Dec. ftxfegj FOREST AND STREAM 
got over in the road to look. We noticed one dog did 
not come over with us; went back to look, and found 
him on a stanch point. Cliff kicked up the bird, and 
killed it just ahead. After that we found a few scattering 
birds, and killed straight. At home we counted out 
an even dozen nice ones. We did not find as many 
as we expected, but the sport had been good and we 
were satisfied. Backwoods. 
Mr. Owens' Experience. 
Remsen, N. Y., Nov. 28.— Dear Mr. Edttel Forest and 
Stream: I been readin on your columns bout some five 
year or less, an I wass like special those paper on Fred 
Mather bout what he call "Men I have make fish with" 
and some nuther down in "Low down Louisiana." I 
think Mr. Mather 'wass make fish with good many fel- 
low and hunt too. Some of him prettce good fellow 
whatever. I hope he was keep able for ink dippin and 
vvritin Jus so long he can take pen in hand. 
I been live in town Remsen, quite some mile by Utica, 
N. Y. Remsen wass some kind of Yankee town now, 
but bout 50 year ago wass all settle by some of our 
father and mother what you call Welshman, but that bin 
long while now, an everybody wass talk English talk Jus 
so good like somebody I tell you. 
I bin thinkin long time how some day I wass write 
letter by you an tell bout some kind of hunt I wass have 
las year with Evan Evans by what here fellow was call 
"Jersey man preserves." They wass some three, four 
man from Jersey rent all round by Boardwell Pond, print 
up some little board and call him "preserve." I don't 
know what he call him that for, but wass firs rate place 
for shoot a woodcocks, I tell you. There wass'nt no 
fellow hunt there but Jerseyman, an when 1 goin there 
for hunt, some Yankee fellow name Bill Smith he tell me 
if I "go there for preserve I get in a pickle." I say 
"What you all while talkin bout 'pickle' and 'preserve.' 
1 wass'nt go for steal grocery store. I wass hunt a 
woodcocks." He say somethin bout Welsh, what make 
me pretty mads, so I walk way. It iss pretty good thing 
for do when you mads — walk way — you wass'nt get hurt 
so bad like you bin fightin. I always do that since I 
readin some poem bout him in "Bard Avon" what you 
wass call Shakespeare bout fellow what "Live for fight 
some Nuther day." 
Now Evan Evans he wass'nt shoot a wood cocks afore, 
an so wass I jus same Jackly. We alius been workin cut 
a corns, plowin, pick apple and fertile makin, bout a wood 
cocks season; but this time we make a time for takes off 
day an go shoot him. Evan Evans he say we wass better 
for make practice on roll pumpkin down hill, but I say 
wass no use for spen money on smash pumpkin — better 
save him for a wood cocks. We able for shoot him all 
right cause, she pretty big bird — look you, Mos so big 
like patridges, and we wass both able for hit patridge 
when he sit in a limb on tree; an some fellow wass tell 
me a Woodcocks easier for hit on fly than patridge on a 
sittin, cos he wass got so long bill he get herself cross up 
in a bushes. 
Well me an Evan we startin out an get in alders, and 
walk long, an did'nt see somethin till all of sudden Jump 
up some kind of queer bird an give sort of spit whistle an 
1 fly quick two or three way like a screw corks. All same 
he get couple drink out by my cider hard barrel. 
I say "What than Evan ?" He say "I wass'nt never see 
him fore. Guess he wass what they call it in book 'sy- 
poke.' " 
We go long an keep scare him up all time, but wass'nt 
see nuthin so big what we think a wood cocks. Sy-poke 
keep fly up, an pretty quick we say we shoot some of him, 
but when we come try we find hard for get aim, an if you 
shootin fore get aim you sure for waste powder, which 
wass all same throw money by dogs, an that aint never 
do tall. You aint ever get rich if you do him. Then we 
come to crick, an I look up him an see a woodcocks stan 
on log fishin. I know him a woodcocks for have long 
leg and bill an short feather tail. 
I take pretty long aim then shoot Jus so quick I can, 
an I hit him good I tell you. He wass fine bird with 
yellow green leg. I jus show him by Evan when I hear 
fellow come up an he say real mad "What in name of 
sight dam you do shoot, on a preserves?" 
I say "Nuthin only shoot a woodcocks. I wass'nt 
touch any preserves. Wass'nt see any for touch." 
He say "You got a woodcocks?" 
I say "One" an then I show him. I think he bin mads 
then, but he laf an laf, an say he wassnt never seen any 
fellow like Welsh, til he pretty near roll on a grounds. 
