April 13, 1895. 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
289 
trout fishing during the past ten days, have found it 
rather difficult to keep up a high degree of enthusiasm 
in the face of the raw and chilly weather they have ex- 
perienced. The Cape, as usual, has been the favorite 
stamping ground for this early sport. Mr. John Caswell 
Spent a couple of days fishing in that vicinity, and came 
home with a nice mess. J. A. Littleton and friend tried 
the Big Nickerson Bog at Mashpee with very good suc- 
cess, Another party who control one and one-half miles 
of Scrotan brook, near Sandwich, and also some good 
marsh fishing in that vicinity, felt quite well rewarded 
with the results of their trip, much better in fact than 
with the weather they experienced, which they described 
as pretty uncomfortable. One enthusiast whom I have 
talked with was fishing from a very small, cranky boat, 
and having hooked a big fellow, forgot his caution, and 
as a result was tipped out head first into the ice cold 
water up to his armpits. Although a fisherman for many 
years, he ne^er had an accident before, and strange to 
say, is suffering no ill effects, but is decidedly against 
repeating the performance. 
Trolling tackle for use in the big lakes after the ice 
moves out is now being looked over, and the tackle houses 
are all quite busy with this x>articular branch of the trade. 
Reports from Newfound and Minnedasaukee lakes in New 
Hampshire are rather discouraging at present. During 
the last days of March the thermometers in that vicinity 
registered down to twelve degrees above zero, and wagons 
were rolling over the ice in every direction at Wolfboro 
and Centre Harbor. Sebago and the Rangeleys, in Maine, 
are also strongly encased in ice fetters. In spite of this, 
many people predict the earliest season in years, each one 
basing his belief on different grounds. Hackle. 
Do Fish Talk? 
Your editorial on the "Senses of Fish" is interesting, 
> and though much is known in connection therewith, 
still there is sufficient mystery about their life under the 
water to afford wide margin for speculation. I have 
heard "fish stories," and have personally witnessed 
strange things while in pursuit of them, but it seemeth 
better to me that' others should spin the yarns, being bet- 
ter posted piscatorily than myself. I am tempted, how- 
ever, by your editorial, to add my mite relative to the con- 
versational powers of fish. 
In May last, while anchored off the mouth of Seal 
Creek, one of the numerous branches connecting the Vir- 
ginia broad waters, we were much interested in listening 
( to the voicas of the fish, as they passed with the flood 
tide. While in the cabin during the day, or at night in 
j stormy weather, we never heard them. But after sun- 
\ set, when all was calm and we were seated about the 
table, the sounds were often sufficient to make them- 
selves heard above the continuous cackling din of the 
marsh hen that vibrated over the meadows. To me it 
wf.s uncanny to hear these mysterious tones, sounding 
di-ectly under our feet. 
They seemed to pass in schools, slowly, as though tak- 
ing their time; we could hear them approach from for- 
ward, creak! creak! creakity! c-r-r-eakity! they sang, as 
they passed below. Now and again a distinct grunt 
would be prominent among the creakity! creaks! then 
from afar a drum would sound his note: Br-r-oom! now 
deep and resonant, now subdued, and quickly the answer- 
ing br-room! br-oom! was heard on either side the yacht, 
as the finny host passed on. The smaller squeaks and 
creaks were incessant, continually m evidence, like the 
song of crickets in August. The heavier tones of the 
drum and other fish being mere incidents in the proces- 
sion. 
I tried faithfully on two occasions to induce them to 
investigate my tempting lures, sitting patiently on deck 
for an hour at a time and changing bait often in the hope 
of finally suiting their appetite, but in vain. 
I could plainly hear the drum sound as I sat there in 
the moonlight, but the marsh cries filling the air on 
every hand vere sufficient to drown the otlier voices. At 
first these "siren songs" were exceedingly interesting; to 
me, but when the novelty bad worn away, I found them 
very annoying. Often I have left my state-room, after 
turning in for the night, and gone on deck for a little 
time with my pipe. There, I knew what manner of bird 
or beast it was that voiced its wild nature. The yap! 
yap! of a prowling fox, the salty, gutteral laugh of the 
gulf gull, or skimmer, as he swept by on noiseless wing, 
to show for an instant only, as he swung across the shim- 
mer of moonlight that bridged the inky blackness astern. 
