138 
RAMBLES IN NORTHERN MICHIGAN. 
Lapsing. Mich., June 1. — The "Saginaw (Crowd," on 
their annual big-game hunt to the far West, for a down- 
right good time, "takes the cake" always; but there are 
so many pleasant places and so much of real sport right 
at our own door that very few of those who annually 
spend a few days in the woods feel that it is necessary to 
go all the way to Montana for a really enjoyable outing. 
I met Mr. A. H. Whitehead when be had just returned 
from his goose shooting trip to Dakota, and as he had 
been very successful with the ducks and geese he felt just 
a little mellow, and as I had not had a visit with him in 
a long while, I got him to tell me of his trip last fall down 
the Tittabawasse. 
Mr. Whitehead and Mr. E. F. Cootey, president of the 
Michigan Supply Co., left Lansing the evening of the first 
day of November. At Bay City they were joined by Mr. 
Bob Birney, the drug man, and Mr. John O'Hare, the 
champion boot and shoe man of the great Saginaw 
"Valley. In the morning the party started for Summit, a 
backwoods station on the M. C. R. R. , about sixty miles 
north of Bay City. By a previous arrangement a team 
was in waiting for them, and the outfit, consisting of two 
boats, one 20x16 tent, guns, sporting implements, and 
the necessary grub and camp supplif s was piled upon the 
big wagon, and the whole caravan started for the main 
branch of the Tittabawasse, about nine miles away. They 
arrived at the river about 3 o'clock, found the water very 
low, much lower than usual; and after loading the boats 
they found they had more than they had bargained for 
to get them down the river. The team was sent back and 
the journey down river began in earnest. The small boat 
went along quite well, but the big clinker-built one with 
the camp equipage and heavy luggage had to be pulled 
or pushed most of the way. 
They trudged along as they supposed for about five 
miles, when it grew quite dark, and by good luck they 
landed upon a beautiful grassy point of land, with a nice 
spring of water not ten feet from the bank of the river, 
and a great plenty of good wood close at hand. They 
pushed the boat up to the bank, unloaded them, pitched 
the tents, built a fire, made some coffee, broiled the part- 
ridges that they shot on the way down, and with the 
canned goods managed to make out quite a supper. After 
supper they gathered a big lot of cedar boughs and made 
a bed about a foot thick by spreading the boughs Upon 
the ground. They lit their pipes, lay down upon the 
boughs and spent the evening talking of the day's tramp 
and trying to find an easy spot for their lame backs, and 
doing a little something to ease their blistered hands. 
This, the first camp, they called Camp Birney. 
The next morning the whole camp turned out bright 
and early, and before sun-up breakfast had been disposed 
of, the tents taken down and the camp equipage all 
packed. The day before had given them all quite a bit 
of experience in river boating, so they concluded to get a 
mossback to take the boats and luggage down the river 
about ten miles, for it did not take half an eye to see a 
big day's work and a dreadful hard tramp ahead of them. 
The first settler that they ran across was too busy to leave 
his work, the second for a like reason could not help them 
out, and there being no other team in that neighborhood 
he could not direct them to any one who wanted to earn 
ten dollars in solid coin, even in these hard times. ♦ The 
river was crooked, and they had walked a long dis- 
tance, but they found that they were only about half a 
mile from their camp of the night before. They got to- 
gether again, and as there was no other way out of the 
scrape, they had to try the old way, and push and pull the 
boats along as they had done the day before. The journey 
began, and the old sores and lame backs began to yell out 
in great shape, but by lifting up a collar, like the harness 
on a canal mule, so that the load might rest on a new 
spot, they all began to get limbered up, and after a while 
they could work together quite nicely, but they were an 
awfully lame lot of ducks. Down the river they found 
the water a little deeper. They shot several ruffed grouse 
on their way down, clubbed some stone rollers in the 
rapids, and about noon called a halt and had their lunch. 
By the river they bad gone about five miles, but as the 
crow would fly, about two miles. Lunch over they re- 
sumed their journey, and after going about a mile they 
found a squatter, or mossback, as they are called in that 
section, and by hard talking and a liberal advance of coin, 
persuaded the old fellow to take the luggage and camp 
plunder on his cart, down the river for about five miles. 
The boats, lightened of the cargoes, floated along nicely, 
and after wading the river most of the way thus far, and 
having pulled the boats after them, you my judge that 
they greatly enjoyed the change. Two of them went 
down with the boats, and the others followed along 
behind the settler with the cart and luggage. When the 
boats reached the bend in the river where the cart was to 
stop they found the overland party at a beautiful camping 
place, with tents all up, supper cooked, and as the water 
was getting deeper, and the day had been one of a typical 
Indian summer, things began to look brighter. 
