FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Oct. 6, 1900. 
is -the defect ■vvliieh' the Charleston club hopes to remedy. 
They are going to make efforts to have a special deputy 
Appointed or- empower some magisterial officer. 
"''The Charleston men are arranging plans so as to have 
a law passed at the next session of the Legislature making 
"it inGulnbent for the .trial justices of the various townships 
to see that the game laws are carried out. 
Though the efforts of the Palmetto Gun Club will be 
'directed chiefly to the enforcement of the law in the near- 
by section, it is also , their desire that their niovement 
should take hold all through the State, They ask the co- 
operation of all the sportsmen in every section of the State 
and would especially urge upon the country papers the im- 
perative necessity of assistance in carrying out the move- 
ment which has now been instituted. 
CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 
Game Review. 
Chicago, 111., Sept. 29. — No flight of Northern ducks 
has as yet appeared in this latitude. As far to the north as 
Fox Lake, Wis., I hear that the shooters are still as 
anxiously looking to the nortliAvard as we are here about 
Chicago. A few teal are being killed at the clubs, but 
these little irresponsibles go by no i-ule. There has been 
a big drop in the temperature the last two days all over 
the Northwest, and perhaps this means an early freeze 
in the marshes of the far North, so that the birds will 
before long begin their flight to the open arms and the 
bloody graves that await them from Manitoba to Mexico. 
If I had my choice I would not be born a duck at this 
day and age of the world.. 
Jacksnipe have shown up-as far to the south as our 
Indiana marshes, and some bags of goodish size have been 
made, Oswald von Lengerkc hunts this bird very regu- 
larly. A week ago, at the famous old grounds at Koutts 
he got seventeen jacks and one woodcock, and he is just 
back to-day from a second trip, on which three guns got 
nineteen jacks on the same country. At Maksawba Club 
the jacks have also been in with some regularity for the 
past ten days, and they arc scattered all over, here and 
there, on the better marshes of upper Illinois. I hear 
that Ernie McGaffey and a friend went out this morning 
on the Skokie marsh, near Evanston. for a try at the 
jacks, and should not wonder if they had fair sport. To- 
day the weather is just right for a good flight of jacks, and 
the next week should show some fun in this part of the 
world. 
'Wisconsin Birds. 
The Illinois chicken season is over, hut I hear still of 
an occasional party up in Wisconsin who have had the 
luck to kill a half-dozen birds here and there, and I do 
not believe that the supply of birds in central Wisconsin 
has been so sharply polished off as our stock in Illinois, 
the cover up there being much heavier on the average and 
the open country less in extent. At Waupaca, Wis., this 
week, I saw one shooter who said that he had killed 
thirty-six chickens this. fall. He was a farmer, with a fair 
native pointer. He said that the partridges, meaning the 
ruffed grouse, are a good crop in that part . of the State. 
He also .spoke of a "wood grouse," and at first I did not 
know what he meant till he said they hunted them, as they 
did chickens. Then I knew he meant the sharp-tailed 
grouse, which resorts to the woods or thickets more than 
the pinnated grouse. I have never heard this name 
use,! for the sharpie before.' At Waupaca there are a few 
quail, not very many, but no doubt more than was the 
case a few years ago. as all around that place the migra- 
tion of quail northward has steadily gone on for some 
vears. At this point there were a few Mongolian pheas- 
ants released a few years ago, but they seem to have dis- 
appeared and left no sign. 
_ Mr. D. J. Hotchkiss. of Fox Lake, Wis., has had a 
little fun with the chickens this week, and writes as below 
regarding it : 
"Had a nice little time with the chickens .Saturday. 
Went up to Pardeeville, twenty miles west of here, and 
went out with Lyle Smith, a friend of mine. We put 
up two coveys and a few single birds and bagged eighteen 
of them. Were all fine, big, strong birds, but pretty wild. 
The first covey, of eighteen, we put up four times before 
we got a shot, then got only one bird. The next time we got 
into theni plenty in the high grass and managed to get 
eight of them. Struck another covey of eight and the 
second time we got them- up managed to secure five of 
them. The other four were single birds that had been 
scattered. I lost anothe r single old rooster that carried 
two loads of shot over into a cornfield about a mile away 
and dropped in the corn, where we were unable to find 
him. Another old rooster gave me the laugh in great 
shape. He jumped from behind a small willow bush in 
the marsh and passed on to another one about two rods 
away, when he turned and made off straight behind the 
bush where I could not see to shoot. I managed to give 
him two shots between the two bu.shes. but the best I 
could do with him was a small hunch of feathers. We 
had a delightful tramp and lots of fun, besides getting 
all the chickens we needed in our business. Had two 
dogs, good ones, though they were a little fast on the 
start, and did not hold the birds well for a time or two. 