Then I get a little mads an I say, "What for you make 
fool by yourself an callin me Welsh ?" 
Then he sayin "Any body sides Welsh wass know sy- 
poke from a woodcocks." 
An I say in "So wass I. I see lot of sy-pokes fly up 
an twist off like screw-cork an spit whistle, but I wass'nt 
able for get aim on him." 
Then he laffin some more an say that little birds was a 
wood cocks, and we better go back by house out of pre- 
serves else he cost us money an he wass'nt want for do 
that cos we pretty good fellow both two of it. Well we 
think so jus same Jackey, and we gettin out in open an 
Just we get over fence up go nuther screw-corker bird. 
I got to shoot off gun any way else woman don't let me 
bring him in house so I trj- him. I take long aim — shut 
my both eye an let fly it. Evan give big shout "You get 
him." An he run pick him. 
Well now he wass pretty— all brown different shade an 
color an eye on so high top head he look Jus so her bill 
put on behind side first. Well we -go home an woman 
make little pie by hirn an he was firs rate I tell you an 
some time I was sure for take some nuther off day, and 
see if I pay preserves fellow a quartel dollar for get on 
right side of it an shoot nuther woodcocks. Man mus 
have little fun even if she do cost money. 
If you likin this letter I write bout him when I go next 
for hunt an if you never come by Remsen We have glass 
buttermilk an firs rate time talk about cow an butter an 
make fish an hunt. 
P. S. I bin read in book bout sy-pokc an I see him 
call there "green heron" an I wass think him a wood- 
cocks so I guess I wass like heron — all a same green. 
Yours for make sport, 
Owen Evan Owens. 
(Transmitted by J. R. B.) 
A Piedmont Game Preserve. 
Several FayetteVllle gentlemen, including Major Chas. 
Haigh, W. N. Williams and G. A. Burns, have taken up 
some 30,000 to 40,000 acres of land in the vicinity of Spoiu 
Springs, in this (Cumberland) county, with a view to 
make it a great game preserve. The territory is watered 
by upper Little River and several other good-sized, clear 
water streams, and is the natural home of the red deer, 
which are. almost as numerous now as they were too years 
ago. Three carcasses were brought into town three days 
ago, one doe weighing i6o!bs., which is very heavy veni- 
son for this section. Turkeys are here too, and game 
of other kinds, especially quail is abundant. The syndi- 
cate includes several Northern gentlemen, and it is pro- 
posed to make here as fine a game preserve as there is in 
the South. 
Shooting in the purlieus of Fayetteville is nothing to 
brag of. Local and visiting sportsmen occasionally bring 
in a brace or two of partridges, but the principal part 
of each bag is made up of larks, doves and robins, which 
are not game, to my notion. 
Some ruddy ducks, coots, and sawbills are picked up 
on the Water Works Pond, a mile from town. This body 
of water is clear as crystal, and contains some black bass, 
ring perch and pickerel (called jack here) of large size. 
One of the latter was brought in last Saturday which 
measured 22in. As a rule, this species of fish is not of 
the best quality in Southern streams, which are for the 
most part muddy; but this county of Cumberland is re- 
markable for its clear water ponds and streams, which 
are not surpassed in purity and sparkle by any in Minne- 
sota or New England. The Lakewood Club owns a lake 
a mile long and a fine house seven miles out from towti, 
and Mr. Herbert Lutterloh, a capitalist, has a fine private 
black bass pond, which contains some fine fish, to which 
additions will be made this winter for stocking purposes. 
Several miil owners have ponds which afford unusually 
fine fishing, and the center of the city itself is crossed 
by Blounts Creek and Cross Creek, both of which afford 
exceptionally fine angling. Fox hunting with horses and 
hounds is a favorite pastime on moonlight nights. 
I find very little game in the immediate vicinity of 
Fayetteville, but deer, quail and turkeys are reported in 
abundance everywhere else outside of a radius of twenty 
miles. That is hard on my dog, which is kept on chain by 
durance! Your Aleck Hunter, who is now at Pittsboro, 
near by, writes me that the shooting is "splendid." Here 
in town the local gunners do not hesitate to bag coots, 
mud hens, fish ducks, robins, larks, doves, field sparrows 
and yellow hammers. Even the mockingbirds do not 
escape. A 2-cent cartridge will blow r the life and song out 
of a $25 mockingbird in a jiffy. Up to date there were 
several on our premises, but I reckon they have all been 
shot off by this time. Local sportsmen have marked me 
low down as a sportsman because I will not bag such 
small game, and bring home more pitcher plants and venus 
fly traps than larks, but the fact is I have seen only seven 
quail in four outings, shooting in company over a good 
dog, of which two were bagged. 
