188 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Sept. 7, 190 1. 
programme, which were certainly remarkable for a human 
voice. Just at dusk we glided up to the landing, which 
was immediately covered with guests and guides to see the 
fine buck and congratulate the successful hunter. At 
supper there was nearly a rough house, for Burt, who 
took the honor of bagging the first deer, modestly deter- 
mined not to take the head of the table, which Bob and I 
agreed was the proper place for him, and we proceeded to 
seat him with formalities which -promised to upset the 
table. Bill, 
[to be concluded.] 
CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 
Opening Day, 
Chicago, III., Aug. 29.— There is no day in all the 
sporting year the equal of "opening day." that time set 
by custom and by law for the beginning of the fall sea- 
son of outdoor sport. We are now almost up to th^ 
opening day, and not for very many years has there been 
an opemng day of so much interest and significance as 
attaches to Sept. i. this yea". 
Here in Chicago it seems as though everybody' were 
gomg shooting and had postponed lo tlae last minute 
the necessary preparations for this trip. The stores 
here are packed as they have not been for a long time, 
and the ammunition trade is sometliing greater than ever 
known before. For instance, I made inquiries to-day 
of one firm, that of Von Lengerke & Antoine, as to the 
relative importance of the ammunition trade this season 
as compared to last. Mr. Von Lengerke replied that, 
so near as they could tell, there were nearly six persons 
gomg shooting this year to one who went last year. "Of 
course, we cannot keep absolute check on this," said he. 
because our new shell trade we might naturally expect 
to bring us a certain increase of business. You will 
remember that we took over the entire loaded shell busi- 
ness so long handled by Mr. E. S. Rice, and we have 
many thousands of dollars invested in ammunition. We 
have 70,000 Du Pont shells now on the road, which we 
wish would reach us pretty soon. Here on our retail 
shelves there are about 50,000, and in our reserve stock 
down stairs we have about 200.000 more. I can say 
from available figures that we will sell about 2,000,000 
more shells this year than we did last vear. I do not 
believe that this is all due to an increased tine of goods, 
but think that it is very largely attributable to the gen- 
eral interest in shooting matters and the abundant crop 
of game." 
About 2,000,000 shells ! That is a good many of itself, 
but 2,000,000 "more" than were sold last year— what 
figures these be! It will be remembered that this is but 
one firm of many. The shooting industry of this coun- 
try can be estimated somewhat from these figures. Some 
one asks where do all the pins go? He might better 
ask where do al! the shot go? 
They Stop in Iinnois.B 
A good many of these shells will be fired at Illinois 
game tliis fall; more than for many years past. As it 
stands now, Wisconsin exacts a $10' shooting license, 
Indiana a $25 license, Dakota a $25 license, and Minne- 
sota a $25 license if you live in a license State yourself. 
Hence, the open shooting regions are very much re- 
stricted, since figures like the above render shooting 
prohibitory- to a great many sportsmen, although they 
do not hinder a great many others going out. The 
great influx of sportsmen upon the Illinois game fields 
this fall will be due to the fact that the shooting is too 
high elsewhere, m.ore especially in Indiana, which has 
always been a great sporting groimd for Chicago shoot- 
ers and anglers. 
As to where they are going, the answer is that thev 
will be in every county of this State where there is grass 
or corn enough to hide a prairie chicken. A great many 
will go not much farther than Joliet, 111., which is in the 
center of a remarkable profusion of birds this fall. Take 
the cross-line railroad out of Joliet, am] stop at almost 
any little village ten miles or more from the latter-named 
city, and you will be practically certain lo find birds if 
you g;> there soon enough. As to die nliundance of the 
crop, there is no question whatever -.lODut it. The local 
wardens report that they never have seen so manv chick- 
ens in Illinois as there are this fall. 
The great Kankakee marshes will be .he center of 
operations for a great many shooters, and it must be 
remembered that Indiana does not have an entire 
monopoly on this crooked stream. Some of the best 
chicken marsh of Illinois lies along that river. The 
birds take to the wide, grassy swamps for breeding, and 
these wet bottoms have always been produdivc of great 
numbers of prairie chickens. I have already mentioned 
Koutts, Knox and oth^r Indiana towns as good to re- 
member, and one may add Lowell, Water Valley, Rose 
Lawn, and other kindred Indiana points. If one does 
not care to pay the license and prefers to shoot in Illi- 
nois, he should try Momence, Kankakee, -jr other to\ ns 
further down along the Kankakee River. De Kalb county 
is a good tip this week, as it was last. Aurora, about 
40 miles west of Chicago,' is the home of a great many 
able sportsmen, and these will have good orair'e chicken 
shooting within carriage drive of town. About 15 or 20 
miles beyond Aurora there is good chicken country. 
