Sept. 14, 1895.] 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



227 



rampage somewhere up here, and D. C. Shepard, Hod 

 Thompson, H. P. Upham and son are scheduled to leave 

 • St. Paul in a few days equipped with Mr. Shepard's special 

 •car. Judge Kerr and E. S. Warner are out at Klontarf, 

 and when our season opens next Sunday there will be 

 trouble for birds and dogs all along the Great Northern. 



The game warden at the State line in Grand Forks is 

 alert. It is unlawful to carry or ship game from the 

 Dakotas. As the law, passed by the Dakota Legislature 

 Uast winter,, imposing a tax of $35 a man on non-resident 

 ■ sportsmen, cannot go into effect until Dec. 1, 1895, hun- 

 ters from other States are shooting in Dakota fields. So 

 the game warden at Grand Forks runs a dozen dogs into 

 i;he east bound baggage car, observes their sniffling, and 

 >when a suspicious trunk or box is pointed by one of the 

 dogs the package is attacked from behind with a dark 

 ilantern and jimmy. Where there appears to be a war- 

 rant for doing so the thing is opened, and if birds are 

 found there is trouble in somebody's clothes. The other 

 day one of the dogs pointed a bottle. That was opened 

 also, but no trouble ensued. 



THE VANISHING WILD TURKEY. 



I remarked on in a paper that had the honor to appear 

 in Forest and Stream that the "woodcock was destined to 

 follow the wild turkey in Canada on the path of extinc- 

 tion." The wild turkey will of course go first. In the 

 New England States and in most of the Middle States he 

 is practically extinct, except some preserved birds, and 

 his final extermination all over North America is only a 

 matter of time. In Ontario, Canada, he is confined to a 

 few townships in the counties of Lambton and Kent, with 

 a few birds in the counties along Lake Erie. In all these 

 places he is now nominally preserved, which, however, 

 does not prevent any one who knows how to set about it 

 being able to buy a wild turkey during the fall in Toronto, 

 London or any of the larger cities. 



It is a pity, for shooting the wild turkey is a grand sport 

 for the man who does not mind roughing it. Some twelve 

 years ago I shot my first wild turkey in the district first 

 mentioned. I had been shooting in the little town of 

 Bothwell with a friend, a Mr. C. A flock of turkeys had 

 while we were there come through some woods within 

 two miles of the town. We saw their tracks in the 

 light snow (it was in November), but saw no birds. They^ 

 were on the travel, as the turkey often is, a fact which his 

 pursuer discovers very soon indeed. We got some quail 

 and rabbits, and a few ruffed grouse, but the turkeys had 

 emigrated. My comrade was called away home, and 

 shortly after his departure I made the acquaintance of a 

 fine old Highlander, a Mr. K. , who had a bush farm in 

 the woods, twenty-eight miles back. He said, "if I didn't 

 mind going back with him to his place next day, and 

 living a little rough, I could get lots of shots at turkey 

 and deer too." I jumped at the offer, and next day after 

 a rough drive in a farm wagon got to my friend's farm 

 early in the afternoon. Though the roads were real 

 backwoods roads, the distance was made in remarkable 

 time, for my friend was feeling pretty good for various 

 reasons, and most of the way was traversed at a gallop. 

 However, I got there alive, and as the afternoon was 

 young, started to prospect. I saw tracks both of deer and 

 turkey in the bush, quite near the house, but saw no big 

 game; so toward evening I turned my attention to the 

 partridge, which were plentiful, and soon shot eleven. I 

 also missed some, though they were tame, and rose close 

 to the gun. 



Next day I was out early. There was a great forest near 

 the house thirty miles or more through without hut or 

 clearing, all hard wood; not a pine tree did I see all the 

 time I was there; free from brush, except in the black 

 ash swamps, which intersected the rolling beech ridges. 

 A beautifully easy bush to get lost in, as I found out some 

 days afterward. I betook myself to its skirts and was 

 soon prowling along enjoying to the full that feeling that 

 Sir Sttnuel Baker so well expresses in one of his graphic 

 sporting books, "the delight the sportsman feels when 

 wandering along through a new country, full of game, on 

 the lookout for anything that may turn up." 

 Tracks, both deer and turkey, were plenty, and I was 



■ on the lookout all over me. Before very long I saw 

 through the great open woods about 300yds. away perched 



. on the bough of a large beech tree a great bird, whose 



; glittering bronze plumage told me at once that here was a 

 turkey at last. I stealthily approached, but he saw me be- 

 fore I got within 100yds. of him, and was off. I stamped 

 my foot on the ground with vexation, when a noise like 



. a dozen grouse getting up close by, made me wbeelround. 

 Another turkey, who bad been watching ME while I was 



. stalking the first, had taken that opportunity to depart. 