All these I love to hear as I sit on deck on quiet nights, 
but down below, those grunting fish! Ugh! 
WlLMOT TOWNSEND. 
A Note from Dr. Kingfisher. 
EM' or Fo.esl and Stream: 
When a hunter gets "rattled" while waiting and ex- 
pecting the appearance of big game — or small for that 
matter — or when the game comes to view unexpectedly 
and he begins to quake and shake so that he can't hold 
his gun onto a haystack, or a "flock o' barns," why will 
every writer, including the editor of Forest and Stream, 
persist in calling this state of the nerves "buck fever?" 
when every fledgeling M. D. and drug store cub knows 
that one don't "quake" nor "shake" while the ague is 
on, but only while the chill lasts: while the fever is 
shaking the marrow loose in your bones, and your teeth 
are chattering like a king-fisher windin' up his reel with 
the. click on. 
Don't throw us into a fever, when this is no fever. Call 
it by the name our fathers used before us. "buck ager," 
or to be precise, "buck ague." 
Next, with an attack of "buck fever." 
Cincinnati. Kingfisher. 
Salmon Fishing For Sale. 
Freehold; on the heat fishing waters of the Southwest Mirimichi 
River (Burnt Hill). For terms and particulars apply to Thomas 
J. Conroy, 310 Broadway, New York City.— Adv. 
CHAINED 
to Business? 
Can't go Shooting? 
Do the next best thing- 
Read the 
Forest and Stream* 
hnie mid Jfis// Qrofwtwn. 
New York Spring Shooting. 
The Fuller bill, allowing spring duck shooting, has become a 
law. It extends the open season to May 1. 
An Oswego correspondent writes: "The local sportsmen are 
delighted over the change in the duck season, which allows them 
to shoot until May 1st, instead of March. 1st, as formerly. The 
ducks are quite plentiful in the lake and numbers have been 
killed." 
Of course they are delighted; but it is just such satisfaction 
as the child feels who roots up the planted seed and finds that it 
has sprouted. The mature view of the subject given in these 
notes by Mr. Geo. R. Feck, of the Auburn Advertiser, who 
writes: "A friend of mine, who is supervisor of one of the best 
ways in the city, although not one of the most progressive 
wards, said to me yesterday : 'George, 1 bought a pair of black 
ducks yesterday for fifty cents, and the man of whom I bought 
the pair said they would not have nested here.' 
"I cant't say whether this particular pair of black ducks 
would have nested here or not, but I do know that thirty black 
ducks were raised in Canoga marshes last year, which was the 
second year of a short spring season — the season closing March 
1— and some were raised down the river. Teal ducks nest in 
this section and so do wood ducks. Why, wood ducks have 
nested in the inlet of Owasco Lake and been killed early in 
August before the season opened and before the ducks were 
hardly able to fly. 
"The gentlemanly sportsman (?) who sold my friend a pair 
of black ducks, probably never did anything to encourage a 
pair of black ducks to nest and raise young in this section. I 
wonder if he ever even thought that a pair of ducks getting 
ready to raise young needed protection and his encourage- 
ment! I doubt if he ever looked at it in that light. In the fall, 
after the ducks are raised and ready to take care of themselves 1 
blame no one for shooting them or game of any kind. It is the 
time to kill the game and fish and the time to eat them. It is 
the privilege that the law of nature has conferred upon man. 
But because nature has given man a game to be killed in the 
season, it does not follow that nature gave man the privilege of 
butchering game in the mating and in the procreating season. 
