Feb. S, 1883.1 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



the line is near the southern boundary of the cretaceous rocks 

 of Texas, south of which is the tertiary formation. 



It is a health-giving region, especially to those having lung 

 complaints. Here there is pure air, with cool breezes from 

 the Gulf of Mexico in summer. The days of winter are 

 mostly bright and clear, seldom too cold to make exercise in 

 the open air unpleasant to the invalid. 



All sportsmen and invalids who love hunting or the study 

 of nature in Us varied forms, especially botany, entomology, 

 ornithology or zoology, can find here a country which will 

 be apt to give them health, also much pleasure and useful 

 knowledge. 



It is important that those who have diseased livers or lungs 

 or throats should have some pleasant, employment when exer- 

 cising in (he open air to divert their minds from the thoughts 

 of disease. This is why the sportsman's life is so healthy; 

 and still more so are the studies of nature in the field, for 

 they can be pursued and enjoyed anywhere in the country. 

 But new fields are best for all, hence the superior advantages 

 of Southwestern Texas. S..B. Btjckxey". 



Ararra, Texas, January. 1882. 



The Fort Clark News, Kinney county. Texas, says: "We 

 learn that the Keene boys recently killed forty-two deer in 

 five days. Pretty good ^port for the time spent. It seems 

 almost cruel to ruthlessly kill the animals for no other pur- 

 pose than that of securing their skins," The Henrietta 

 S7iit : M, Clay county, says: "Mr. P. A. Brown, from the 

 Little "Wichita River, brought into town a splendid lot of 

 wild game Tuesday. There were three fat turkeys, a dozen 

 squirrels, a lot of cotton-tails, an opossum, three or four va- 

 rieties of ducks, some quail, and half a dozen kinds of small 

 birds. They were all nicely dressed and as fat as butter 

 balls." 



For the information of your readers I will add that Kinney 

 county is the third county west of Bexar county, of which 

 the city of San Antonio is" the county seat. A railroad now 

 runs from San Antonio direct to Fort Clark, and will soon 

 be completed to El Paso on the Rio Grande, and thence to 

 San Francisco. A railroad also runs from Denison, west to 

 Gainesville, where a daily stage, runs to Henrietta. Most of 

 the Little Wichita River is in Clay county, and the country 

 in both Kinney and Clay counties is mostly open prairie and 

 easy hunting grounds. The string of Mr. Brown shows the 

 splendid variety of game to be found here. He probably re- 

 tained his venison for family use. 



I hunted over these grounds in 1S52-3-4-5, when game 

 wa3 very abundant, and I see there is much there yet. 



H, W. Merrill. 



DAVE. 



ONE day in June last a friend whose business calls him 

 daily to the woods, and who thinks that about the 

 smartest trick in the world is to get a joke on an editor, 

 brought to the sanctum a something or other, and went his 

 way. We examined the donation and decided at once that 

 it was a bird. We claim considerable credit for that de- 

 cision, for not a sign of feather or wing did it show. A ball 

 or lump of pure white down, with eyes and a bill on the top 

 of it, and claws on the bottom of it — that was about all. 



We took the nondescript home, and it was at once adopted 

 by the boy, who has a boy's turn for pets of all kinds. In 

 fact I may as well admit that the queer little, bunch of fuzz 

 won the affections of the whole family from the start. It had 

 a clumsy way of walking on its elbows, and a bright intelli- 

 gent look out of its large eyes that were quite taking. It did 

 not take Dr. Coues' " Key"" to decide that it was some kind 

 of a hawk, but what kind was an important rmestion if we 

 wanted to "raise it by hand." What would it eat — fish, 

 flesh or fowl ? At first we feared it might be a fish-hawk. 

 and were greatly relieved when it accepted bits of fresh 

 meat. But the next day when some minnows were brought 

 in by a boy who heard that we had a fish-hawk, we were 

 chagrined to see Dave gobble them down as fast as they were 

 offered. We soon lost all confidence in these signs, for we 

 found that fresh meat, birds, mice, toads or fish, were equally 

 welcome to the young gourmand. And how he grew. In three 

 weeks he was full feathered, and in three weeks more reached 

 his adult size and strength. Then we were able to deter- 

 mine his species, and found that we had tamed a pigeon- 

 hawk, and that his proper title was Ampeter fmcus, although 

 we always called him Dave, for the friend who brought him in. 

 During the summer Dave went with us to our summer home, 

 and it was about all the boy wanted to do to catch fish and 

 other food enough for him." He was tamed, or more nearly 

 tamed than we had ever supposed a hawk could be. We 

 kept him tethered to his perch, but this became more a thing 

 of convenience than necessity, for although he often loosed 

 his bonds and sometimes visited the chimney top, the orchard 

 or the woods, as soon as he found himself away from his 

 home and friends he would sit and scream until some one 

 came for him. He apparently lost some of the characteris- 

 tics of his race, especially so far as killing anything for food, 

 and the chickens and sparrows gathered with impunity the 

 cnunbs from his table. We must admit, however, that to- 

 ward a dog he ever kept one eye open, and neither a mouse 

 nor a toad ever escaped if within his reach. It maybe 

 worthy- of mention that, while he fairly doted on toads, he 

 would never touch a frog at his hungriest times. 



