Forest and Stream. 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 



Terms, $4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. ) 

 Six Months, $2. j 



NEW YORK, IVIAY 16, 1884. 



1 VOL. XXlI.-No. 16. 



j Nos. 39 & 40 Park Row, New York. 



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CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



Game Protection Fund. 



Open Seasons. 



Non-Sporting Dog Show. 



National Trap-Shooting Ass'n. 

 The Sportsman Tourist. 



Sport in the Apennines. 

 Natural History. 



The Catbird. 



Deer in the Adirondacks. 



Superf etation in the Deer. 

 Game Bag and Gun. 



A Hunter's Camp. 



Cimarron to Cimarron Canyon. 



Camp Tinware. 



Fish and Game in Manitoba. 



A Fund for Game Protection. 



Philadelphia Notes. 



The Performance of Shotguns. 



The Choice of Hunting Rifles. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 



Camps of the Kingfishers. — i. 



The Maine Season Opened. 



Fly-Fishing for Shad. 



An Angler's Wife in Camp. 



FlSHCULTURK. 



The Menhaden Question. 

 The Kennel. 

 Westminster Kennel Club Show. 



The Kennel. 



Chicago Dog Show. 



The Vicars Testimonial. 

 Rifle and Trap Shooting. 



Army Rifle Practice. 



Range and Gallery. 



The Wheeling Club. 



The Trap. 



The Chicago Tournament. 



Proposed National Association. 



Notes from Worcester. 

 Canoeing. 



Ianthe C. C. 



The Chart Locker. 

 Walkill River. 



The Galley Fire. 

 Canoe and Cainp Cookery. 



A Night on a Log Jam. 



Airtight Boxes for Canoes. 



Canoe Rigs. 



Leaks in Birch Bark Canoes. 



The Spring Meets. 

 Yachting. 



Isis. 



Knickerbocker Y. C. 



Yachting: at Belleville, Ontario. 



The Collapse at Nice. 



Tapering Down. 

 Answers to Correspondents. 



A NATIONAL TRAP-SHOOTING ASSOCIATION. 



\ MERICANS delight in national associations. Almost 

 -^*- every branch of trade has its organization of this 

 kind, and so has almost every branch of "sport." The 

 horsemen are leagued together, so are the base ball men, the 

 cricketers, lacrosse players, archers, boating clubs, lawn 

 tennis clubs, and all the rest of them. Some of these socie- 

 ties are active, useful and influential; others are unwieldy, 

 purposeless and moribund. With the character and work- 

 ings of some of these national associations, the readers of this 

 journal are tolerably familiar. 



There is the American Fishcultural Association, which is 

 national in design, but in reality chiefly supported by its 

 Eastern members, who represent a quite circumscribed terri- 

 tory. But the society is unquestionably national in its in- 

 fluence; the fruits of its efforts are seen from the Atlantic 

 to the Pacific. The National American Kennel Club, the 

 American Canoe Association, the National Rod and Reel 

 Association, and the National Rifle Association are all strong 

 and useful bodies, each of which in its special sphere has 

 materially advanced the special interests to which it is de- 

 voted. 



Some years ago a National Sportsmen's Association was 

 formed. It tried to do too much; to cover too much 

 ground, to unite the inharmonious interests of trap-shooting 

 and game protection. It proved too big, was unwieldy, and 

 fell to pieces. The history of the movement is instructive; 

 we may recur to it at another time. 



At the clay-pigeon tournament in Chicago, it is expected 

 that twenty-five or thirty clubs will be present, representing 

 fairly well the trap-shooters of the country, and it is pro- 

 posed to take advantage of this meeting to form a 

 new national association, which shall have for its pur- 

 pose the encouragement and direction of trap-shoot- 

 ing in this country. In another column will be 

 found a letter from Mr. J. E. Bloom, giving an outline 

 of what it is thought such an organization might do. We 

 publish Ihe letter and call attention to it at this time, so that 

 the gentlemen who are going to Chicago to represent their 

 clubs in the clay-pigeon tournament, may have an opportun- 



ity to discuss the project with their fellows before leaving 

 home. 



