152 



THE GAME BREEDER 



prises, but we decided that a little pub- 

 licity might hold up the measure for re- 

 pairs and our readers are aware that we 

 gave a few lines, now and then, to this 

 public service. We gave as much space 

 to the game law as seemed to be fair. 

 Our subscribers who are engaged in 

 game breeding are entitled to find some- 

 thing besides game laws in the maga- 

 zine. We need some space for pictorial 

 advertisements of the sale of game and 

 other interesting facts and notes about 

 game abundance, the breeders' methods, 

 etc., etc. These should not, of course, 

 be crowded out. It soon seemed likely 

 that the bill which said ''you mustn't'' 

 could not get through until it was re- 

 paired so as to say "you may," just as 

 the bill which prohibited the sale of a 

 rabbit had rough sailing until it was 

 slightly modified so as to permit the 

 sale of a deer, etci There were long 

 waits. There were many excursions to 

 Washington and much lobbying; all of 

 this could have been avoided had our 

 advice been heeded and had the simple 

 little repair we suggested been inserted 

 lone ago. The new Section 12 says: 

 "Nothing in this act shall be construed 

 to prevent the breeding of migratory 

 game birds on farms and preserves and 

 the sale of birds so bred under proper 

 regulation for the purpose of increas- 

 ing the food supply." This is a simple 

 permissive section, easily understood, 

 and the breeders of migratory birds can 

 safelv go right on with their business 

 without any interference. Since the 

 States cannot enact laws, as we under- 

 stand the proposition, which conflict with 

 the U. S. law, anyone who wishes to do 

 so can get into the food production in- 

 dustry or can have the game birds for 

 sport or for profit without State inter- 

 ference. 



We congratulate our readers who took 

 an interest in the matter upon the good 

 outcome of their efforts. There ,are 

 many thousands of game breeders in 

 America and the number is increasing 

 rapidly. We would advise them in the 

 future when State laws are proposed 

 prohibiting quail shooting or putting the 

 grouse or other wild food birds on the 



song bird list, to see that the bills which 

 say you mustn't be repaired before they 

 are enacted so as to read that, nothing 

 in the act shall be construed to pre- 

 vent the breeding of the food-songsters 

 on the farms and preserves and the sale 

 of the birds so bred for the purpose of 

 increasing the food supply. There are 

 many capable and intelligent State Game 

 officers who do not approve of the New 

 York wild lifer-protectionists rushing 

 into their States and prohibiting field 

 sports for terms of years or forever. It 

 should be an easy matter to run them 

 out. By permitting those who desire to 

 increase the food supply to do so, field 

 sports can be kept open, for all hands, 

 since the game overflowing from the 

 fields of abundance will keep supplying 

 the public lands and waters with game 

 for those who are not producers. The 

 country is so big that there is no danger 

 of there being too many preserves. Since 

 most of the farms are now posted against 

 shooting and the States are enacting laws 

 putting food birds on the song bird list 

 and prohibiting field sports, no harm 

 will result in our calling a halt so that 

 some of the posted farms can be made 

 to yield abundantly and so that upland 

 field sports can be kept alive. 



Those who put in all of their time at- 

 tempting to secure laws preventing the 

 production of desirable foods do not seem 

 to be as well engaged just now as those 

 who are actively engaged in producing 

 tons of food. The idea that in the in- 

 terest of wild-lifing it must be a crime 

 to profitably produce food on a farm 

 seems to be vanishing rapidly. North 

 America soon will become the biggest 

 game-producing country in the world. 



THE WILD DUCK SICKNESS. 



An outline of a recent bulletin on the 

 Duck Sickness in Utah is printed on an- 

 other page. The bulletin, containing 25 

 pages, is full of interesting matter not 

 only about the trouble in Utah but also 

 about similar troubles in other regions 

 in California, Oregon, Montana and 

 Kansas where the cause of death was 

 similar to that producing duck sickness 