He knew every member of the family, and when spoken to 

 or caressed would twitter and chirp with great expression. 

 He. would always answer when his name was called, arid fly 

 to the shoulder of his owner to be fed. In fact he was a 

 good bird and we loved him. Imagine, then, if you can, my 

 feelings when on coming home one day I found only his 

 dead carcass, riddled by a load of shot that some thought- 

 less (?) boy had poured into him during the absence of the 

 family on Christmas. Just while I was feeling the worst 

 there came a memory of something that I had seen in the 

 Forest axt> Stream, and hunting up my last volume I soon 

 had my eye upon these words: " Particular pains taken in 

 mounting pet birds." That was the man for me. No com- 

 mon skinner, who makes a living by dressing skunk hides or 

 putting up birds for the milliners, could have had the job; 

 but a man who has judgment enough to advertise, and deli- 

 cacy of feeling enough to take "particular pains with pet 

 birds," he is our man. So we expressed the remains to New 

 York, and now. as we write this, with the family all around 

 us, I here sits Dave on the top of our desk "just as natural as 

 life," only he doesn't, chirp. 1 have seen some good work in 

 that line (have done some myself that I am not ashamed of), 

 but when I remember what a* mangled bloody bunch of hawkl 



; " The Formation of Vegetable Mold through the Action of Worms, 

 with observations on their habits," Bv Charles Darwin, D.D.D., 

 F.B.S. New York, Appleton & Co., 1888. 



sent to New Tork, I feel like saying that Dave presents the best 

 specimen of taxidermist skill I have ever seen; and that I 

 firmly believe, if anybody could make that bird twitter again, 

 Fred. Sauter, the naturalist, of 199 William street, could 

 do it. T. B. A. 



HlGHTSTOWN, N. J. 



STRANGE HABITS OF BEAVER. 



I WAS greatly surprised, two months ago, on entering a 

 trapper's camp in the White River bottoms, about eighty 

 miles from its mouth, to find several fresh beaver pells hang- 

 ing up. I asked the trapper where they came from. He an- 

 swered "I cotched 'em round hyah." Now, as this camp 

 was several miles from any high land, and as the country all 

 around for at least five miles overflowed from one to twenty 

 feet in depth, usually as early as February, I thought it a 

 very queer place for beavers to inhabit. 1 got all the infor- 

 mation about them from the trapper that I could, and found 

 him a very skillful trapper and quite an intelligent and very 

 obscrving'man. He had trapped for beaver in"the Northern 

 States and in the Rocky Mountains. When he came here no 

 one knew of there being such a thing as a beaver in the coun- 

 try. But when trapping in the bottoms he found tmite plen- 

 tifully many unmistakable signs of beaver, namely, where 

 they had cut down trees, their tracks, etc., but no "dams or 

 iioii-es He set his traps in the regulation style to catch 

 beaver, and "cotched" them, sure enough. I "asked him 

 how and where they lived, and how they managed in the 

 long overflow, lasting often from the las"t of January into 

 June. His opinion was that when there was no overflow 

 they lived much as otters do, namely, in burrows in the 

 ground, or rather houses hollowed out in the steep banks of 

 the. lakes and bays, having no place of ingress or exit except 

 under the surface of the water below low water mark. 



These lakes and bays in the bottoms of the lower White 

 River are peculiar. The larger of them are undoubtedly old 

 river beds, or channels, where the White River has once 

 flowed : others — the smaller — have been scooped out by the 

 river when rising rapidly, when there is no back water "f roni 

 the. rivers below, flowing across the bottoms with a strong 

 current. The larger and some of the smaller of them are 

 usually deep, theirbottonis on a level with that of the river. 

 which" is a deep stream and filled the year around with clear, 

 comparatively cool water. They swarm with black bass and 

 other fishes. Here, then, the beaver has assumed habits 

 suited to his surroundings. He dams not for fear he may 

 be dammed, or rather he don't ' ' haf to. " He stores up little 

 or no supply of winter food, for the door of his house, is sel- 

 dom closed by ice. He builds no houses, for the reason that, 

 good architect as he is, he could not build them high enough 

 to get out of the wet. Our trapper thought these White 

 River beavers built a temporary house on a large, hollow log 

 during the overflow, but this is only guess work and not a 

 proven fact in natural history. But it is a fact that beavers 

 are here, cut down trees, and build neither visible houses nor 

 dams. How they pass the two to four months of overflow 

 remains to be found out. 