Nothing is easier, on this side of the Atlantic Ocean, than 

 the formation of a national association. We apprehend, 

 then, that it will be no difficult task to organize the pro- 

 posed society at Chicago, and to elect a president and other 

 officers. But, the society once established, it is quite an- 

 other thing to keep it going. We suggest, then, the im- 

 portance of very thoroughly discussing the exact aims and 

 character of such a national body before taking decided 

 measures to establish it. The purpose ought to be very 

 definitely understood ; and the efforts of the members should 

 be directed to that one thing alone. 



So far as we are informed, the purpose for which it is de- 

 sired to establish the new association, is to provide annual 

 tournaments, in which the clubs belonging to it can contest 

 at the trap for prizes and renown. The success of the pro- 

 ject then, will depend upon whether or not the association 

 can make annual provision of sufficient inducements to at- 

 tract clubs to come from a distance to its tournaments. In 

 other words, the one question to be considered is the finan- 

 cial one. 



GAME PROTECTION FUND. 

 TN another column may be found a letter from a New 

 -*- York gentleman who knows something of the way in 

 which the game of this and other States is being peddled 

 out of season, and who understands that the administration 

 of justice so far as it relates to this subject is a huge farce. 

 As things go now, game traffic is carried on all the year 

 around. Our correspondent then proposes to gather funds 

 for the detection and prosecution of offenders. He asked 

 us what we thought of the project. We replied that it was 

 excellent, but that its great weakness was that it appealed 

 to the pocket-book. There are plenty of folks who will 

 talk game protection by the hour, but few who will give 

 anything toward it. But we should be glad to own up mis- 

 taken in this case. Does anybody want to join in raising 

 such a fund? 



This gives us occasion to repeat what we have often said, 

 namely, that in New York State there ought to be a live 

 association of men bound together by their interest in game 

 and fish, to take active charge of all matters pertaining to 

 the enactment and carrying out of the laws on the subject. 

 There is abundant material for such a body. Why can it 

 not be organized ? 



We believe that were such a society started by the 

 right persons, it would receive the support of a sufficient 

 number of sportsmen to carry through any measure it might 

 think best to urge at Albany. This would do away with the 

 annual game law tinkering at Albany, and would insure a 

 good statute against being subjected to the interested schem- 

 ing of men who are working for mercenary or selfish ends. 



OPEN SEASONS. 

 /~\NE way to secure the observation of the times and 

 ^-J seasons for game and fish is to make them known. 

 This we are doing to the best of our ability by publishing 

 every year a revised list of open and close seasons. That it 

 may be correct, we have invited the co-operation of our 

 readers in the several States. Now the request is repeated. 

 Please report to us any changes that have been made in the 

 laws of your State during the past winter. 



The American Fishcultural Association convened 

 at Washington last Tuesday, and the meeting is now m 

 progress. Mr. Theodore Lyman, of Massachusetts, delivered 

 the annual address, and Mr. John A. Ryder read a paper on 

 "Legislation Necessary for the Protection of Ocean Indus- 

 tries." A report of the proceedings, with the papers read, 

 will be given in our columns. 



A Full Report of the bench show in this city last week 

 is contained in our Kennel columns. As we have there noted, 

 a remarkable improvement was seen in some of the classes 

 exhibited. There were unnoticed exhibits in classes which, 

 according to the standard of excellence at former shows, 

 would have received the ribbons. The show was well man- 

 aged, and ranks high among the creditable exhibitions given 

 in this country. • 



Maine Lakes.— The ice is out of the Richardson, Moose- 

 lucmaguntic and Rangeley lakes, and the boats are running. 

 Elsewhere will be found a communication on the subject. 



A NON-SPORTING DOG SHOW. 