One yellow hammer, which fell to an all too certain 
aim, had been shot before in the leg, and the enlargement 
around the fracture had so completed its curative pur- 
pose that it sloughed off in a lump and hung only by a 
thread, leaving the tibia apparently as sound and shapely 
as ever. I have known of injured trees casting their 
burls, but this is the first case I have noticed among 
fauna. It is interesting. 
A crack rifle shot has developed here, the son of ex- 
Governor Fowde, of this State, who was a corporal in the 
recently disbanded Second North Carolina Volunteer 
Regiment. He shoots hickory nuts off the trees, and bores 
coins with a .22 bullet, with as much facility as Dr. Carver 
ever did. C. Hallock. 
The Jackson's Hole Situation. 
Jackson, Wyo., Dec. 3. — Editor Forest and Stream: 
Some three weeks since the residents of lower Jack- 
son Valley, interested in game protection, contributed to 
a private fund and placed an additional game warden at 
Teton Pass, to assist Game Warden Lannigan. The first 
arrest was of George Moulten, of Idaho, who had in his 
possession, as I write now, eight head of elk, four cows 
and four bulls, killed in absolute violation of law. Jus- 
tice La Plant fined him $30 and $5 costs, and Game War- 
den Lannigan took charge of his game. Two days' after 
this, L. Davidson, a resident of Idaho, was arrested, hav- 
ing in his possession eight head of elk, four cows and 
four bulls ; and he admitted that he had killed and trans- 
ported two bulls some two weeks earlier. On the 30th 
ult. B. F. Parker and Casper Allen were arrested, both 
non-residents, having in their possession five head of cow 
elk. The following day John Davidson and Ben. F. 
Davidson were arrested, having in possession four head 
of elk; also Thos. Wilson, a justice of the peace, of Teton 
Precinct, was restrained from proceeding out of the State 
until his case was investigated; and on the same day T. 
W. Cox, a resident of Idaho, was arrested, having in his 
possession four head of elk, During this time over 100 
head of elk had been transported to the Teton Basin side 
of Wyoming by alleged and real residents, who lived there, 
all of this game having been killed in the Teton timber 
reserve, at and near Jackson's Lake, Wyo.. with a full 
knowledge of all the residents therein that the greater 
part was killed unlawfully. 
To show how wantonly and indiscriminately the game, 
was slaughtered it suffices to say that on Saturday and 
Sunday, the 26th and 27th ultimo, Bradley M. Eley, the 
mail carrier to Elk, Wyo., informed me that 2,000 shots 
were counted during these" days, and this statement was 
corroborated by others with whom I 'talked. 
The arrests heretofore made of some of these individu- 
als was by the privately-paid deputies at the Teton Pass, 
forty miles from where the game was killed; and the sub- 
sequent prosecutions were to all intents and purposes 
farces, so far as any penalty was concerned, and evi- 
dences that notwithstanding the fact that the great ma- 
jority of the people favor strict prosecution, such did not 
occur. 
As the retained attorney of the Jackson Hole Gun Club. 
I appeared in all cases, and filed and swore to all com- 
plaints, except those made by the wardens employed. 
4sg 
,r-r " 1 - 1 - 1 - ■ - 1 -' - i * 
That the case of L. Davidson was settled by him pay- 
ing $1 and nominal costs, the same as the ease of Cox. 
Ben. F. Davidson Was fined $5 and costs, and all the rest 
ivere turned loose. True, in some cases the meat was 
confiscated, ahd in Parker's and Allen's cases it was not 
wholly confiscated, they being allowed to take out two 
and a half head. It can readily be seen that these cases 
worked no good to the game. We are gratified, however, 
that the instituting of these proceedings probably saved 
from slaughter 500 to 1,000 head of elk, as it was intended 
by Idaho people to come to Wyoming and take out a 
license, and hunt, kill and pursue to their heart's content. 
Davidson, Parker and Cox each had a license issued by 
Jackson Valley courts, and it is held by the court that 
there is no penalty attached to the section of the statute 
forbidding transportation of killed game out of the State, 
when such game was killed under and by virtue of a 
$20 license. In my opinion more game has been illegally 
killed in the Jackson Valley country, principally within 
the Teton timber reserve, this year, than in any three 
consecutice years in the past. If the next Legislature re- 
fuses to pass laws and appoint a proper commission to pro- 
tect the game, and to take the game question entirely out 
of the jurisdiction of county authorities, and out of 
politics, then the greatest game country in the United 
States, and that country that receives the surplus of the 
National Park game, will be absolutely depleted. It is 
a self-evident fact that game protection in the Jackson 
Park country is of no material benefit, judged from pro- 
ceedings of the last two weeks. The privately-paid game 
wardens admit their inability to do anything with the vio- 
lators in view of the light fines and costs imposed. Of- 
fenders plead guilty and throw themselves upon the mercy 
of the court. That the greater portion of the people are 
dissatisfied goes without saying, 
W. L. Simpson. 
Erie County Association. 
