2^6 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[SEPt. 21, rgbt. 
gunners. If the property was left for a few days without 
a resident, vandals appropriated everything in sight, 
camped in the houses and even removed doors and win- 
dows. Fires were started either intentionally or care- 
lessly, and two houses were consumed. 
Parties would pitch their camps in our dooriJ^ards, raid 
the orchards and gardens, shoot anything with wings or 
fur or hair that they got sight of, and, after catching every 
trout possible, they killed the most of the remainder with 
explosives. At the end of ten years of attempted preserv- 
ation there is more game in the outside districts, where 
it is not so easy to reach it. In this time we had a tame 
deer shot within ten rods of the house, and many half- 
tamed birds, squirrels and other small creatures potted at 
our doors. There are few things as exasperating as some 
that I have mentioned, and this is a statement of facts, and 
the case is not half exploited. At this time we are en- 
deavoring to prevent vandalism by posting the premises. 
Our laws pronounce it a misdemeanor, punishable by a 
fine of at least $20 to "trespass" on posted and inclosed 
grounds — but no one ever hears of an arrest. 
Instead of feeling offended noAV when I see grounds 
posted, I feel that the owner of t.hem has some little 
humanity, and give him credit for, rather than condemn, 
his selfishness. Any conscientious sportsman who owns 
or controls wild lands should, from the best kind of mo- 
tives, post and protect them against vandals. If his game 
is plentiful he has friends enough worthy to share it upon 
his invitation. If a man is too poor to have land or 
friends who have, let him feel not wronged. If half the 
lands are posted and protected there will be overflow 
enough for the sportsman witlTout land or friends or 
anything but a gun and primitive instincts. It is as certain 
as anything in the world, atte>~ted by square miles of 
proof, that if some protection other, than enactment of 
laws is not extended the game of the country w'H scarcely 
be worth words in another ten years. 
If at this time I had the framing of a trespass law, I 
should make it the same offense as burglary or house- 
breaking to enter posted premises and kill or appropriate 
or destroy. No man should enter upon another's prop- 
erty with firearms or fishing tacide without permission, 
any more than he should with skeleton keys, a jimmy 
or a supply of djmamite. If he does so he should be sub- 
ject to the same hazard under the law that a liurglar is. 
It is the same offense and has been tolerated longer than 
any other uncivilized custom of past ages. From the 
sportsman's standpoint the stringent protection' of private 
lands by potent laws and sensible penalties would do as 
much or more for the preservation of game than all other 
efforts combined. I.et the private owner realize that his 
groitnds and the am'mal and bird life upon them are really 
his property, and there will be plenty of energetic wardens. 
Ransacker. 
Flickers ia New Jersey. 
Editor Forest and Stremn: 
Considerable comment has been caused by an apparent 
conflict of the laws passed last year in relation to the 
killing of the bird referred to in the general fish and game 
act as the flicker or highholder. The Legislature appar- 
ently intended to permit the killing of these birds during 
September and October, but it is the opinion of lawyers 
generally that the Legislature did not succeed in carrying 
out its intention. . The gunners of the State looked to the 
Board of Fish and Game Commissioners for an interpreta- 
tion of the law, and this Board, at its last meeting, de- 
termined to instruct its officers to arrest all persons killing 
the birds referred to. 
The reasons for this action were explained as follows by 
Mr. Howard P. Frothingham, President and Treasurer of 
the State Board : . 
