LETTERS FROM OUR READERS 



4*7 



my knife, to end his suffering; but as I placed 

 my hand on his under jaw to pull his head 

 back he made a sudden start, throwing me 

 back on the ground, and as quick as a flash 

 he was up. I grabbed his front leg, he made 

 another lunge forward and we both rolled 

 down the hill thirty feet together, first one 

 on top and then the other. If I had not had 

 a good grip he would have got away from 

 me. During the melee the ravens swarmed 

 around us in a threatening manner. I finally 

 got out my -knife and cut the deer's throat, 

 knowing that to turn him loose would be cer- 

 tain and a more painful death. I cut the 

 horns and shoulders off, also the tenderloin 

 along the back and tied them to my saddle. 

 After that I covered the carcass as well as 

 I could with rocks and sticks and started to 

 camp, but not before I had killed about fifteen 

 ravens with what few cartridges I had. 



J. D. Lea, El Paso, Texas. 



NOT SO SERIOUS. 



Reports received by us this month would 

 indicate that the stories printed all over the 

 country in newspapers, with reference to the 

 destruction of quail during the past winter 

 were somewhat exaggerated. While it is 

 true that a great deal of game was killed by 

 the cold, yet our correspondents seem to think 

 that there is a plentiful stock still left for 

 next season. 



Fish, however, seem to have suffered se- 

 verely, especially in the Northwest, where 

 many of the rivers were frozen so deep that 

 many fish perished. At one point in Nebraska 

 Deputy Game Warden F. C. Nicholsen found 

 thousands of dead fish, among them being 

 over four hundred bass, averaging in weight 

 two pounds each. The game wardens of the 

 Northwest will take steps to prevent a recur- 

 rence of this unfortunate experience. 



WHERE WILL THE GEESE GO? 

 Editor Recreation : 



Where may the wild geese go to spend 

 the winter? They raise their young away 

 up yonder on the bottoms of the Kuskoquim 

 and other northern rivers, where the green 

 grasses afford them nourishment and where 

 the summer climate is all they can desire, 

 but when the gozzlings are large enough to 

 fly the cold winter comes on, and the old 

 geese lead the way, as they always have done, 

 to southland's warmer climes. The valley 

 of the Sacramento has-been a great winter 

 resort for them and when vast areas of land 

 were covered with honkers and whitened with 

 the flocks, men were hired to slay them by 

 thousands, and yet they come. 



Not in such great numbers as once, but 

 they come to be slaughtered. The ducks are 

 killed by thousands and when the market 

 hunters are asked why they kill so many, 



their reply is because there are so many to 

 kill. They seem to think the fowls are every- 

 where and don't realize that there are few 

 places where they can find such green foli- 

 age in mid-winter as in .California. I have 

 witnessed their flight from the North and 

 I, too, have followed to southern climes to 

 see wagon loads of those fowls in the markets 

 of San Francisco. 



The days of the wild fowls are numbered 

 and that old familiar honk is gradually grow- 

 ing less frequent, and as they now stand on 

 the plain with necks stretched up their pa- 

 thetic call seems to ask, "O, where may we 

 spend the winters?" 



California game protection legislators made 

 a feeble effort last season, but met with great 

 opposition. They should be encouraged un- 

 til market hunters are taught that it is a 

 crime to kill for the market and unneces- 

 sarily exterminate their winter visitors, — the 

 wild fowls; but, will it ever be done? 



Addison M. Powell, Seattle, Wash. 



Yes, if we all unite and make the demand 

 for federal laws protecting migratory birds. 

 — Editor. 



A SHEEP IN A LION'S SKIN. 

 Editor Recreation : 



I have searched in vain through collec- 

 tions of snakes and in pages of works on 

 natural history for a snake that I once en- 

 countered in the San Gabriel mountains of 

 Southern California. The snake I speak of 

 is small and slender, a little more than two 

 feet in length, as I remember it, and marked 

 like the Harlequin .snake, with the exception 

 that the alternating bands are red, black and 

 pure white. The bands are about half an inch 

 wide and the colors very brilliant. The head 

 is narrow, the tail pointed, and so far as I 

 could judge from brief examination, the 

 scales are not like those of the common 

 venomous snakes. 



A native Californian, of Spanish descent, 

 who was with me declared that the snake 

 was venomous, but I doubted it ; and after 

 trying in vain to induce the creature to strike 

 by poking a lead pencil against its nose, I re- 

 fused to kill it, as my companion advised, and 

 allowed it to go unharmed. 



The Californian called the reptile a "cor- 

 ral" snake — not "coral" snake, as the books 

 name a cousin of the Harlequin found in the 

 Southwest. The name is derived from the 

 idea of the Mexicans — correct or otherwise — ■ 

 that the snake frequents "corrals." If the 

 naturalists can identify the snake I have de- 

 scribed and tell us something about it, some 

 of us who are not quite sure whether or not 

 the creature is dangerous will be interested 

 in what they have to say. 



Allen Kelly. 



Here is an interesting letter from a most 

 interesting man, a man who knows wild ani- 



