Forest and Stream. 



A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gur 



Terms, S4 a Year. 10 Cts. a Copy. ) 



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NEW YORK, DECEMBER 28, 1890. 



j VOL. XXXV.-No. 23. 



j No. 318 Broadway, New York. 



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CONTENTS. 



Editorial. 



Maine Fish and Game. 



Protection of Pickerel. 



Snap Shots. 

 Sportsman Tourist. 



A Winter in Michigan.— m. 



Cowbiy Reminiscences. 



The Winter Camp-Fire. 



Over the Old Squirrel Route. 

 Natural History. 



Snowy Owls. 



The Porcupine. 



Notes on Woodcock. 



The Woodcock's Whistle. 

 Game Bag and Gun. 



Loading Shotguns. 



Chicago and the West. 



Wild Turkeys in the Overflow. 



October 18. 



More About Sights. 



Game in Newfoundland. 



The All- Around Gun. 



Holding on Game. 



Massachusetts Game and Law 



Game Notes. 

 Camp-Fire Fmcke rings. 

 Sea and River Fishing. 



Fishing in the Lower Potomac. 



Indian Bass Fishing. 



Rod, Line and Hook in 

 Jamaica. 



A Fishing Trip to the Island. 



Angling Notes. 



Sea and River Fishing. 



•Susquehanna River Fishing. 



Those Sunapee Trout Again. 

 Ftshculture. 



Hatching Blueback Salmon. 

 The Kennel. 



Central Field Trials. 



Philadelphia Kennel Club's 

 Field Trials. 



Cocker Spaniels of 1890. 



Dog Chat. 



Hamilton Kennel Club. 



A Little Dog Show. 



Red Cockers. 



New St. Bernards. 



Kennel Notes. 



Kennel Management. 

 Rifle and Trap Shooting 



Range and Gallery. 



The Trap. 



Chicago Trap. 



Kansas City Trap Events. 

 Yachting. 



Paid Time Keepers in the Lake 

 Y. R. A. 



The Two Deeds of Gift. 



A Plan for a Markboat. 



The Wreck of the Urania. 

 Canoeing. 



Canuck. 



Reminiscent— A. C. A. 1890. 

 Toronto C. C. 

 Answers to Correspondents. 



MAINE FISH AND GAME. 



JUST as we go to press we are in receipt of the report 

 of the Maine Commissioners of Fisheries and Game 

 for the years 1889-90. With respect to the fish supply 

 the report makes a favorable showing; notwithstanding 

 the large increase of anglers visiting the State, say 

 Messrs. Stilwell and Stanley, the fish have generally held 

 their own, and many localities show a decided increase 

 both in size and numbers— a condition due not alone to 

 the favorable stage of water during the past two seasons, 

 but to a more general appreciation and observance of the 

 protective statutes, and to the practice of returning fin- 

 gerlings to the water. The Commissioners touch upon a 

 very important phase of the subject when they point out 

 that good fishing means increasing tourist patronage, 

 better market for home produce, and many-sided revenue 

 to Maine people. 



That which is perhaps most worthy of note in connec- 

 tion with the fish and game interests of Maine is the 

 growing tendency of individuals to unite in associations 

 for organized systematic effort toward keeping up the 

 supply at the great angling centers. We have already 

 noted with warm appreciation the plan and work of the 

 Franklin County Association with headquarters at Range- 

 ley; the report makes record of this organization and its 

 work, as well as of the one formed at Lewiston and 

 Auburn, which has raised a fund of $1,000 to build a 

 hatchery for stocking Auburn Lake. Those who are 

 familiar with the conditions at the Rangeley outlet, will 

 applaud the public-spirited enterprise of two gentlemen 

 from other States who have rescued the famous spawn- 

 ing grounds at that point. 



Fred S. Dickson, Esq., a gentleman from Philadelphia, who 

 owns and spends his summers with his family, on a beautifu^ 

 island in Rangeley lake, and Capt. R. A. Tuttle of Boston, an 

 owner in Lake Point cottage, have at their own expense, leased 

 the dam of the Union Water Power Company at Rangeley outlet 

 for the purpose of controlling the old hatching ground at that 



place and to so govern the water that it wUl be favorable for the 

 fish to spawn as they did before the dam was built. Also to 

 arrange a series of dams that the fish can have a free passage 

 from, or to the lakes below. This was formerly one of the best 

 breeding grounds for large trout in that vicinity, which was 

 ruined when the dam was built. 



