9' 



mh b 



COW MOOSE WITH HER YOUNG 



Notice the fold of skin at her neck resembling a bell 



causes, together with a steadily increas- 

 ing commercial demand for animal prod- 

 ucts, have had an appalling effect. The 

 buffalo, elk, and antelope are reduced to 

 a pitiful fraction of their former count- 

 less numbers. 



WAXTOX WASTE OE WILD LIFE 



Practically all other large game has 

 alarmingly decreased, and its extermina- 

 tion has been partly stayed only by the 

 recent enforcement of protective laws. 

 It is quite true that the presence of wild 

 buffalo, for instance, in any region occu- 

 pied for farming and stock-raising pur- 

 poses is incompatible with such use. Thus 

 the extermination of the bison as a deni- 

 zen of our western plains was inevitable. 

 The destruction, however, of these noble 

 game animals by millions for their hides 

 only furnishes a notable example of the 

 wanton wastefulness which has hereto- 

 fore largely characterized the handling 

 of our wild life. 



A like disregard for the future has 

 been shown in the pursuit of the sea 

 mammals. The whaling and sealing in- 

 dustries are very ancient, extending- back 

 for a thousand years or more ; but the 

 greatest and most ruthless destruction of 

 the whales and seals has come within the 

 last century, especially through the use 

 of steamships and bomb-guns. Without 

 adequate international protection, there is 

 grave danger that the most valuable of 

 these sea mammals will be exterminated. 

 The fur seal and the sea-elephant, once 

 so abundant on the coast of southern 

 California, are nearly or quite gone, and 

 the sea otter of the North Pacific is dan- 

 gerously near extinction. 



The recent great abundance of large 

 land mammals in North America, both in 

 individuals and species, is in striking con- 

 trast with their scarcity in South Amer- 

 ica, the difference evidently being' due to 

 the long isolation of the southern conti- 

 nent from other land-masses, whence it 



393 