A special directors' meeting of the Erie County Fish 
and Game Association was held in Buffalo, Dec. 3, to de- 
vise some plan for the enforcement of the fish and game 
laws that would be more effective than the simple seizing 
of nets and reporting of the offenders. The meeting was 
held in the office of Percy S. Lansdowne, secretary of the 
Association, and those present were President L. P. 
Beyer, Vice-President George B. Webster, Treasurer 
Goodrich J. Bowne, Secretary Lansdowne, George Goetz, 
Jr., Thomas Cary Welch, attorney; Special Protector 
Eben P. Dorr, of the New Y'ork State Fish, Game and 
Forest League, and Protector Carter. 
From the remarks made by Attorney Welch, it was 
evident that he is personally an enthusiastic believer in 
the enforcement of the fish and game laws and that he 
will co-operate with the Erie County Association to secure 
such an end. The directors, at the conclusion of the meet- 
ing, made him a member, and then elected him a director. 
He had been called to the meeting to give his views on 
the subject of prosecuting restaurateur, hotel-keepers and 
others in this city, who have been selling or who have 
had in their possession venison since Nov. 20. Mr. Welch 
reported that he has good cases against a number of local 
dealers, who have not yet been arrested. He said that 
what the fish and game protectors need most to secure 
a reasonable obedience to the law is the backing of the 
community. "They need the supporting sentiment of the 
people generally, so that, when these officers take cases of 
violations of law into the courts, the justices will know 
that convictions will be for the general good; that the en- 
forcement of the game laws is not for the benefit of the 
rich sportsman alone, but for the benefit of the poor 
sportsman as well ; and that the general public desires 
the prosecution of violators in the interest of the preseva- 
tion of the fish and game in this vicinity." 
"Yes," said President Beyer, "there seems to be a 
.general impression that we who cry 'Enforce the law !' 
are talking for the benefit of a favored few. That is a 
grievous error. The protection of fish and game in this 
vicinity is more particularly for the benefit of the poor 
sportsman, because he has not the means to have a fish 
and game preserve of his own, as the rich man has, nor 
to travel to the Adirondacks or more distant points in 
search of game, as the rich man does. If the general 
public only could see the matter in this light, I'm sure this 
Association and other like associations and the fish and 
game protectors, instead of being looked upon as med- 
dlers, would have the hearty support of the community, 
and the, courts would not think the enforcement of the 
law was a persecution of the poor. More convictions 
would create more respect for the law and more respect 
for the law would yield more fish and game for Buffa- 
lonians. There would be better fishing and duck hunting 
on Niagara River, which is the favorite resort for Buffalo 
sportsmen of moderate means." 
Vice-President Webster, Secretary Lansdowne and 
Protector Carter spoke along the same lines. Carter said 
emphatically he hoped that he and other protectors could 
gain the public's support. "I've done everything in my 
power to stop net fishing on the river," he said. "I have 
seized hundreds of seines and fyke nets and squat nets 
and every other kind of nets I have stoned nearly every 
hauling grounds from the head of Squaw Island to the 
foot of Grand Island, And, by the way, I think the 
scheme of piling boatloads of stones into the river where 
seines are usually hauled prevents more seine hauling 
than any number of protectors could, because the illegal 
fishermen don't care to risk their nets being torn. And 
yet, in spite of all tire work I and my assistants have done, 
the use of nets continues. I have been told, and I be- 
lieve, that if more violators of the law were prosecuted 
and punished, there would be fewer violations of the law. 
I want to say that out of about 300 cases that I have taken 
into court from time to time, I have never secured but 
one conviction, and yet in every case I caught the viola- 
tors right in the act. The one man who was convicted 
was Kleiber, of Tonawanda, who was fined $5 by Justice 
Graf last summer." 
President Beyer referred to a fact of interest to the 
men who fish in Niagara River, which heretofore has not 
been published. Last spring the Erie County Fish and 
Game Association, which, with its membership of 500, 
has a fast-growing influence, applied to the State com- 
missioners for some muscallonge and pike spawn. The 