 I promptly gave him both barrels at about 40yds. distance, 



; and he went smash into the crotch of a big buttonwood 

 and then slid to the ground, bringing a shower of bark 



; and twigs with him. He weighed 18lbs. I slung that 

 bird over my shoulder and went straight home, for I 

 didn't want to be lost in those woods before I'd shown 



i him to somebody. 



The afternoon of the same day I got my first shot at a 



ii deer, while out with the son of Mr. P. as a guide. We 

 pumped the deer out of an oak top cut down and left by 

 lumberers. He was not 35yds. from us when he started, 

 and I missed that deer with both barrels, loaded with 

 buckshot, though I could have hit a rabbit nearly every 

 time at that distance. Of course buck fever was what 

 was the matter with me, but what was the matter with 

 the guide? He missed the deer too, though he had killed 

 scores before. Did my buck fever infect him, or was 

 that deer bewitched? We followed him three miles 

 without finding blood or hair before we'd acknowledge 

 i that we'd both missed him. 



Next day I shot a fine buck on a runway as he was 

 • driven past me by hounds, an honest and fair way of kill- 

 ing deer, not like the murderers driving them into water 

 and shooting them out of a canoe 5yds. off. I used a 13- 

 ibore gun, one barrel loaded with ball and the other with 

 Ibuck8hot— better weapon than the rifle for this kind of 

 shooting, where there is liable to be so much brush and 

 small trees. The deer got the ball straight through him, 

 perforating his liver and breaking a rib on the other side, 

 and seven of the light buckshot in his ribs, and yet that 

 buck ran half a mile before he fell. I afterward got three 

 more deer and six turkeys, besides a lot of partridge, quail 

 and other small game. 



Most of the turkey I got by a way of hunting then prev- 

 alent in that district, and very deadly, though there is 

 nothing unsportsmanlike about it. You wait for a deep 



light fall of snow, when the turkeys can't travel easily, 

 and then set out. You find the track of a flock and push 

 them for all they're worth. They will soon find out some 

 enemy is after them, and begin to run. Before long one 

 bird will leave the flock, and go off either to the right or 

 left. Follow that bird. Before you have gone a hundred 

 yards you will find him hidden in some dense bit 

 of brush or some other cover. He will let you 

 get well within shot before he rises, so it's your 

 fault if you don't get him. It is always the 

 heaviest and best birds that leave the rest to hide thus 

 early, so you acquire the "flower of the flock" at once. I 

 fear I shall never have shooting like this I have briefly 

 related in Canada again. The turkey is very good eating; 

 it pays to shoot him for the market, where he finds a 

 ready sale at a high price. These things mark him out 

 for early destruction. The only chance for keeping any 

 number of them in North America will be their preserva- 

 tion in the national parks. But even in these their wan- 

 dering and migratory habits will be against them. 



Reginald Gourlay. 



ADIRONDACK DEER. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



A little while ago, if I remember correctly, a man wrote 

 a letter to the Forest and Stream in which a sentence to 

 this effect appeared: 



"Stop the crusting of deer and let the little evil, if it is 

 an evil, of hounding go." That man ought to have 

 known better. Judging from his letter he knew more or 

 less about the Adirondacks, had visited them and had 

 hunted there to some extent. After what he wrote as 

 quoted above, one would believe that that is the way he 

 killed his deer, and that being the case, he should know 

 that it is a tolerably easy method by which to procure 

 them. The idea of calling hounding deer "a little evil" or 

 none at all is saddening to one who has seen the deer 

 steadily decreasing— withering before dogs, as it were, 

 like leaves over a camp-fire. 



When the law prohibiting hounding is passed, and is 

 enforced, it will do away with hounds to a large extent. 

 They may be retained to hunt foxes perhaps, but the best 

 fox-hounds are not as a rule good deer dogs, and some 

 lawless men will use dogs still to kill deer. Yet the law 

 will make the practice odious to the visiting sportsmen 

 and dangerous to the visiting head hunters, and a growing 

 sentiment, even now perceptible among woodsmen, and 

 a prominent standard among sportsmen who think, will 

 in time eradicate all desire to hunt deer with dogs, and 

 when a few men— two or three— of a locality begin to 

 carry out the necessary provision that dogs seen after 

 deer may or must be shot, pot-hunters will think the 

 expense too great and cease their persuit of deer in so 

 barbarous a manner. 



I rode from Morehouseville to Northwood a while ago 

 with Mr. Wilson, of Colvin's Adirondack survey, and we 

 were discussing hounding and still-hunting. He was 

 rather astonished that people allowed dogs to be used in 

 hunting deer. Up where he lived, in the southern part 

 of St. Lawrence county (I think), a dog running deer, if 

 seen by a woodsman, was shot. There the deer were 

 increasing. 



