THE GAME BREEDER 



103 



found it difficult to get all the venison 

 needed ; many breeders reported that 

 they were entirely sold out. There cer- 

 tainly should be good profit in breeding 

 deer on suitable ground where they will 

 find most of their food so long as veni- 

 son sells for 38 cents per pound. We 

 predict that the prices of venison will be 

 even higher next fall and that it will 

 remain up until the close of the war, 

 when venison again will be imported. 



Pheasant eggs sold well at $20 and $25 

 per hundred until June, when the prices 

 fell somewhat as usual. Duck eggs sold 

 at $20, but sales later were reported for 

 $15 and some "near wild duck" eggs 

 brought even lower prices. Eggs from 

 true wild mallard and black ducks sold 

 for $25 per hundred, but comparatively 

 few breeders have true wild birds and it 

 is well known that in most cases newly 

 trapped birds do not lay eggs. As the 

 egg season closed there was a demand 

 for more duck eggs and advertisers re- 

 ported they were sold out. 



There is a decided tendency to im- 

 prove- the character of the ducks on 

 many game farms and "shoots" by in- 

 troducing wild blood and there is a cor- 

 responding demand for true wild ducks. 



Pintailed ducks, teal and some other 

 species have been offered in good quan- 

 tities at very low prices. We believe 

 this is due to the fact that many breed- 

 ers have not had much luck in getting 

 eggs from these species. There is a 

 big demand for teal eggs and the eggs 

 of species other than the mallards and 

 we are quite sure the game farmer who 

 can secure the eggs of teal, black ducks, 

 widgeon gadwalls and other ducks or 

 who can offer birds guaranteed to lay 

 will make a lot of money. 



We have heard of some important 

 experiments which will be made with 

 teal and other ducks on some big new 

 preserves in which we are interested and 

 later we may have some interesting 

 stories from these places. It seems a 

 pity that many preserve owners prefer 

 not to have us report what we see when 

 we visit places where the shooting is 

 lively. We understand where the trou- 



ble lies, but we feel sure it soon will be 

 removed and then people will be glad to 

 permit us to report the abundance of 

 game, lively shooting and good prices 

 received for the extra food which must 

 be sold because those who produce it 

 can not use but a very small part of the 

 "crop." 



A Good Sign. 



There is a rapidly increasing demand 

 for books about game breeding, and the 

 book sales of the Game Conservation 

 Society are increasing rapidly. Usually 

 very few books are sold in the summer 

 months, but during August the receipts 

 from books were several times as large 

 as the sales in the best three preceding 

 winter months. The lively interest in 

 wild duck breeding and the natural foods 

 of wild ducks, no doubt increased the 

 sales of our Wild Fowl and Waders 

 which was the best seller in August of 

 all the books handled by the society. 



We would advise all of our read- 

 ers who have not done so to pur- 

 chase Dr. Job's excellent book, "The 

 Propagation of Wild Birds." Dr. Job 

 is at the head of the new department of 

 applied ornithology of the Audubon As- 

 sociation, and his book is the only Amer- 

 ican book which covers the breeding 

 and proper management of all species of 

 birds. 



War Birds. 



A writer, discussing conditions in Rus- 

 sia, in the New York World says : "Un- 

 til we reached the interior of European 

 Russia (traveling from Vladivostok to 

 Petrograd), the dining car meals con- 

 sisted mainly of fish, pheasant, wild 

 duck and white bread." 



In another clipping from a newspaper 

 sent to The Game Breeder we are told 

 that crows were for sale in Germany all 

 through the winter for meat. "I recall," 

 the correspondent says, "going into a 

 grocery one evening in February and ex- 

 pressing my surprise when the old 

 woman in charge told me she had noth- 

 ing but oranges, lemons, cooking apples, 

 spinach, a black root which is now eaten 

 as a vegetable, and crows." 