"The other day two men caught a female pickerel in Cayuga 
Lake which weighed nineteen pounds. When they dressed her 
they found five pounds of row in her. A few days afterwards 
William Ferree brought one to Auburn and hung it in front of 
a fishing rod and tackle store. She weighed twenty-thrpe 
pounds, and probably contained six pounds of roe. The fish 
ought never to have been shown, least of all to the multitude, 
from the front of a fishing rod store, and the proprietor did not 
permit the fish to remain there long. The pickerel were prob- 
ably caught off their laying beds. A hook is dropped on a bed 
and the fish in removing it gets caught. It is the way to 
destroy 30,000 eggs, and like duck shooting in the spring, it is 
just as bad. 
" When the sportsmen of the country take up in dead earnest 
the defense an 1 protection of the females of game and fish to 
procreate, then game and fish will increase and multiply." 
New Hampshire Legislation. 
Manchester, 1ST. IT., April 5, 1895.— Editor Forest and Stream: 
The Legislature of this'State has adjourned, much to the relief 
of the people in general, bub no class has reason to be more 
grateful than the sportsmen, as each hour of the two last weeks 
of the session brought rumors of a coming storm that seriously 
jeopardized the interest of hunter and fisherman. The sourcB 
of the danger was the farmer element, which desired to do away 
with laws that restrict them from doing whatever they wish 
with fish and game found on their land, at any time of year, 
brought about in part, I presume, by the habit of grouse bud- 
ding apple trees, assisted materially by a desire to lawfully 
snare various kinds of game. The promoters of the mis- 
chievous bills had sympathizers among non-agriculturists; men 
who neither knew nor cared for anything connected with the 
question, but liked to curry favor with the few selfish and 
short-sighted land owners. As far as the House of Representa- 
tives was concerned, they would have succeeded in their 
wicked endeavors, but the consideration and greater wisdom of 
the Senate killed the iniquitous bills, as they came from the 
lower branch. Little respect has ever been paid to the fish aud 
game laws by the advocates of the defunct bills, yet to have 
taken down all bars, which was the practical effect of the legis- 
lation the destructionists desired, would havn been deplorable. 
As finally settled, thanks to the Senate's firm and sensible 
stand, the changes made in the laws were few and not detri- 
mental to sportsmen, but mostly of a highly commendable 
character. 
These changes consisted of asking for a report from the Fish 
and Game Commissioners each alternate year, instead of annu- 
ally. Extending the open season on d a er, caribou, and moose 
from Nov. 1 to Nov. 15, and prohibiting them with dogs at any 
time, under heavy penalty, and the summary disposition of 
dogs so engaged by Game Wardens. The season on woodcock, 
ruffed grouse, partridge and quail was shortened by changing 
the opening from Sept. 1 to Sept. 15. The open season on lake 
and brook trout was shortened two weeks on each end, causing 
it to begin May 1 and to close on Sept. 1. They prohibited the 
killing or having in possession passenger pigeons and turtle 
doves until the first day of August, 1898. They appropriated 
$500 for the importation of foreign game birds, and care of 
native varieties. They passed a joint resolution to stop the 
depositing of sawdust and shavings in several ponds and 
streams. Appropriated $500 for an addition to the Cole brook 
fish hatchery." Authorized the Governor and Council to end the 
joint tenancy between Massachusetts and this State, in the 
Plymouth fish hatchery. They prohibited, for four years, 
fishiug through the ice in twenty-live ponds and lakes in vari- 
ous towns, and all ponds in the towns of Croydon, Grantham, 
and Washington; they also stopped fishing at all times during 
the coming five years, in streams emptying into Dan Hole pond 
in the towns of Tuf tonborough and Ossipee. 
The sportsmen of the State are not exulting over the few 
good points they gained, nor mourniDg for the many they 
hoped to secure that were really necessary, so much as they are 
congratulating themselves upon the evils they more or less 
narrowly escaped, and^though they are not borrowing trouble, 
so far as I kwow,' profiting by recent experiences, they should 
recognize the fact that their forces in future legislatures must 
be awake, or field sports in this State will suffer by the turning 
down of good, if imperfect, regulations. Meantime the motto 
of the New Hampshire sportsman, during the next two years 
should be, "Enforce existing laws." 