But here, from Northwood to the West Canada Creek 

 lakes, from the Fulton Chain to Piseco, where hounding 

 is the favorite way, the deer are decreasing rapidly, not- 

 withstanding apparent increase due to the deer being 

 driven out of the woods by lumbermen and their opera- 

 tions. 



All summer long at various times I have heard ©f deer 

 being around, of their occasionally coming in sight of 

 the clearings, and those who told me of the deer usually — 

 and I do not remember of a man who didn't — end up 

 their story with: "If they'd only keep their blamed dogs 

 tied up, deer would be thick hereabouts." But dogs must 

 be exercised, and the best deer dogs when released make 

 at once for the woods and do not return sometimes for 

 days at a stretch. These dogs would gradually die away 

 and the deer would get thicker and more easily accessible 

 to both visitors and natives. 



The influence of clubs like the Adirondack League is 

 very great in a region like this, and their members by not 

 killing does have had a very great influence for the in- 

 crease of deer, or rather, perhaps, this has made the de- 

 crease less rapid than if they had killed everything their 

 numerous and handsome hounds put into the water. But 

 think what a difference there would be if the League 

 would stop hounding on its preserves and shoot the dogs 

 that run there. It would have the support of 75 per cent, 

 of the woodsmen, and in time the remaining 35 per cent, 

 would grow used to the order of things and become sup- 

 porters of the practice of dog shooting. It is to be feared, 

 however, that no such thing as this will be done. 



From time to time we read in the Forest and Stream 

 of trips to the Maine woods, of which the story of "My 

 First Caribou," in the issue of Aug. 34, by Mr. Irving H. 

 Pomeroy, is an example. The deer, judging from the 

 news reports, are so commonly billed as to be scarcely 

 worth mentioning, and yet the above-mentioned letter 

 shows that in some localities at least they are very numer- 

 ous. As for instance : "* * * shot a nice four-year-old 

 buck with good antlers; fired at two other deer, and prob- 

 ably heard twenty or thirty whistling and stamping the 

 ground." I do not mean to say that so many as that 

 ought to be seen or heard in any given place 

 in tbe Adirondacks, because from the nature of 

 things it is hardly possible except in yards; but 

 what I would like to call attention to is that 

 a region famous the world over for years and years as a 

 land of sports, visited by thousands of hunters yearly, 

 should yet furnish such sport as Mr. Pomeroy and hosts 

 of others have described in the Forest and Stream. I 

 remember having read in one of Capt. Farrar's books 

 about how a party of young fellows caught a live deer, 

 and how one day dogs ran three deer down through the 

 camp, and seeing the camp deer attacked it. Then the 

 boys killed them. Later two men came that way, and 

 as Capt. Farrar pictured them — vicious, hang-dog sneaks 

 — one saw how the upright class of woodsmen in Maine 

 regarded hounders. They have their reward in deer, cari- 

 bou, moose and easier consciences. 



I heard the story of the last moose killed hereabouts, 

 and it was fitting that it should be a monster of its kind, 

 with antlers of tremendous size — a creature to be remem- 

 bered, even though others of the same kind abounded. 

 He had lived around these woods for years; he was often 

 seen and his great tracks led through many a swamp and. 



across trails often with men still-hunting after. But they 

 did not get him. 



One fall day the hounds struck his trail over in the town 

 of Ohio, and with that yelping, running cry they followed 

 where the old moose led. He knew it was a race for life; 

 perhaps he knew his time had come. That day, that 

 night, he ran them with head down and with weary, hope- 

 ful persistence he ran along a road through Russia. Be- 

 hind came the hounds, "noble creatures'* and blood- 

 thirsty brutes. They were tired too. 



Right at the little settlement ran the moose. There 

 was a shot, another and another, then more, and soon 

 the street was full of men, boys and dogs. 



The old moose staggered, plunged forward, then stood 

 erect, as if the blood was not pouring out of bis sides, 

 and turned his big head around to gaze on his pur- 

 suers. He sank down then and died. Even in those 

 days the dogs destroyed, and if it hadn't been for them 

 the moose would have held their own for years and 

 years in the Adirondacks. 



Blow out the jack lights, burn tbe lumber camps and 

 kill the dogs. Raymond S. Spears. 



Northwood, N. Y. 



CONNECTICUT PARTRIDGE SNARES. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



From where I sit while writing this article the eye can 

 roam over as favorable a section of country for the propa- 

 gation of small game as can be found anywhere in New 

 England, and yet it is but seven miles from here to the cen- 

 ter of the third largest city in New England. A mile to 

 the west a range of forest-covered hills raise their ver- 

 dured sides to a height of some 500ft. above the level of 

 Lond Island Sound. 