Is it not an entirely new fact in natural histoiy that the 

 beaver is occupying a region so peculiar as this ? Of course 

 they have been known to inhabit places liable to overflow by 

 spring freshets, lasting for a considerable period, but here the 

 overflow is liable to begiu in mid-winter and last until June. 



Since writing the above I have had a chance to interview 

 one of the oldest settlers, an observing man. He says that 

 during the time of the overflow these White River beavers do 

 not stay in the bottoms, but come to the high lands on the 

 west side, I asked him how he knew this." He said " that 

 he had often heard them slapping the water with their tails." 

 I have also conversed with another trapper who has trapped 

 here thirteen years. He also said that they go to lands that 

 do not overflow, where he had often seen" their "sign," 

 where they had fed, etc , and what is more to the point, that 

 they do not bring forth tneix young until June or later. This 

 is, I think, correct, for some pelts I have seen taken late the 

 past fall were not more than one-fourth grown. This hunter 

 also said that beaver were quite plenty on the Bayou Metoe, 

 a stream twenty miles west of here, where they had dams like 

 good old-fashioned beaver; also that there are "beaver at many 

 other points in this State. 



Deer, bear, turkeys, ducks, geese, squirrels, raccoons, 

 opossums, quail, prairie chickens and rabbits are very plenti- 

 ful here at present, and large bags and fine sport can be had. 

 The weather has for the most part been fine, warm and dry. 

 but just now we are having a wet spell, and the streams and 

 rivers are ' ' going on a high. "' Bybhe. 



Crockett's Bluff, Ark., 1883. 



THE WORK OF EARTH WORMS. 



A NGLERS have usually looked upon earth worms as 

 J\. chiefly valuable for fish bait, but Mr. Darwin *tells us 

 that they change the earth's surface, swallow and bury rocks, 

 fill up valleys, and that they have buried ancient cities, and 

 finally, that the upper crust of the earth has passed through 

 their bodies. Further, that this low order of beings, although 

 blind and deaf, possess some mental powers and much mus- 

 cular strength. By extensive observations and many experi- 

 ments, Mr. Darwin seeks to substantiate these claims. 



It has been the. custom of some religionists to take the worm 

 as the type of humility, and to call themselves "worms of 

 the dust" H Mr. Darwin's estimate of the geological impor- 

 tance of these creatures be correct, perhaps" it will be neces- 

 sary to look still lower in the scale of creation for a compari- 

 son, even to the Protozoa possibly. 



Shakespeare seems to have anticipated the importance of 

 the worm — he makes Hamlet saj r : 



" Your worm is your only emperor for diet— we fat all 

 Creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots." 



I believe it is a fact, well-known to anglers at least, that in 

 North America there are no earth worms in the wilderness. 

 Only in cultivated ground, like old fields and gardens, can 

 they be found. I have searched for them in "vain in the 

 woods and on the prairies, in the Adirondack wilderness, and 

 in Canada, in Maine and in Florida, in Georgia and in Colo- 

 rado; and I have never found them except in long cultivated 

 grounds. 



In Chicago, in 1840, earth worms were only to be found in 

 an old garden attached to the Fort. 



When it is asserted " that long before man existed, the land 

 was regularly ploughed by worms," this may he correct as 

 regards England, but that island is but a speck on the map 

 of the globe. 



H, as we are to infer from this book, the business of earth 



worms is to fertilize the earth by passing it through their 

 bodies, why do they only follow in man's footsteps? Why do 

 they not operate in new soils, and prepare them for human 

 occupation? 



To criticize any theory of Darwin, may he considered by 

 his disciples as great presumption, and to dissent from him 

 rank heresy; but that seems to ba a connection between earth 

 worms and the dung heap, which has not been noticed in 

 this volume of three hundred pages. S. C. C. 



ENEMIES OF GAME BIRDS. 



Editor Itbrest and Stream? 



In your issue of Jan. 20, I notice you seem to doubt my 

 assertion about the sharp-shinned hawk and sparrow hawk, 

 and give the impression that my statement is an opinion only. 

 Now I will go into more particulars, as I seem to have failed 

 to convey clearly before that I knew them to be dangerous 

 to quail. ' I saw twice on my late trip, while quail shooting, 

 the sharp-shinned hawk with a full grown quail in its clutches 

 barely able to fly, in fact unable to rise above a foot or two 

 over the ground" on account of the weight of the bird. The 

 man with whom I was shooting also saw it and we killed 

 them both, The balance of the quail were badly frightened 

 and scattered all over the field. I noticed every day these 

 small hawks hunting out cover where. I knew the quail lived. 

 I was told there that both these, hawks were exceedingly 

 troublesome and bold, and would kill a half-grown chicken 

 — that they were, in fact, the most troublesome hawk they 

 had, being so small and cruiet they had an advantage over 

 the larger kind and were better able to surprise their prey. 