With this brief notice, we must defer, to be given next- 

 week in our fishculture columns, a more detailed notice 

 of the work of the Commission, 



In that part of the report devoted to game interests, 

 there is substantial confirmation of the report given in 

 the Foeest and Stream the other day of the lawlessness 

 prevailing in certain sections of Maine with respect to 

 the killing of deer. This game, the Commissioners tell 

 us, is far more abundant than ever before, and those who 

 have been in the Maine woods this year will fully bear 

 them out in the statement. Never, within the memory 

 of residents and visitors, have the deer been so numerous. 

 With this increase of the supply, there has grown up in 

 certain localities absolute indifference to the law and de- 

 fiance of it. All through last summer and into the au- 

 tumn — we are not now drawing information from the 

 report — hounding and jack-hunting were practiced, in 

 most instances we have reason to believe for the benefit 

 of visitors repairing to Maine for trout — and venison. 

 The number of deer so killed, carcasses accidentally 

 stumbled upon by a single fishing party would indicate, 

 in the aggregate must have been large. Whether or 

 not such destruction has had an appreciable effect on the 

 supply may be a subject of debate: but there is not the 

 slightest question that if hounding and jacking are to be 

 carried on in the future as they have been in the year 

 1890 the effect must be disastrous. 



The reason for such unrestrained license is set forth by 

 the Commissioners to be the want of an appropriation for 

 the wardens. Without means to enlist the services of 

 trustworthy and efficient officers, in short without any 

 funds at all to employ officers, the Commission was 

 powerless to enforce the statute when public opinion 

 failed. The responsibility for the present state of affairs, 

 then, rests with the Legislature. We trust that the 

 representatives of the people at Augusta do not fairly ex- 

 press the public sentiment of the State. Maine can never 

 expect to conserve her fish and game resources without 

 a competent warden system. There is sound sense in the 

 recommendation of the Commissioners. Our laws are 

 good, say they, but if they can be improved change them; 

 then give us the means to see that they are carried out. 



Skin hunting, which is destined to destroy the finest game 

 animals of Maine, can be readily put to an end, if our Legislature 

 will only give us the means. It is not the restoration of the 

 moiety of the money penalties for infractions of the game laws to 

 the wardens that we ask for. But it is that they will give us the 

 means to hire good and faithful men as wardens; to pay them 

 fair per diem wages when ordered on duty, and a bounty for all 

 convictions. Twenty such men sent into the forests in certain 

 sections of our State in March and April would effectually sup- 

 press skin and crust hunting. The skins and property seized 

 should be forfeited to the State. Let the pay be generous, and 

 fair, and proportioned to the duty, and the bounty for convictions 

 equally so, and deserving of the State that pays it to honest and 

 deserving citizens. A few such men could patrol the State the 

 whole year, and cost less than an army of men who fear to offend 

 when assigned to duty near their own homes. These men would 

 be unknown to sight where stationed, and could not be followed 

 or watched. No one interest has our State that pours into her 

 ]np so large an income, and one that is shared by all, as our fish 

 and game; not accumulated into the pockets of one to be spent in 

 other States or climes, but dividing its portion to every home- 

 Give us the means to enforce the laws and protect it. 



The Commissioners urge that September be made an 

 open month for moose, caribou and deer; that the prin- 

 ciple involved in the fish law limiting the amount of 

 fish— transported by one who has caught them— be ex- 

 tended to apply to every species of game; that the law 

 against spoons for catching fish be repealed; that the law 

 respecting posting notices on streams and ponds protected 

 by special laws be changed to apply only to private 

 waters; that a bounty be paid on seals; that a law be 

 passed to protect young salmon, thousands of which are 

 now destroyed on the boarded floors of weirs that are left 

 dry at high tide. 