Mr. T. A. Hagerty, of this city, is one of those lucky 
enough to have a friend who is a large land owner, and 
he has received an invitation to shoot over these prac- 
tically preserved farm lands. He goes west of Atirora 
about 12 miles, and should have very decent sporr. 
Streator, 111., is another town which should be remem- 
bered by one in search of chicken country, although I 
should prefer the De Kalb or Joliet districts instead, as 
Streator is a mining town, and sometimes the coal min- 
ers shoot ahead of the opening day. 
Going Oat. 
Mr. Marvin Hughitt, Jr., general freight manager of 
the Chicago & Northwestern Railroad, and his fri^snd, 
Mr. Robert Cox, have started for the Northwest on one 
of their annual chicken hunts. 
Mr. F. T. Trego has gone up to Neepenauk Gub, 
Wisconsin, where he will shoot on opening day, and 
probably, with very fair success. At the same club is 
}/[r. J. A. Day, of this city, who is spending tliii week 
fishing and will begin active operations on the upland 
game next week. 
Mr. Joseph E. Pflueger and Mr. Geo. Pflueger, his 
brother, both of Akron, Ohio, paused at the Fore.st 
AND Stream shop to get directions for a Minnesota 
chicken hunt for which they were en route. These I told 
to take State Game Warden Fullerton's advice as to good 
local country in Minnesota. 
Tremeadoas Chicken Crop aad Cause for Same. 
This time we have without doubt or question a tre- 
mendous chicken crop. There are birds everywhere in 
the Northwest, or in every place where there has been 
any breeding stock at all. Here in Illinois, as I have 
stated, there are very many more birds than last year, 
or for some years back. Agent Fullerton's advices from 
Minnesota show that they have a grand croo also in that 
State. The State Warden of North Dakota states that 
the birds are "almost anywhere." To-day I was talking 
with Mr. West, of the general passenger department 
of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway, and he 
said, "It is simply remarkable what stories of chickens 
come in from all over our South Dakota line. I wish 
I could get out myself for a little fun, for, froin all I 
can learn, there are more birds out in South Dakota this 
fall than ever was known there at any time, and they are 
full grown now. It is an early season." Asked what 
specific points were best along the line, he said, "any- 
where west of the Minnesota line in South Dakota." 
Much the same story as this comes in from Wiscon- 
sin, which, also, is having a good chicken yea'. It 
would be very pleasing for one to believe that this sud- 
den increase m our game supply is due to the increased 
respcc' for the game laws of 'hese "^Vestern State.^. This 
may be one of the causes for the increas?, yet one is 
constrained to believe it is but a minor cause. The true 
reason for the great abundance of prairie chickens lies 
in the fact that we have had an extraordinarily dry spring 
and summer. Any one who savvies prairie, chickens 
knows that they take to the lowlands to breed, and now- 
adays almost their only nesting groimds e.\ist in the 
swamp lands. The hen grouse builds her nest along the 
edges of the swamps, and, as quick as the spring floods 
come, the nest is drowned out. Once in awhile she 
nests again, perhaps with a reduced number of eggs. 
Now give that same grouse a perfectly dry nesting 
ground, and she will turn out more than twice as many 
new birds as in a season of prolonged rains and high 
waters. A young prairie chicken is a tiny, downy, weak 
little thing, and quite as subject to death from heavy 
rain storms as is the domestic chicken, or the young 
duckling or gosling. This summer, as every one knows, 
it has been abnormally'- hot and dry, This was bad for 
human beings, but mighty good for prairie chickens. 
The prairie chicken does not really need very much 
water, and it resorts to these lowlands simply from the 
desire for .shelter, and not from any taste for wet grounds. 
The prairie chickens live week after week out in a high, 
dry cottntry, where there is not a bit of water, the dew 
of the grasses serving to provide all the moisture they 
demand. I presume every old chicken hunter has seen 
these birds sometimes, when put up in the middle of the 
day, fly to a cattail swamp, or has known his dog to find 
them in such .sinroundings during the heated hours of 
the day. Somet*mes there will be water in such a swamp 
as this, but I have nearly always found it well to hunt 
around the edges of such cover; yet it is an open ques- 
tion if the birds do not go there for shade or protection 
rather than for water. The prairie chicken is a bird of 
the high, dry prairies, and it does best when it finds 
itself situated in something like the old environment. 