At a meeting of the Hillsborough Co. Game and Protective 
Association, the 2d inst., the President, Mayor William C. 
Clarke, declining a re-election, the Secretary, Mr. Charles J. 
Darrak, was elected to that position, and Mr. Fred. Thurston, 
Secretary and Treasurer. PAYSON. 
A Minnesota Association- 
St. Paul, Minn., April 3.— Editor Forest and Stream: A 
meeting was held last night to form the Voluntary Game and 
Fish Protective Association of Minnesota, as an auxiliary to 
the State Game and Fish Commission. 
The following committee was named: 
For Minneapolis -F. F. Davis. C. S. Brackett, Wm. L. Wol- 
ford, W. L. Bigelow, W. P. Andrus, James Griffin. 
For St. Paul— Uri L. .Lamprey, Dr. C. A. Wheaton, H. B, 
Goodenow, Wm. L. Tucker, Crawford Livingston, R. W, 
Matthews, 
lor the State at Large— C. N. Nelson, Stillwater; O. Mc- 
Farland, Dalton; J. H. "Claggett, Montevideo; L. Z. Rogers, 
Waterville, H. B. Griffin, Buffalo. 
A call for a general State meeting was agreed upon for May. 
15 at Minneapolis and the following general letter was ordered 
to be printed and sent out by the secretary : 
"Dear Sir— At a recent meeting of a number of gentlemen 
interested in the subject of preservation and protection of game 
and fish in Minnesota, recognizing that these natural resources 
constitute a large food supply for the use of our citizens, it was 
resolved to support a movement for a voluntary State Game 
and Fish Protective Association, as an auxiliary to the consti- 
tuted Minnesota Game and Fish Commission; to assist in the 
further preservation, protection and propagation of these im- 
mense interests, and to render such aid to the State Commis- 
sion in restraining and prohibiting violations of the laws made 
for the protection of these bounties of nature as the conditions 
require, and we are in a position to offer. 
"Previous to this letter this subject has been discussed in the 
columns of the Pioneer Press, Minneapolis Times, and Forest 
and Stream; also a number of gentlemen interested in this 
matter in the State, have been communicated with as regards 
the necessity of such a voluntary association and as to the good 
we might accomplish. The idea has met with a hearty ap- 
proval from all quarters, and the indorsement of our State 
Board of Game and Fish Commissioners. 
"In accordance with the general interest that has been mani- 
fested, the present committee has been formed to open up a 
general correspondence, that we may soon have a permanent 
and working organization to assist in preserving, protecting 
and propagating the great natural food supply of our State. 
Upon no consideration will it be allowed to become of a sec- 
tional character, or operate to the advantage of a peculiar 
class of persons. Farmer and townsman, club and individual, 
will work side by side in pure, unselfish effort in a public wort, 
for the public good. 
"You have no doubt observed during late years that the 
game and fish reserves of Minnesota are fast becoming depleted 
through the indiscriminate hunting and fishing, both in and out 
of season. Naturally, there are cases which the State Board 
does not become acquainted with, though where they do, they 
vigorously prosecute. 
"We will be perfectly voluntary in character, without salary 
to any officer; and with a membership fee of not more than $1 
yearly we should enlist the support of a very large number of 
geutlernen of like tastes. The game resources of Minnesota are 
worthy of the effort. We can be of much service in effecting 
additional legislation. There is a growing sentiment among 
sportsmen of the whole country that laws should be passed 
prohibiting the sale of game. 
"Recognizing you as a gentleman liberal in your views on 
this subject, we make this a personal request to give us your 
good will and assistance in forming a permanent organization; 
and for this purpose kindly consider this an invitation to be 
present at a State meeting called for May 15, to be held in 
Minneapolis, that we may organize and adopt a suitable consti- 
tution and by-laws and thus perfect the organization." 
For Shis purpose all friends of the movement are requested 
to send in all names of clubs and individuals, that they may be 
communicated with. 