The birds got up the fir.?t time half a mile awav, but we 
could mark them down easily and managed to stay with 
them until we got our tribute from them." 
New Sport in the 'West, 
It is tt) be feared that the West is losing some of its 
erstwhile woolly quality and becoming sadly eft'ete. A 
friend in Saginaw Mich., tells me that the sportsmen of 
that place have taken to shooting rail, his words thereon 
following: 
• "The sDortsnien here have been having fine fun this 
fall shootitig the sora rail. The marshes along the Sagi- 
naw River, and they are immense wild rice beds, have 
been literally alive with these little fellows for the last 
two or three weeks. The north wind raises the Avater and 
then is the best shooting. A duck boat with a man to 
punt it through the rice, a light charge of No, 10 shot and 
ynn are fixed for an afternoon's sport. Bags of sixty or 
eighty have not been infrequent, and every afternoon 
ll^e ti'ain on tlip Pe^<e Mnvfluette to B^y city \]^ 
carried .sportsmen to Cheboygannin Creek, which has been 
the favorite spot." 
The Guide and His Gon. 
The old question of guide and sportsman continually 
comes up. Without doubt the guide has come to stay 
as long as we shall have sport, for the hurry of modern 
life practically compels the city shooter or the tourist 
sportsman to save his time as much as possible on a 
trip, and so he has to hire a guide in order to learn a 
piece of country as quickly as possible. By hiring the 
guide, of course, he robs himself of more than half the 
pleasure of his trip, if he be one of the sort who are able 
to take care of themselves, but this giving up part of 
one's privileges seems to be a part of the surrender man- 
kind makes in the social compact. The guide is there- 
fore a part of society, not a part of the wild and natural 
life. It is the guide who has the fun, and yoit pay him 
for it. 
The question of property in the game a guide kills is 
OIK which, I believe, has received a certain amount of 
dozen of then-i in every little town in -Saginaw Valley, waiting for 
the city hunter to do business with. I am not over-stating the 
case in the least. It is true that a sportsman may hire such a 
htmter for a companion or guide, if he will, without doing any 
harm, but it is a fact that the birds killed are soid to tlje city 
liunter, and it is not only what is killed that day, but all that he can 
kill during the season. Two years ago the egg crate game was tried 
by market-hunters in a certain locality, but they were inlormcd 
that it would not be tolerated, and that ended it. Now they have a 
better market right at home for all that they can kill. I coul^ 
name you men from Saginaw who did not kill one bird for every 
twenty that they bought and paid for. The number of birds 
shipped out of the country is not a drop in the bucket compared 
to the amount disposed of to city hunters. Now the question 
is; VVhat is going to be done about it? The law cannot reach the 
guilty ones, and if it continues in a few years every lover of the 
legitimate sport may as well sell his dog and gun. These market- 
hunters are out every day; they have as much principle of the 
sportsman about them as a butcher; they are cleaning the game 
out of the country just as rapidly as if marketing of game was 
allowed. I have been out with my hounds lately, and can say that 
1 do not think there is one bird for every five that were a year ago 
H ere, then, is a subject for every lover o£ dog and gun to con- 
sider and act on. It is a delicate question to discuss in sporting 
clubs, for some of the worst offenders are prominent in clubs. Wc 
are powerless to cheek the evil in the country;' the 
remedy must come from tlie city. One thing is certain 
if the city hunter continues to give a market to the pot- 
LYMAN AND MERKIM. 
discussion in the columns of Fokicst and Stream, and 
which still remains unsettled. -Its ultimate solution will 
be when human nature changes, and until then I pre- 
sume the question will appear in as many different lights 
as there are men who go shooting. Over in Michigan, it 
secins, there are tnany shooters who go out with guides, 
paying the guides a good stiff price, and keeping all the 
birds that the guides kill. As the latter is in good con- 
dition and steady practice, he naturally kills more birds 
than his employer, and the latter is able to take home a 
nice bag with him, which he can ttse, give or hang up in 
the family smoke house as his conscience shall dictate. 
