APPENDIX 



361 



B. 



BIG-GAME REFUGES 

 (See pages 37, 378.) 



Writers in newspapers and magazines have frequently stated 

 in recent years that moose are approaching extinction, and the 

 assertions are rarely contradicted. These alarmists are gen- 

 erally unfamiliar with the subject, and they start with the 

 assumption that little effort is made to protect moose from 

 promiscuous slaughter, or take it for granted that such efforts 

 are futile. Meanwhile increasing protection has been given 

 the moose by laws regulating bag limits and hunting seasons, 

 and by the establishment of game refuges in many quarters. 

 These measures have already led to a considerable increase in 

 the number of moose in many portions of his range. 



Ex-Congressman Shiras, who has had exceptional oppor- 

 tunity to observe game conditions in many portions of the 

 [United States and Canada, expresses the opinion that the moose 

 **is now more abundant and more widely distributed on this 

 continent than at any previous period with which a comparison 

 can be made." "When I first visited Lake Superior, in 1870," 

 he writes, "moose were practically unknown on the southern 

 or northern shores of this lake, and the same was true of a 

 large area north of Lake Huron, for the larger portion of 

 western Ontario was occupied only by the caribou. Now 

 moose are present by thousands in the country north of these 

 two great lakes, and to the western end of Ontario, and they 

 are steadily increasing. 



"This increase would have been impossible were it not that 

 the food conditions have been improved ten-fold In the past 

 fifty years by cutting down the pine, and by forest fires, fol- 

 lowed by a second growth of poplar, cherry, birch, beech, 

 maple, and mountain ash, besides ground vegetation. . . . 



"Another remarkable increase of moose," says Mr. Shiraa, 



