for instance, is noted for its immense weights, forty 

 pounds being common. The fish of the Godbout are more 

 numerous than anywhere else, but the average is possibly 

 the lowest of all. It is estimated upon careful observa- 

 tion that 50.000 salmon run into the Godbout every year. 

 It is a fact, established beyond question, that salmon al- 

 ways return to the river where they were propagated, and 

 old fishermen claim that they can tell at a glance from 

 vrhat river a salmon has been taken, There would cer- 

 tainly be no difficulty in distinguishing a Godbout fish 

 from a Restigouche fish, if their habitat is to be deter- 

 mined by their weight and inches. 



The fish had been in the river five days when we ar- 

 rived, the guardian told us. Tho water was in fair 

 stage, with good fishing all the way from the " Upper 

 Pool " down to tide water. Salmon seldom take a fly in 

 salt water, though occasional instances are on record of 

 their having done so. It is not unusual, however, for 

 them to take bait. Feeding in salt water is their business. 

 That is what they are there for. They eat ravenously, 

 and come into the rivers gorged with caplin, sand eels, 

 shrimp, and other sea food. Thus they fortify them- 

 selves for their long and abstemious journey up stream 

 to their spawning beds, and for the -work of procreation. 

 It is astonishing what great weights of flesh salmon will 

 gather in a single season — not uniformly, but in great 

 variation, as we find them when they come to the scales 

 with figures ranging from ten to thirty pounds. A sal- 

 mon may go down stream in summer a respectable three- 

 pound smolt, and return next June weighing twelve, 

 eighteen, or twenty-five pounds. You cannot tell a sal- 

 mon's age by his size and weight. I incline to the opin- 

 ion that (hey do not grow very old. They are not like 

 the pike and the carp which live 200 years. If all sal- 

 mon survived they would stock their native rivers so full 

 in a couple of years that there -would not be room for 

 them. They would soon thrash each other to pieces in 

 the pools, and die for want'of oxygen. No : salmon are 

 short-lived. When they have reached then full and vig- 

 orous maturity, they have first to run the gauntlet at the 

 river's mouth of the schools of porpoises, fin-backs, 

 and seals, which cruise off and on and lie in wait to inter- 

 cept then entrance. It is no easy task to run such a 

 blockade. Then there are the pound nets set along the 

 coast for six miles or so, above and below the river, which 

 take a great many, and the stake nets and drift nets set 

 in and across the river, which capture more than all the 

 rest together. And after the salmon have evaded all 

 these, and worked their way for a hundred or two hun- 

 dred miles up the tortuous and rapid stream to head- 

 waters, many die of exhaustion, and many more in the 

 tinal effort of propagation. The proportion which returns 

 to the sea is small. But newseed has been planted above, 

 and a crop of salmon, peel or parr, which was planted the 

 previous year, is still in the river and thriving, safe from 

 enemies in the ocean below ; while the smolts. which 

 have been on probation for two years, are now matricu- 

 lants on their way to salt water to gather flesh and strength, 

 and anon to take then turn at the spawning beds. Fortu- 

 nately, in the Godbout there are no nets or artificial ob- 

 structions to the free run of the fish. 



What living creature can be imagined more beautil'u 



