86 



THE GAME BREEDER 



T& Game Breeder 



Pubushkd Monthly 

 Edited by DVVIGHT W. HUNTINGTON 



NEW YORK, JUNE, 1916. 



TERMS: 



10 Cents a Copy — $1.00 a year in Advance. 



Postage free to all subscribers in the United States. 

 To All Foreign Countries and Canada, $1.25. 



The Game Conservation Society, Inc. 

 publishers, 150 nassau st., new york 



D. W. Huntington, President, 



F. R. Peixotto, Treasurer, 



J. C. Huntington, Secretary- 

 Telephone, Beekman 3685. 



SNAKES. 



We invite readers of The Game 

 Breeder, especially game-keepers, to con- 

 tribute short stories about their observa- 

 tions of the snakes. We know from 

 personal experience what the black 

 snake and rattlesnake do to game birds 

 and eggs ; it is enough to call for their 

 extermination on preserves. Although the 

 laws may possibly protect certain snakes 

 because they are beneficial, we are in- 

 clined to believe game keepers will fol- 

 low the precedent in the Massachusetts 

 deer case (vintage of 1730), reported m 

 the May Game Breeder, which indicates 

 that laws protecting deer or vermin do 

 not apply to land owners or tenants 

 when any damage is being done. This 

 is good common sense. Most game keep- 

 ers are unaware of laws protecting bene- 

 ficial hawks, and it is gratifying to ob- 

 serve that the courts held, at such an 

 early date, that the protective laws do 

 not apply, even to food animals, when 

 damage is done. Some legislatures have 

 confirmed this common law principle by 

 enacting declaratory statutes on the sub- 

 ject. The rule laid down by, The Game 

 Breeder in relation to the control of ver- 

 min, "carefully observe what it does and 

 act accordingly," has become a common 

 rule of conduct on preserves. Even the 

 most highly recommended "beneficials," 

 like the marsh hawk and others,- are 

 promptly hung up on the vermin rack 



when they are observed to prey on. game. 

 We should like to know more about 

 snakes. 



AT IT AGAIN. 



The regulations adopted under the 

 Federal migratory bird law having cre- 

 ated a considerable disturbance through- 

 out the country, the Biological Survey 

 has decided to try again and see if it can- 

 not please the prospective criminals. Mr. 

 H. W. Henshaw, chief of the Bureau of. 

 Biological Survey, U. S. Department of 

 Agriculture, in a letter to The Game 

 Breeder, inclosing a copy of the pro- 

 posed regulations, says: "I trust you 

 will give the proposed new regulations, 

 full publicity." 



We will. They are published in full 

 on another page. Before discussing the 

 absurdities of this amateurish attempt 

 at criminal law making, we wish to re- 

 mark that there should be no objection 

 to a simple, national law making it a 

 crime to kill migratory song and insecti- 

 vorous birds at all times (when not in- 

 jurious to crops) and to shoot migratory 

 game birds during the breeding season, 

 provided, of course, such a law be con- 

 stitutional. 



Such a law should be short, simple, 

 easily understood, uniform and universal. 

 It should be placed in the statute books 

 with other criminal enactments where 

 the people who are presumed to know the 

 law can find it. 



Crime is a serious matter. The mak- 

 ing of criminal laws should not be dele- 

 gated to the doctors of medicine and 

 ornithology, who evidently have no 

 knowledge of the common legal princi- 

 ples which should, underlie all criminal 

 enactments. A great wrong is perpe- 

 trated when numerous legal snares are 

 set and concealed which will result in 

 innocent people being trapped by game 

 officers and fined or imprisoned because 

 they do not know the law. We say "con- 

 cealed" advisedly, since the regulations, 

 creating the crimes are published in a 

 bulletin, which usually soon is out of- 

 print, and not in the statute book where 

 one would expect to find. a; criminal law. 



Judge Beaman, in his brief, filed in 