ACTING on the suggestion contained in the Forest and 

 Stream of April 24, the gentlemen interested in in- 

 augurating a bench show of non-spotting dogs, have con- 

 ferred with the Westminster Kennel Club, which has con- 

 sented to give such an exhibition. The show will be held in 

 the Madison Square Garden, this city, iu the third week of 

 next October. 



There is just now a tremendous "boom"' in the popularity 

 of these classes which are known as non-sporting dogs. The 

 demand for these dogs exceeds the supply, and all sorts of 

 ridiculously fancy prices are paid for fairly good specimens. 

 Almost every steamship from England brings into port ac- 

 cessions to the multiplying canine hosts. The bench shows 

 are crowded with them. In fact the exhibition of 

 the Westminster Kennel Club has grown to propor- 

 tions altogether unwieldy. The number of classes and 

 the entries in each are so great that there is abundant 

 material for two exhibitions instead of one. This arrange- 

 ment will accomplish -more in the education of the public 

 than could have been attained by the otber plan. With the 

 spring exhibition devoted chiefly to sporting dogs, and the 

 fall exhibition to the other breeds, visitors will have a better 

 opportunity of intelligently studying the several classes. 

 The judging can be finished more promptly; there will be 

 more room for display; and in various other ways the ex- 

 hibition can be managed to greater satisfaction than is now 

 attainable. 



A Competent Forestry Officer. — We have had several 

 opportunities of discussing forest conservancy with Mr. 

 Charles F. Amery, a gentleman of considerable professional 

 experience, gathered both in the forest bureaux of Germany, 

 and iu the East Indian forest department, in which latter he 

 held a high appointment for fourteen or fifteen years. Mr. 

 Amery is well known in India and to forest men in England 

 by his "Notes on Forestry," a little work in which the 

 whole system of forest management in Germany is intel- 

 ligently set forth, together with practical instructions for its 

 application to the East Indian forests. His wide experience 

 in practical forest management, and in dealing with the 

 many difficulties inseparable from the inauguration of a 

 system of forest conservancy, would render his services 

 very valuable at the present juncture in this country, where 

 in spite of the generally recognized necessity of doing some- 

 thing for the maintenance of a permanent timber supply, 

 action is paralyzed by the difficulty of deciding how best to 

 set about it. It is precisely difficulties of this sort for which 

 the services of the trained professional are required, and the 

 appointment of such a man as Mr. Amery on the staff of the 

 forestry department would be regarded as an earnest that 

 the Government had at length come to the resolution to face 

 the problem squarely. Mr. Amery is an alien, if it is proper 

 to apply the term to one who has made this country his 

 home, and has no claims to political patronage, his sole 

 claim to nomination is the value of the services his special 

 training qualify him to render, and these are certainly ex- 

 ceptional. 



Forest Fires and Forest Folly. — Our exchanges 

 have been filled with reports of the extensive and disastrous 

 forest conflagrations which have raged in various portions of 

 the country, and numerous editorial pens have bewailed the 

 consequent loss of human life and the destruction of millions 

 of dollars' worth of property. But no one of our numerous 

 and highly-esteemed contemporaries appear to have thought 

 it worth while to suggest that one-tenth paTt of the money 

 which has been so lost, if judiciously expended in securing 

 protection against the forest fires, would have averted the 

 terrible calamity. It requires a long time for us here in 

 America to learn these things. 



Canned Goods should not be cooked in the cans, for the 

 physicians tell us that there is danger of poison if this be 

 done. The proper way is to pour the meat or vegetables 

 into a cooking vessel. It is possible to provide abundant 

 facilities for all necessary culinary operations without cum- 

 bering oneself with a heavy load of pans and kettles. In 

 another column we quote from "Woodcraft" the description 

 given by "Nessmuk" of his camp tinware. 



The Massachusetts Fish and Game Protective Asso- 

 ciation will hold its last meeting for the season to morrow 

 evening, and the matter of the defeat of the game bill will 

 be thoroughly discussed anel plans for the future mapped 

 out. 



