THE GAME BREEDER 



game is protected in every case because 

 it pays to do so. Were the American 

 game laws, which prevent such industry 

 apphed to the foreign game birds, they 

 would vanish fully as rapidly as the 

 game does in America. 



There are records of people being 

 arrested for having game birds in their 

 possession for propagation and for 

 shipping- live birds for such purpose. 

 Fortunately, however, many state game 

 •officers are beginning to realize that such 

 arrests do not tend to increase our game 

 supply and in some of the states the laws 

 have been amended so as to encourage 

 the production of game by breeders. 



Hundreds of American game farmers 

 and breeders are now engaged in the 

 new industry and their numbers are 

 increasing most rapidly, of course, in 

 states where the laws favor their in- 

 dustry. Although some of the game 

 farms may appear to be running in vio- 

 lation of the law,' it no longer is the 

 fashion to arrest their owners or to seize 

 their live birds in transit. There has 

 "been a country-wide movement in favor 

 •of "more game" and fewer game laws 

 and this has been recognized by many 

 of the state game departments which 

 have conceded the fact that the laws 

 should be amended so as to encourage 

 and not to prevent game breeding. 



Having been a close observer of the 

 •effect of this movement in many states, 

 where the game laws have been amend- 

 •ed, I predict that the United States soon 

 will become the biggest game producing 

 country in the world. The statement 

 may seem to be over-optimistic, but I 

 cannot think so. I know breeders of 

 game who last season produced many 

 thousands of birds and they have in- 

 formed me that they could not possibly 

 fill their orders. One of the biggest 

 English game farmers, who usually has 

 thousands of birds and eggs, wrote me 

 that he could not supply any wild ducks 

 this season and mentioned the fact that 

 many birds and eggs were being shipped 

 to America. Since the New York mar- 

 l<et recently has been opened to the sale 

 of foreign game, and some home-bred 

 species, as food, and the profits in the 

 new industry are, of course, large, it 

 ■seems evident that many new game- 



farmers and clubs or syndicates of 

 sportsmen will undertake game breeding 

 for the ver}^ good reason that it will pay 

 to do SO'. Many tons of game will be 

 produced in the vicinity of New York 

 the coming season. One of the largest 

 game farms, owned by Wenz & Mac- 

 kensen, is in Pennsylvania. There are 

 others in the West; and the number 

 of these will be increased, no doubt, as 

 soon as local laws permit their owners to 

 ship the food which they produce to the 

 New York market, where, of course, the 

 prices are the best. 



A few days ago a man from a western 

 state called to see me, and said that he 

 would sell this year many thousands of 

 live quail for propagation. Two years 

 ago he would have been arrested had he 

 been caught shipping one! 



I have been interested actively in 

 several places in some important experi- 

 ments (with our indigenous game and 

 also with some of the introduced species) 

 which prove conclusively that our game 

 birds easily may be restored, and made 

 profitably abundant. The foreign spe- 

 cies also, which lend themselves to hand- 

 rearing, notably the pheasants and mal- 

 lards, can be made tremendously 

 abundant on comparatively small areas 

 of land, which to-day are worth little 

 or nothing. All this can be accomplished 

 in a remarkably short time. One of the 

 experiments to which I have referred, 

 included the restoration of the wild 

 turkey and the breeding of these fowls, 

 in a wild state and in captivity, on some 

 farms where they had been extinct for 

 many years; the restoration of the quail 

 (bobwhite) and the breeding of hjundreds 

 of these valuable food birds in fields 

 where their natural enemies were con- 

 trolled ; the introduction of mallards and 

 black ducks on ponds where these fowl 

 had not been seen for years, and our 

 experiment resulted in the shooting of a 

 very good bag of these birds, and a few 

 hundred pheasants, besides, within nine 

 months of the date when the experi- 

 ments were begun. 



During the coming season, all of the 

 above named birds and some additional 

 species will be multiplied on a much 

 larger scale on a number of game farms 

 and preserves, which I visit, and since. 