"Mr. Lamprey presided at the meeting. Mr. Tucker, who in 
the first instance started the movement, spoke as follows : 
"Gentlemen— In calling your attention to the fact that an 
effort to form a protective game and fish association was being 
made, the purposes of which were outlined to you in a circular 
letter, we wished to see what the sentiment among representa- 
tive sportsmen and citizens of the State on the subject of a 
good protective system of game laws really was. Responses 
that have come in are very gratifying to us, and show a healthy 
and solicitous regard for the game interests of the State and a 
willingness for co-operation. We cannot fail to see that these 
interests have been by many per cent, benefited by the work 
that has been done by the State Game and Fish Commission 
since its organization. Valuable as these reports have been, 
we also cannot be insensible to the fact that much yet remains 
to be done that can be done, and can readily recognize the 
necessity for a general movement by all classes of citizens 
Interested in this subject to extend a helping hand to the 
State Commission, the members of which I must say to you 
have been and are ready at all times to encourage any effort in 
this direction and will very gladly accept our co-operation. I 
very much regret to notice by the annual report submitted to 
the Governor recently, that during the year just closed no 
organized gun club in the State has proffered the assistance to 
the commission that they have so earnestly desired and that 
thev were so willing to receive. 
"By this same report you will notice the general decrease of 
exportation of game; the saving of $25,00C as the value of the 
venison product that has been kept within the State during the 
year; the valuable increase that the fish supply of our lakes and 
streams has received; that our present game laws have been 
sustained by the Supreme Court on all points brought up for 
its decision; of the large per cent, of convictions that have been 
secured, and of the confiscation of large amounts of pot 
hunter's paraphernalia. The game laws of Minnesota are 
recognized by our sister States as the best fish and game laws 
in existence in this country. 
"This state of facts indicates, conclusively to our minds, that 
the citizens generally are awakening to the fact that the sub- 
ject of game represents more than the one pleasure of hunting 
it. It is a great food supply, in its season. The once very 
prevalent opinion among many people that game laws are class 
laws is giving way to a more enlightened consideration of the 
subject. In rural districts this notion to some extent exists. 
Again I would direct your attention to why this is so. In many 
instances a proper regard has not been shown to the farmer's 
rights. We have invaded his property, without leave or 
license, at times abusing the'courtesies he has shown, until the 
name of city gunner is to him a synonym of a finely polished 
rascal. Now, the farmer is in reality one of our best protec- 
tors and propagators of game. It is his fields and his woods 
that sustain game life, and in which our game is found; not in 
the streets of a bustling town or city. 
"And now, gentlemen, in veiw of all these facts, it seems 
very proper to ask you to assist in forming a game and fish 
protective association that will be a valuable auxiliary to the 
constituted State Commission. By the organization of an 
association of the character that has been outlined to you, these 
facts present themselves for our consideration: We would give 
a good moral support to the State game laws; we would assist 
in their enforcement, and the protection and further propaga- 
tion of game where practicable. When we should have on 
hand more funds that is needed for actual expenses, to purchase 
and turn loose in the State any game we may acquire; to keep 
up the natural feeding grounds of game birds and ducks, plant- 
ing waste lands in favored localities with celery and other food; 
to°oveTcome the antagonism and to cultivate the good will of 
the farmer element of which I have spoken; and to co-operate 
with associations of neighboring States, that we may influence 
legislation to the extent that the shooting and fishing seasons 
open and close at the same time in these States. 
"There can be no better time than the present to form and 
put in motion a game and fish protective association that may 
long exist, the value of which mav be noted as year succeeds to 
year, and it will be a pleasing memory to us to know that our- 
selves laid the cornerstone. It is no scheme for personal ag- 
grandizement. It is to be a popular movement in behalf of a 
popular subject. So you have been asked to come here to- 
night to form an organization committee, that we may open up 
correspondence with gentlemen of like tastes throughout the 
State and at the proper time to form a permanent organiza- 
tion." 
After other addresses the following resolutions were adopted 