At this camping place they were so comfortably situ- 
ated that they concluded to remain for a few days. The 
deer season would not open till the fifth. The sandbars 
on the river and the runways on the banks of the river 
and in the bush back from the river, were well tracked by 
deer, and as the tracks all appeared to be fresh ones, the 
prospects for killing plenty of deer were way out of sight. 
The day was spent m grouse shooting. They found plenty 
in almost any direction from camp. Some thickets 
would contain twenty or thirty great big nice fellows, the 
largest that they had ever seen. Mr. Birney had brought 
along, his two spaniels. They could tree more partridges 
than any two dogs in Michigan, but Mr. Birney had so 
neglected their education that when the birds came down 
the two dogs would break away and rushing upon the 
birds they would each grab hold, and by vigorous pulling 
and hauling would most generally divide the plunder 
between them before the shooter could get to them. The 
dogs got punished enough to kill a wolf, but it was no go; 
they just continued to pull all the birds apart they could 
get hold of during the trip. 
The camp now located was near the east branch of the 
TittabawasBe, and what is known in that country as a 
tote road ran along the bank of the river, on the brow of 
the hill just back of the camp, During the day several 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
teams with big wagons loaded with camps and camp sup- 
plies, and followed by men and dogs, passed along the 
tote road looking for a favorable location to make camp 
and be ready for the deer slaughter which would open the 
-fifth. 
They remained in camp for two days, spending the 
time in grouse shooting, healing the blisters on their 
hands and getting the sore spots out of their spines. The 
morning of the fifth day they broke camp and started for 
a great deer range well known to Mr. Birney about ten 
miles down the rivers, this being one of his old hunting 
grounds. They stowed the luggage on the boats and 
made the start. Mr. O'Hare, having his Irish setter dog 
with him, concluded that he would follow the tote road 
and get a few birds for dinner. He had been gone but a 
few moments when his 10-bore was heard to speak o"t with 
both barrels, as Cooley and Birney said, "with powder 
enough to kill a bear, as he had loads of No. 6 shot, to 
blow any birds in the woods clear out of Michigan." He 
soon put in his appearance, and when they shouted to 
him about missing his bird with such cannon-like loads, 
he replied that he had jumped a fine big doe near the 
river bank, that she had run past him at about three rods 
distance, and as she went he gave her both barrels of 
shot, and his setter had run up to her and chased her out 
of sight in the thick woods. Such small shot would not 
kill a deer at 40ft. and it would be all foolishness to spend 
any time looking after her. The party were hankering 
after fresh venison and looked at the matter differ- 
ently, so Mr. Birney took them back to the place where 
he had shot at the doe. They took along the two part- 
ridge dogs, and when they reached the spot they 
started on the trail with a zip. They did not run 
ten rods from the place where O'Hare had lost sight 
of the setter and the doe, before they stopped and began 
to bark vigorously, and when the men reached them they 
found the doe stone dead. The charge of shot had struck 
her just back of the foreleg, and the shot had passed clean 
through her and lodged under the skin on the opposite 
side. She was literally torn all to pieces, and had several 
ribs broken and shattered by the shot. Tb>y dragged her 
to the river, and stowing her away under the pO'>p deck, 
and taking a big drink of river water and giving three 
rousing cheers for O'Hare, they proceeded on their jour- 
ney. They felt jolly good over their luck. They killed a. 
great number of grouse that day, as the spaniels would 
jump them every few rods in the bush by the river side. 
They made a run of about fifteen miles, and went into 
camp near the west branch of the Tittabawasse. This 
camp was nicely located and called Camp Cooley. It was 
a lovely spot. With the deer hanging by the tent door, 
strings of partrides strung up in the white birch trees, 
tents up and boats pulled up <m the grassy banks, it made 
a pretty picture indeed. 