In numerous places the sides of these semi-mountains 

 rise in nearly abrupt rocky cliffs, whose crevices and 

 miniature caves form for crafty foxes and corn-filching 

 coons secure abiding places into which to retreat when 

 hard pressed by pursuing hounds. It almost seems that 

 Mother Nature has provided these safe retreats for their 

 especial benefit. 



The view from the summit of these hills is at any time 

 of the year grand, but at this season it is exceedingly so. 

 Extending from their eastern and western slopes, the eye 

 of the beholder roams over alternating stretches of tim- 

 bered and meadow land. From the western side one 

 looks down upon miles of this wooded and meadow land, 

 through which, like a narrow ribbon of silver, flows a 

 fair-sized trout stream. In tbe springtime, should a per- 

 son be so fortunate as to spend the right kind of a day on 

 this stream, if a careful, cautious angler, he would be well 

 repaid by securing a fairly filled creel of medium-sized 

 speckled trout. Although these fish, as a rule, do not 

 attain to any great size, still the extreme brightness of 

 their spots., firmness of flesh and other excellent qualities 

 eannot he surpassed anywhere. 



To the east and north rise other lofty hills, whose ver- 

 dancy, as they roll away in the dim distance, changes 

 from green ,to one unbroken line of indigo. To the south, 

 hidden by the shielding foliage of giant elms, lies the city; 

 while stretching away from its feet and basking in the 

 rays of Old Sol the bosom of the, commerce-dotted Sound 

 glitters in scintillating radiance. 



When the day is nearly spent and the sun, as it seems, 

 sinks to sleep in a bed of verdancy behind these hills, 

 when the afterglow of ^crimson, indigo and gold has given 

 place to twilight, then here ,in ,the springtime will be 

 heard the whip-poor-will call and. other evening sounds of 

 spring as they issue forth from meadow and wild wood. 



Now it is but natural to .suppose that in a tract of 

 country so abundantly supplied by Mother Nature with 

 everything so essential to their propagation it would be 

 an easy matter to find in .plentiful numbers that most 

 noble of American game birds==-the partridge. That this 

 section, however, is almost entirely devoid of partridges is 

 only too true. Where six or seven years ago a fair hand 

 with the gun, on a day's tramp after these birds, would 

 meet with fair success, he now considers himself fortunate 

 if he gets a shot at one. It must not for an instant be 

 supposed that the nearly extinction of this noble bird in 

 this section is due to the shooter : ; nothing of the kind. I 

 invite anybody who wishes to know what really is the 

 cause of this thinning out to take a walk with me any 

 day within a month of the opening of the shooting season, 

 or long after the law is on, and I will show to him such 

 an (almost) unending string of strangling snares as to 

 turn his heart sick while his feet demolish them. Through 

 the woods that line the streams, stretching their unlawful 

 lengths at the base of the hills, and covering their sides 

 and summits, extending to the north, east, south and 

 west over miles of muntry, nothing but snares, snares, 

 snares. 



Now it is not natural to suppose ,that the persons who 

 indulge in this business of snaring do so for the sport or 

 pastime these is in it. I have no way of proving it, still I 

 have heard it whispered that persons whose apparent 

 respectability would naturally lead a person to believe 

 otherwise have made it a business — in and out of season 

 — of purchasing for a good price the ill-gotten spoils of 

 these law-breaking snares, and shipping the same to a 

 New York market. Whether there is anything other 

 than rumor in these reports I do not know, but this much 

 Ido know, snaring is carried on so extensively that, unless 

 something is done to put a stop to it, it will soon be 

 impossible to find a single bird hereabout. Should this 

 article aid in any way in bringing the attention of the 

 proper authorities to this prevailing evil, then will I rest 

 content in the knowledge of the fact that I have performed 

 a duty. William H. Avis. 



Hamdbn, Conn., Se pt. 3. 



In a New York County. 

 Smithville Flats, N. Y.— Editor Forest and Stream: 

 The partridge shooting in Chenango county has been un- 

 lusually lair this fall. Woodcock, owing to the dryness of 

 the season, are not so abundant as they will be later. 

 'George P. Finnigan made the following scores tbe open- 

 ing days of the season: Aug. 16, two woodcock and twenty 

 partridge; 17, five woodcock and six partridge; 19, four 

 woodcock and six partridge; 30, eighteen partridge; 31, 

 twelve partridge; 33, two woodcock and eighteen par- 

 tridge; 33, eleven partridge; 37 (one-half day), five par- 

 tridge; 38, one woodcock and eight partridge; 39, four 

 woodcock and eleven partridge: 30, one woodcock and 

 thirty-one partridge. Total for eleven shooting dayB of 

 nineteen woodcock and one hundred and forty-six par- 

 tridge. B, 