The drowning out of the nests in the spring-time is 
one of the great causes of the decrease in the supply of 
these grouse in the West, whereas a dry season means 
lots of birds. Thus we who have spent the distressingly 
hot summer in the cities may now have something of 
compensation in the increased pleasure of trips afield. 
If one were asked to name the point most properly 
to be called the center of the prairie chicken industry 
of America, he would be obliged to point, without hesi- 
tation, to the twin cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis. 
If you want a taste of real sportsmanship: that is to say, 
if you wish to find a whole community of sportsmen, 
visit the Twin Cities. On the morning of opening day 
there is nothing left but the court house in these towns. 
They shut up the factories, close the schools, adjourn the 
Supreme Court, lock up the store doors, and go shoot- 
ing. If you would go out there next Sunday you would 
find nobody at home in St. Paul or Minneapolis. The 
servant would tell you— if the servant had not also gone 
out shooting — that the head of the family had left for 
up country, where he intended to do a little shooting on 
the following Monday morning. The big city of Chi- 
cago, just as the big city of New York, is located a little 
too far away from the shooting grounds to be really a 
good place to Hve. A chicken trip, or, indeed, a hunting 
trip of almost any sort, nowadays, means for the inhabi- 
tant of either of those two cities a long and somewhat 
arduous journey, with al! the trouble of shipping dogs 
and that sort of things If you live so far west as Min- 
nesota, you can have a backj-ard big enough to lick your 
dog in, and yoti can raise a dog which will know a 
chicken when he smells him. Blessed are the men of 
Minneapolis and St. Paul, and busy enough they are this 
week, getting ready for the annual hegira. 
Assault 00 a Game Warden. 
The vicinity of Willow Springs, on the Desplaines 
River, iiear Chicago, has always been one more or less 
productive of game birds, snipe, ducks, or even quail, 
and it has been patronized very generally by shooters 
ot the humbler class, who go out on Sundays with their 
cheap, muzzle-loading shotguns to kill whatever they can 
find. Five days ago there were four Italians who were 
out on such a quest as this and who had killed a few 
wild ducks and half a dozen quail, illegally. As they 
were wandering about two miles east of the railway 
station, they were met by Deputy Warden Louis M. 
Greenwald, who has charge of that part of the country 
in his work. Greenwald halted these Italians, arrested 
them, and undertook to take awav their game from them. 
One of the men struck him with a club, knocking him 
down, the fou|- then run^iing away. Greenwald drew bi^ 
revolver and fired at the man who had struck him. Hel 
thinks that he hit the fellow, but is not certain. Upon' 
this the other three Italians assaulted Greenwald, beat 
him into insensibility, and kicked him about the body.; 
breaking several ribs. He was left unconscious in tlie 
woods, where he was found later by farmers, taken to 
the railway station, and brought to the County Hospitall 
of this city, where, at last accounts, he lay in a criticall 
condition. 
Very frequently we read of the offenses of this Italian 
element in the neighborhood of New York and other 
Eastern cities, and it seems members of that nationality 
are guilty of similar cases of indecent violence here in 
Chicago. These Italians furni.sh a very poor element of 
citizenship in some cases, and it is persons of this sort 
who make up a large percentage of ignorant Sunday 
shooters who defy alike law and decency in their maraud- 
ing operations about the edges of the cit}^ It is to be 
hoped that Greenwald will recover and be able yet to 
have his assailants properly punished. i 
New Warden at Milwaukee. 
Mr. Valentine Raeth has been appointed by State 
Warden Henry Overbeck as district game warden at 
Milwaukee. Mr. Raeth is a newspaper man and has for 
more than ten years been connected in different capaci- 
ties with the press of Milwaukee. He is an ardent hunter 
and fisherman, and has always been a firm advocate oi 
game protection. He is the author of the Wisconsin 
law which empowers game wardens to act as forest war- 
dens, also, which law was passed last spring. It is con-: 
fidently expected by the sportsmen of the Cream City 
that Mr. Raeth will fill the bill acceptably as local con- 
servator of protective interests. 