 They considered that 100 quail a year was about the average 

 each hawk killed. This, of course, is mere conjecture. 



The English snipe I spoke of was a full-grown hud, killed 

 in the open meadow in full view of my friend who shot the 

 hawk which proved to be a sparrow hawk. I have only to 

 add that I have spoken to several good sportsmen and natu- 

 ralists on the subject, and they agree with me entirely. 



W. HoLRERTON. 



[We are glad to receive the above interesting particulars 

 from Mr. Holberton. We certainly did fail to understand 

 him as doing anything more than expressing an opinion. 

 Facts and details" are required in matters of this kind, and 

 these. we now have. It is hardly necessary for us to say that 

 if Mr. Holberton had told us that he knew the small hawks 

 were dangerous to quail we should have accepted his state- 

 ment without a word.] 



DECREASE OF GAME BIRDS. 



North Bloometet/d, O. , Jan. 24, '82. 

 Editor Forest arty Stamn: 



I have read with regret the various articles that have ap- 

 peared of late in Forest AHD Stream, regarding the growing 

 scarcity of ruffed grouse throughout the land. I was well 

 aware that their numbers had been rapidly d imin ishing in 

 these parts for some years past — but had hoped for better 

 things elsewhere. 



I see some of your Eastern correspondents attribute the 

 scarcity of grouse* in their localities largely to the tick, and 

 give reasonable proof of it. Others think the red squirrel is 

 playing the mischief. But I very much doubt if either are 

 in any degree responsible for their scarcity in this vicinity. 

 It is true an occasional tick is to be found on an old bird ; and 

 although I have shot several hundred during the past few years, 

 and probably seen as many more that have been killed by 

 other guns, I have yet to- see the first one not in prime 

 condition, and have only heard of one. Nor have. I reasona- 

 ble grounds for thinking either the tick or red squirrel molest 

 the young in this country — but the very best reasons for 

 assu m ing" the contrary. 



The unmerciful manner in which our grouse have been 

 trimmed by resident and non-resident sportsmen during the 

 past few years is, I think, the principal cause of their present 

 scarcity with us. 



Foxes, cats and skunks are all more or less destructive to 

 all ground-roosting birds; and long protracted storms during 

 the nesting season, I think, contribute not a little to the de- 

 struction of very young broods— particularly along river bot- 

 toms and on low ground, and I have the very best of reason 

 for thinking our freshet which came in the early part of last 

 June cost us many a brood, as young birds were seldom met 

 with later than that, or during the shooting season. 



Another thing that stands greatly in the way of any rapid 

 increase of our noble game bird is the fact that a veiy great 

 majority of them are not of that gender that could reasonably 

 be expected to devote any great portion of their time to family 

 cares, preferring as it seems during the entire summer and 

 early fall to give themselves up to meditation, and caring 

 only for their lordly selves. 



Still, regardless of their natural enemies and unfortunate 

 hindrances, I think a little prudent care on the part of our 

 sportsmen would enable their numbers to so increase as to 

 give us an occasional fair day's sport for some years to come, 

 providing the pot hunters only confine themselves to other 

 territory, hut so long as they continue to overrun ours, 

 there is' little encouragement for us to do other than make 

 it as discouraging as possible for them. Buckeye. 



White and Gray Rabbits — Cortland, N. Y., Jan. 20, 

 1882. — A party from town a short time since came back home 

 from a rabbit hunt, bringing with them six white rabbits. This 

 is quite remarkable. these days, as it was supposed the old- 

 fashioned white rabbit was nearly exterminated in this sec- 

 tion. Please inform me by 7 what means the gray rabbit 

 deposes or is the means of* driving away the large white 

 variety. — Mm. [Does it do sov We'kave found both species 

 abtmdant in Massachusetts in the same localities. The larger 

 species is the more boreal in habitat of the two, and gradually 

 replaces it as we proceed further north.] 



Crows as Nest Robbers.— I know from personal observa- 

 tion that the crow is a merciless thief and will rob any other 

 bird's nest it can find, of either eggs or young, which they 

 cany away to their own nests to feed their young on. Dur- 

 ing their nesting season the erow may be seen almost any 

 time of day stealing noiselessly about searching for the above 

 food. Now and then he is seen for a moment, gathering or 

 hovering over a cert a in place and to fly rapidly away. An 

 examination of the spot will usually reveal an empty and 

 torn nest. So it is true that the erow will destroy a whole 

 brood of birds at once, and I believe that a reward or bounty 

 should be offered for their heads.— G. W. E. 



The cccnfcsiox in the Forest aki> Stream office, caused 

 by the fire last Tuesday morning, has caused some necessary 

 interruption of the smooth routine of the paper, 



