FROM THE GAME FIELDS. 



121 



more abundant here. All guides in this 

 region hope the game laws will remain un- 

 changed. 

 Geo. C. Jones, Reg. Guide, Caratunk, Me. 



CALIFORNIA TO BLAME. 

 Enclosed you will find a clipping from a 

 local paper, giving an account of a duck 

 hunt that surpasses anything of its kind 

 as a wholesale slaughter: 



There was a hunt at lower Otay reservoir to- 

 day, the following 9 hunters, Dr. J. B. Starkey, 

 George Nolan, Dr. H. W. Taylor, F. Keissig, Mr. 

 Essen, James Scripps, Dr. Frazer, Henry Seebolt 

 and E. S. Babcock, composing the party. The 

 hunt began at 9 o'clock. The first round before 

 noon brought down 1,200 birds, and the second 

 round in the afternoon added 800 more to the 

 score, making a total of 2,000 for the day. 



Something ought to be done to prevent 

 such another day's shooting. That 9 men, 

 in one day, could be guilty of killing 2,000 

 ducks, which makes an average of 222 to 

 a man, is almost beyond believing. All 

 sportsmen should demand and see that the 

 law protecting game is enforced. It is a 

 shame to manhood that anyone could com- 

 mit such a crime, for c uch it certainly is. 

 Knowing that your magazine takes hold 

 of such cases in the right way, I send the 

 clipping that you may do with it as you see 

 fit and help to get justice done. There is 

 a law and I believe such lawbreakers should 

 suffer the extreme penalty. 



W. F. Klages, Los Angeles, Cal. 



ANSWER. 



These annual butchering matches of 

 Babcock and his fellow razorbacks have 

 aroused the indignation of thousands of 

 decent men everywhere, yet the sportsmen 

 of California, who are directly interested, 

 stand idly by and allow the slaughter to 

 go on without recourse to the law. Cali- 

 fornia has on her statute books a law limit- 

 ing the number of ducks which any man 

 may kill in a day to 50. The Babcock herd 

 usually plead exemption from this statute 

 by claiming that most of the birds they kill 

 are mud hens and that these are not ducks; 

 yet if the game wardens of that State would 

 do their duty they would no doubt be able 

 to convict some of these ornery brutes of 

 killing more than 50 real ducks each in a 

 day. — Editor. 



PLEASE WRITE HIM. 



I have seen a great many letters concern- 

 ing game hogs in your paper. Many of 

 them are unjust. If a man has the true 

 sporting spirit and wishes to make a good 

 bag during his vacation, is there any need 

 of your making his exploits notorious? 



I did a little hunting last fall and I am 

 not ashamed to tell of it. I went down to 

 Wareham on a 2 days' trip with a good 



supply of ammunition, but I did not ex- 

 pect to have such good success. I bagged 

 133 ducks, also many smaller birds, the ex- 

 act number of which I do not recall.. I do 

 not say this to boast, and I hope you will 

 not take it as such; but just to show you 

 I am not ashamed to back up my opinion 

 as to your injustice to so called game hogs. 

 I assure you I do not object to having this 

 published if you think it worthy of notice. 

 I should like to read your answer in 

 Recreation ; or, if you dare not print a 

 letter in opposition to your views, address 

 your reply to 



, James R. Cohenstein, Boston. Mass. 



You are different from some of the other 

 swine from whom I have heard. In fact I 

 have heard from some thousands of men 

 who say they had slaughtered game for 

 years and knew no better, but that they are 

 now ashamed of it and will never do it 

 again. You seem to be beyond the reach of 

 any appeal, even to your better sense, if you 

 have any. I have printed hundreds of let- 

 ters from decent sportsmen, expressing 

 their condemnation of just such butchery 

 as you confess to having committed. Still 

 you affect to believe that I am alone in my 

 views regarding slaughter of game. In 

 order to convince you, if possible, that I am 

 not, I now request a few hundred readers 

 of Recreation to write you direct and tell 

 you what they think of a man who kills 133 

 ducks and a lot of other birds in 2 days and 

 in these times of scarcity of game. — Editor. 



RANCHERS MAY BE TRUSTED. 



After a steady diet on "sow-belly," beans 

 and flapjacks, when a man hasn't had a 

 mouthful of fresh meat in his house for 

 weeks, he and his family craving it, and 

 then refuses to shoot at a doe or a fawn, 

 it seems to me that the future of our deer 

 is in safe hands. That is the ex- 

 ample I had on a recent trip up in Routt 

 county, Colorado. I saw lots of deer, 

 and when on little trips from our camp 

 on Troutt creek, near Pinnacle, with 

 ranchers living near there, we had several 

 opportunities each day at does or fawns, 

 but the ranchers paid no more attention 

 to them than if they had been a cow and 

 a calf strayed from a neighbor's bunch of 

 cattle. To a tenderfoot this seemed little 

 short of heroic. All the inhabitants I met 

 in that country frown on anyone guilty of 

 killing a doe or a fawn. This sentiment 

 among . them goes much farther toward 

 preserving the game than any law that 

 could be enacted, and it is not with those 

 men the result of any fear of the law. The 

 campers who swarm the best hunting 

 grounds quickly become aware of this sen- 

 timent, and they fear the ranchers much 