Big Illinois Game Preserve. 
What is thought to be the largest transaction ever com- 
pleted in the State of Illinois by way of game preserves 
was concluded yesterday at Lewiston, 111. Mr, W. C' Fitz- 
henry sold to a club of sportsmen the body of water 
known as Thompson's Lake, long celebrated for its exn 
cellence as a fishing and hunting resort. The purchaser^ 
were Mr. Henry Bates, Mr. W. P. Ijams, well known in 
railroad circles; Hon. Harry S. New, National Republican 
Committeeman from Indiana and a prominent newspapef 
man of Indianapolis ; Dr. Thomas Hill, and others, friends 
of the above. These gentlemen not only bought Thomp- 
son's Lake, but also several thousand acres of marshy 
lands adjacent to the water, and the consideration was 
about $30,000. , 
Mr. New is a member of the Turtle Lake Club, whose 
grounds are located about tAventy miles from Alpena^ 
Mich. He is an ardent and expert fly-fisherman. 
E. Hough. 
Hartford Building, Chicago, 111. 
Boston' Gunners. 
Boston, Aug. 31. — The shore bird gunners are not hav^ 
ing the best of success of late. They say that the weather 
has been almost too fine, and the flights have been rather 
small. Down Chatham way the vacationists have theit 
guns at hand, and go out mornings, with the result of a 
few dozen sitiall birds. I. L. Kenniston brought up a 
pretty good bag Thursday morning, the result of a couple 
of mornings along shore. The birds were mostly summer 
yellowlegs and peep. In the vicinity of Scituate the 
gunners have had some sport, mornings and evenings, 
Local gunners have done most of the shooting so far, how- 
ever. In the Essex River and Plum Island section the 
Boston gunners have put in some time, and brought back 
a few birds. A couple of Boston gunners got over sixtj 
birds in that section last Tuesday. J. H. Jones and a 
friend have been on gunning trips lately, but their chums 
haze them with a report that they got no birds. Mr. 
Jones has secured the gun that he lost overboard while 
shooting muskrats last spring. The canoe was upset by 
the recoil of the gun, and Mr. Jones went to the bottom; 
gun, rubber boots and all. The gun he was forced to 
drop in order to save himself by swimming. Mr. Leonar<3 
Hasson, of Quincy, has been giving considerable atten 
tion to the rearing of Mongolian pheasants in captivitj 
for three or four years. This year he has not had th« 
best of success. He put abotit thirty eggs into the bes^ 
incubator he could get. but not an egg hatched, all being 
infertile, though he supposed his male birds were al 
right. Hence he has not a chick in his coop. The mating 
and nesting seemed to be as good as the year before, wher 
the eggs hatched. He will change his breeding stock nex' 
year. The old birds seem to thrive, since they feed welf 
He has one solitary quail in his pens that seems to be ir 
good condition. He went gunning off Marshfield way i 
few days ago, but got only three yellowlegs. But he mel 
a gunner who claimed to have shot seventy plover on 
the marshes about North River, Marshfield, in one day, re- 
cently. Mentioning this story to a gunner, wJio is thor- 
oughlj' familiar with that section, having gunned there 
for several seasons, he laughed at the idea. "Yes," saicJ 
he, "I have heard of such plover before. I have not i 
doubt but what they were 'stibs' or 'whitebreasts,' whicl 
birds are not much larger than peep. The gunners it 
that part of the country like to call them plover, because » 
sounds large. Further down the Cape the gunners cal 
them 'whitebreasts.' " This same gunner says that yellow 
legs are really scarce so far this season, but Labor Day 
Sept. 2, may bring in some bags. That day the gunneri 
will all be out. T. L. Hanscom has just returned from i 
gunning trip down the Maine coast, in the neighborhood oi 
Biddeford Pool. Summer visitors make it rather uncora 
fortable gunning in that section. One never knows hov 
near he may be to some sort of a picnic, sailing or boatitu 
party, even where the coast appears remote or unsettle< 
He found that very early in the morning there was littl 
danger from these summer sojourners being in range 
while that was really the best time for gtmning. With ; 
friend who owns a boat, he made some pretty good bag 
of yellowlegs and peep. Special. 
The FoKUT AKO Stxeau is put to press each week on Tuewfaq 
Correspoadcsiee iatcnded for publication should reach as at til 
latest MoadaT and as landt ^«rii«r M practiotfelf. 