As was to be expected, Mr. Trumbull's paper on the 

 woodcock and its ways has been read with decided in- 

 terest. Further notes on the bird are given in our Natural 

 History columns to-day, the most notable contribution 

 being from the pen of Mr. William Brewster, who is 

 unconvinced by Mr. Trumbull's records [respecting the 

 bird's whistle, 



PROTECTION OF PICKEREL. 



\ MOVEMENT is now reported to be in progress in 

 northwestern Pennsylvania to accomplish the repeal 

 of the Act of May 22, 1889 ; so far as relates to the catching 

 of pickerel from Dec. 1 to June 1. The portion of Sec. 4 

 of this Act directly involved in the controversy reads as 

 follows: 'And no person shall by any means or device 

 whatsoever catch or kill, in any of the waters of this 

 State, any pike or pickerel between the first day of 

 December and the first day of June in any year. Any 

 violation of this section shall subject the offender to a 

 penalty of ten dollars for each and every fish caught.'* 

 (Book of the Game Laws, 148.) 



The law is obnoxious to some residents of the region 

 mentioned because they are deprived of the opportunity 

 of enjoying fresh pickerel during the winter, when they 

 most enjoy fish food and have leisure for fishing, and 

 because they believe the legislation to be wholly in the 

 interest of the summer visitors. It is admitted that the 

 law was enacted "ostensibly" to protect the fish; but the 

 complainants are positive that pickerel need no such pro- 

 tection, and, to use the outspoken language of a Mont- 

 rose newspaper, "the man or boy who catches a half- 

 dozen two-pound pickerel from a lake this winter does 

 more toward stocking that lake than does the man who 

 next spring dumps into it a can of 5,000 young fry 

 furnished by the State." 



Has it occurred to these opponents of the pickerel 

 legislation that this period of protection is intended to 

 cover the spawning season of this common fish, so highly 

 prized by the farmers and their boys and so little thought 

 of by the summer visitors to northeastern Pennsylvania? 

 Are the objectors to this close time not aware that several 

 really valuable food fishes, such as black bass, wall-eyed 

 pike, brook trout, lake trout, and other members of the 

 salmon family, are liable to capture in winter under pre- 

 tense of fishing for pickerel? We can see the application 

 of most commendable common sense in any measure 

 looking toward the protection of fishes during their repro- 

 duction, and, unless some better reason is advanced for 

 repealing the section than the one mentioned above, we 

 hope the law will remain in force. 



SNAP SHOTS. 



UNIFORM game seasons are excellent in theory, but it 

 sometimes happens that uniformity is secured at 

 the expense of reasonable protection. The Massachusetts 

 sportsmen had a notion last winter that an uniform sea- 

 son for all upland shootiDg would work advantageously;, 

 but it proved impracticable to open the season later than 

 Sept. 15. As this applied to quail the result was that the 

 birds were shot long before they were in fit condition, 

 and in consequence everybody was disgusted. Now, the 

 proposition is to change the opening day to Oct. 1. That 

 is better for the quail by fifteen days; but another fifteen 

 days would not bring the opening at all too late. A 

 movement is under consideration for making uniform 

 game seasons for New England. The plan is an excellent 

 one; there is no reason why Massachusett, Rhode Island 

 and Connecticut at least should not be governed by sim- 

 ilar game laws. We have always believed in and urged 

 the uniformity of game laws for contiguous States which 

 are in practically the same latitude. 



It is not always the man who spends the most money 

 and goes furthest away from home who finds the most 

 fun with a gun. We have repeatedly urged the common 

 sense methods of stocking home covers and enforcing 

 laws for the conservation of home game and fish. Such 

 efforts may cost money, but there is often more profit 

 in them than in expensive journeys to distant game 

 grounds, which some people seem to think are more rich 

 in game the more distant they are. 



There will probably be a creditable display of Ameri- 

 ca's fish resources at the World's Fair in Chicago, The 

 New York Commission has been in conference with other 

 Commissioners, and there is every promise that an excel- 

 lent showing will be made. 



Secretary John W. Titcomb, of the Vermont Fish and 

 Game League, reports that the new society is meeting de- 

 cided approval, and gives promise of a decided influence 

 in the future. 



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