There is little doubt that a steady industry of bird killing 
in this way has been going on for years in the low*'.' part 
of Michigan. I do not like to come out rabidly ana apply 
■all sorts of names to the shooters who have made a prac- 
tice of getting a good bag hi this way. Maybe it seems 
right to them. Perhaps it is their business. But inay 
they not candidly look the matter over, and may they 
not perhaps reconsider their earlier opinion as to the 
wisdom of this course? Three years ago lower Michigan 
had a lot of birds. Last year it was .shot out, as I know 
very well. Do the shooters who bring in the guide bags 
prefer to kill a whole lot of birds one year and very few 
or none the next, or would they prefer to have a steady 
supply of birds and a certain regularity to their possi- 
bilities for sport? I .should myself rather have it the 
latter way. I5e that as it may, there is local criticism on 
the custom, and. for a wonder, .some of it comes froni 
the country. A Michigan paper prints the following from 
a country sportsman : 
There is one great evil to be met. and that is to stop the market- 
hunter. You may be surprised at the statement, but T can prove 
it. that this is really the only evil worthy of attention. You say 
there is a lasv now forbidding the sale of birds. And I maintain 
that the market-htu-iter has been just as busy, killed just as many 
birds as he could, and marketed them at a better price this year 
than any former season. The only difference is tliat formerly he 
sold to the butcher, while now he sells to the alleged .sport, the 
cheap skate from the city, who dresses up in hunting suit, buys 
a gun and maybe a ,$5 dog for $50, and_ goes into the country to 
buy hirds. He puts in the paper on his return how many birds 
he bagged, omitting the price, and calls that hunting. The market- 
hunter is in the field every day. rain or .sl'ine. so as to have a 
supply on hand, for tlie day is past when he can make a killing 
in one day large enough to satisfy the purse of the city hunter. 
T could name one such hunter who admits that he has killcii 
fjVCl' V^^^ sp,asoji.. "Yoy ^yjU S\^^ .T^^]^ ^ 
hunter our days for good shooting arc numbered in the Saginaw 
Valley. If you wish it to remain what it has been, the best shoot- 
ing grounds in the Northwest, then stop those cheap counterfeits 
of sportsmen from buying birds and parading as lovers of legiti- 
mate sport. 
A city sportsman of the same State writes in another 
paper to something the same effect regarding this prac- 
tice and other things which are destroying our game so 
very rapidly all over the West. 
There are many alleged spprtsmen in Saginaw who go to 
Hemlock, Merrill or .somewhere else, and go out shooting with a 
professional guide. Now that is all right if they simp y take 
liini along because he knows the country, and knows where to 
have the team meet them at night, and can point out the best 
places, and then let the sportsman kill his own birds fairly on the 
wing or not at all; but thev do not do that; they want the guicte 
to kill just as manv birds as he possibly can, and if the dog Ponns 
they are more apt to urge him to take first shot, so the bird will 
be idlled, rather than risk it themselves. They are out after meat 
and a big bag and something to brag about. . 
The fact is so many shooters think they are sportsmen, when 
thev realtv do not have the first instinct of a true sportsman, i 
saw in the paper some time ago an account of how^ one of our 
prominent merchants had returned from his spring duck shooting 
trip, giving the number of birds killed, a large quantity, and 
tlien this same alleged sportsman went on to tell it was "the best 
shooting he had had in vears." Did he stop_ to think that for 
every duck he killed he destroyed a mated pair that would have 
returned to some shooting ground in the fall with a hrood? Uid 
he stop to think how worthless the birds were for the table at 
that time of the vear, their breeding season? Did he stop to 
think that these same birds had run the gauntlet ot a never- 
ceasing shotgun warfare from the time they left their far-olT 
Northern home to begin their Southern flight? They had been 
shot at in Manitoba, North Dakota and on the Platte; or if they 
had taken the Great Lakes as their Southern pathway, they had 
been pounded all through Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois, 
Then as Christmas time drew near and they stopped for a breathing 
spcl! along the Mississippi bottoms in .Arkansas and Louisiana 
and Mississippi, the Northern shooter— not sportsman as a rule- 
was still banging a'Way for the Christmas holidays, "to have a 
turn at the ducks down South." A little later around Arkansas 
Pass and Corpus Cristi to their southernmost limit, these same 
butchers with insatiable greed were banging away at them. The 
local item in the Saginaw paper is but a sample of the fate await- 
ing- these poor, tired-out spring birds, and the very few that aie 
fortunate enough to safelv reach their breeding ffrounds in the 
great Northwest, where they have the only rest they get out of 
the whole twelve months. 
Fof the Minnesota Park. 
Gen. C. C. Andrews, the very able fire warden of the 
big State of Mitmesota, has always been one of the warra- 