"The days were cool and crisp, both lovely and pleas- 
and," said Mr. Whitehead, "and we could eat a dozen 
good meals a day and be hungry all the time and sleep 
all the night through without a skip. Every morning 
we were posted on the runways before the stars were 
gone, as deer are on the move all night such frosty 
nights." One morning Mr. Whitehead had just reached 
his runway, when he heard a buck jump in the brush 
and make for the middle of the river. Just then a rifle 
cracked and the buck went down, shot by a hunter, one 
of the party who had pitched camp just over the hill 
back of Camp Cooley, They had started the buck, and 
knowing right where he would take to water, the hunter 
had stole the march on Mr. Whitehead and got his buck 
at the first shot. Mr. Whitehead had on his hip boots, so 
he wad ^' into the river and brought the buck to the 
shore. Hi was a big fellow, about 2501bs. , short leg, long 
body and a handsome nice specimen, with a splendid 
pair of horns, the nicest that Mr. Whitehead had ever 
seen. 
That day Mr. Cooley had been in his blind for a long 
while, and his legs getting tired he thought he would 
just stir around a little and get limbered up. He had 
gone but a few rods when he looked back, and there 
standing within 100ft of his blind stood a big buck look- 
ing right at him. The buck did not remain for Mr. Cooley 
to interview him. Mr. Cooley seldom speaks forcibly or 
hastily upon any subject without giving the matter a 
careful consideration, and on this particular occasion he 
was afraid that he could not do the subject justice, so he 
adjourned the meeting. The whole party sympathized 
with Mr. Cooley in his misfortune, but it was only one 
more evidence of the constant watchfulness and great 
and tireless patience which every deer hunter must have 
to match his hunting qualities successfully against the 
extreme watchfulness of the deer. 
They all came in early for dinner, tired and hungry. 
All had drawn a blank, and all were heartily weary of 
broiled grouse, baked beans and bacon, so they skinned 
out the deer, hanging up the saddles to take home. The 
weather was so warm that the saddles had to be well 
sprinkled with pepper to keep the flies from blowing 
tnem. They had not seen a cloud for .three days, and 
getting tired of watching runways, they all got out their 
shotguns for a round with the birds again. 
Mr. John O'Hare is one of the grandest fellows. He is 
a typical Irishman, and thinks that he has the greatest 
Irish setter on earth. The whole camp had to watch him 
or he would have fed the setter about all the supplies, to 
say nothing of the venison he stuffed into him. He in- 
sisted upon taking the setter to bed with him, quite likely 
fearing that the dog would take cold. One day they all 
started out, O'Hare, dog and all, going down the old log- 
ging road- The entire party, excepting O'Hare, got m 
about dark, each with a big bag of birds. They were as 
hungry as bears and cooked about ten pounds of venison, 
the first that they had cooked. The supper was a great 
affair and how we did enjoy it. The hours went by but 
no O'Hare appeared ; it was 9 o'clock a,nd he did not come, 
so we began to fire the signal gun, and continued to fire 
every five minutes till about 1 o'clock, when he came in, 
the most unconcerned man of the lot, and was amazed to 
think that anybody would think that he would get lost in 
the woods. We took his story for it, and when he told us 
how he had come across a camp of hunters, where he had 
been so well entertained that he never once thought that 
anybody at camp would worry about him, we laughed 
outright, and charged him up with $2 for shells fired to 
guide him back to camp. 
They remained at Camp Cooley for ten days, fishing, 
shooting lots of birds, watching the runways for deer 
and making several trips of three to five miles each 
into the surrounding country, There is a network qI 
[Aw. 18, 1894 
logging roads all through the woods. Plenty of deer 
signs are everywhere. They saw several bear tracks, 
and at one place found a big dead-fall trap and in the 
trap the skeleton of a bear. They gathered the claws 
and tusks and brought them home as relics of the hunt. 
Mr. Birney, who, of course, is expected to know every- 
thing of woods lore, explained why the bear had not 
been taken out of the trap. An old trapper had lived in 
that section for many years, and he had caught lots of 
bear and other fur-bearing animals. He had set his traps 
one fall a few years ago, but not finding game so plenty 
as in years past had gone off and left them, expecting to 
return soon, but he got into a row with some Frenchman 
and was laid out, so the traps were never locked after, 
and this trap and the bear in it had never been disturbed. 
Several other traps had been found in the woods in that 
section and all of the traps had skeletons of some kind in 
them. 
"On one of these side trips," said Mr. Whitehead, "we 
ran across a party of bee-hunters and it was quite amus- 
ing to see them work. They had some honeycomb and 
some syrup. They would burn the comb to attract the 
bees and feed them the syrup, and when the bees were 
full of syrup they would staa-t for their home, and the 
bee-hunters would line them and follow them usually to 
some big hollow tree. The party had been very success- 
ful and had great luck finding bee trees. The liners 
worked all one day burning comb, feeding the bees syrup 
and dusting the bees with flour, and changed positions 
many times before they could yet the line so that they 
could follow it. They gave us a liberal supply of excel- 
lent honey and afforded us an endless amount of 
pleasure watching them in their work. This party were 
all from Flint. At their camp they had a nice big buck 
hung up in a tree; he had a glorious pair of antlers. They 
had jumped the bunk the day before our party found their 
camp a,nd a good rifle shot brought him down. At the 
camp they also had several coon skins, and a fox or two 
had been run down. 
"A few years ago all this section of country was thickly 
covered with huge cork pine, but it is all gone now, with 
nothing but a thick growth of young trees and under- 
brush all about us — very few settlers and nothing but a 
great wilderness on every hand. There is but one 80-acre 
lot of timber now standing, and this lot looms up above 
its neighbors like a huge mountain peak. The lot is 
owned by Mr. Hall of Detroit, who seems to keep it as a 
monument of the past. The life at Camp Cooley was de- 
lightful. Our surroundings just suited us, our camp com- 
rades were jolly, jovial men, and we enjoyed every 
hour of our stay there." 
The vacation of Mr. Cooley and Mr. Whitehead had 
ended, but Mr. O'Hare, the good-natured man of the 
party, and Mr. Birney had not got enough of it yet, and 
who could blame them? 
"The weather had been pleasant, the shooting fine. 
There had been Beven deer killed almost in sight of our 
camp by a lot of hunters who came in the second day 
after we made camp on the river. When we left the 
river there were lots of camps all along the banks. Many 
had been in camp long before the season opened. It was 
a good place for a game warden, but none were there. I 
am afraid that deer shooting in that section will be poor 
for some years to come. The morning we came away we 
got up long before daylight, had a breakfast of broiled 
venison, broiled partridge, with other good things, and 
one of Cooley 's cups of strong coffee. We packed the 
canvas boat and loaded in all of the birds that we could 
find room for, and taking a saddle of venison for the 
friends at home, we bade good-bye to our good friends of 
Camp Cooley, pushing out into the river, and started Tor 
Haws Bridge, 15 miles below. 
"On our way down the river we ran into a log jam of 
over a mile long, and were obliged to back all of our 
camp equipage and boats and other luggage around the 
jam, making the hardest job we had struck in many long 
years. We got around the jam after nearly half a day's 
work, and when in sight of the village where we were to 
take the train, we had the pleasure of seeing the train pull 
out of the station and cross the river, and we were left 
over till the next day. The carry at the big jam took so 
much of our time that we missed our reckoning at all 
points. We got a good night's rest at the hotel, and the 
next night reached home greatly delighted with our two 
weeks' outing on the Tittabawasse. JULIAN. 
PROMPTED BY THE PIGEON STORY. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
It did me real good to read the burning and indignant 
words of "Didymus'' in the Forest and Stream of Aug. 
4, in condemnation of the shameful slaughter of the 
American wild pigeon, and other acts of atrocity as they 
have appeared from time to time; and it is to be hoped 
that none of your numerous readers will fail to read the 
article. 
How "F. E. S.," as in two previous numbers of the 
Forest and Stream, could in cold blood write the sick- 
ening story of his pursuit, from year to year, of the fast- 
disappearing American pigeon, with nets and guns, as 
they were seeking a secluded retreat where they might 
build their nests, lay their eggs and rear their young, is 
past comprehension. He would appear much better on 
his knees begging pardon for the grievous wrong he has 
done to the starving young birds, and also to the sportsmen 
of the present and of the future. 
As a matter of history — as to why the pigeon has be- 
come almost extinct — it was perhaps well enough; but for 
one who while confessing himself guilty of the offense, to 
speak almost boastingly of his share in the wrong done, is 
past endurance. 
I well remember seeing flocks of pigeons miles in ex- 
tent and so compact as to darken the sun, as they passed 
like a cloud over portions of Duchess county, N Y. — and 
I have to confess that, while a boy, I had some little 
share in netting some of them; but those were days of 
ignorance, for which there is some excuse. 
I am thoroughly in sympathy with your "non-market- 
shooting plank," and hope you will stick to it, as you 
have for the preservation of the National Park, and trust 
success will crown your efforts in each case. 
But market-shooting, pot-hunting, etc. , etc. , are trifles 
when compared with spring hunting! If the latter is not 
adopted, the former will soon run out, for want of game 
to hunt. 
Another sickening thing is to read that Mr. So and So 
caught so many hundred trout or bagged so many birds 