'Tn formulating fish and game laws there are other cir- 
cumstances to be considered besides the preservation of 
fish and game or the pleasure of the sportsman. The 
sentiment which protects a bird because it is beautiful or 
because it sings sweetly is laudable, but there is some- 
thing more substantial than sentiment which has brought 
about our fish and game laws. Birds are of great value 
to the farmer and horticulturist, to the man wlio has but 
a single tree which he calls his own, and to all who love to 
see nature in all its glory undiminished. Birds are the 
natural enemies of insects, just as many of the latter are 
the natural enemies of vegetation, and tliis brings me 
down to the question of the protection of the flicker. The 
bird is. a woodpecker, and its proper name is the golden- 
winged woodpecker. In various localities it is called 
yellowhammer. clape and highhole. Highholder is simply 
an ignorant corruption of highhole, the latter name being 
frequently given to the bird on account of its nesting h'gh 
up in holes in trees. The woodpeckers, with the single 
exception of the sapsucker or yellow-bellied woodpecker, 
are among the most useful of birds. They devote nearly 
the whole of their lives to the destruction of noxious in- 
sects, and in this way contribute materially to the success 
of the tiller of the soil, and also to the pleasure of every 
man who prefers trees with healthful foliage to trees cov- 
ered with caterpillars or denuded of their foliage by in- 
sects. 
"This consideration alone should be sufficient to protect 
tile bird at all times. A. law permitting the killing of 
woodpeckers would be a very pernicious one,, and I do 
not believe you can find such a law in any State in the 
Union nor in any civilized country. That there is no 
such law in New Jersey is due mainly to accident, and a 
glorious accident it was. The fourth section of the general 
fish and game act provides that it shall be unlawful to 
kill certain birds excepting at certain times; this .section 
provides that it shall be vmlawful to kill flickers or high- 
holders excepting" during the months of September and 
October, but it prov'des no penalty for their killing at any 
other time. But the section immediately succeeding makes 
it unlawful to kill woodpeckers — excepting the sapsuckers 
— at all times of tlie year. So, according to the law, you 
can kill flickers in September and October, and you cannot 
be punished for killing them in any month of the year, 
but you cannot kill woodpeckers, and flickers are wood- 
peckers every day in the year. I do not think that the 
question is a debatable one. The law plainly provides a 
penalty for the killing of woodpeckers, and that law will 
be enforced as long as I have anything to say about the 
protection of birds. The Board of Fish and Game Com- 
missioners has unanimously resolved that Section 5 of the 
present law, which plainly prohibits the killing of flickers 
at all titnes of the year, shall be enforced. 
"For many years we have striven to have a uniform 
dpen and close season as far as possible. We have at- 
tained this now, the general open season being the months 
of November and December. To permit the shooting of 
flickers or any other kind of birds in September and 
October would mean a great destruction of other kinds of 
game, for it would be used as a warrant for every violator 
of the law to be in the woods during those months. It 
is true that the law permits the killing of woodcock in 
October, but woodcock are to be found in swamps and 
marshy places and not where woodpeckers make their 
homes. I believe that a man who would shoot the useful 
flicker would shoot a quail on its nest. I am glad that 
the Legislature did not succeed in its attempt to legalize 
the slaughter of one of the most useful of our wild birds 
and I sincerely hope that the next Legislature will wipe 
out every evidence of any such attempt ever having been 
made." "H. P. Frothingham, 
"President Board of Fish and Game Commissioners of 
Kew Jersey." 
Game 
in 
Mai 
me. 
Boston, Sept. 14. — To-morrow, Sept. 15, opens the sea- 
son for partridge shooting in Maine. Letters from guide , 
and others interested are conflicting in their accounts of 
prospects for that sort of game. In the more settled sec- 
tions it is very evident that partridges are not plenty — 
not so many as in former seasons, even. It is pla'n tli ,t 
the noble grouse is on the wane in the more hunted 
sections of that State, and it is not strange that it is so 
when it is remembered that in the cities of Bang .r. 
Waterville, Auburn, Lewiston and Portland, there rre 
more crack shots to the square mile than in almost a iy 
other section of the country. Lewiston and Aulnirn 
have at least half a dozen crack shots, capable of follow- 
ing up at each shoot 96 and 97 clay pigeons out of a 
possible hundred. Two or three members of the Auburn 
Gun Club are tied on score of 96, and with this record 
they go to the State shoots every season. These shots 
arc all great lovers of acttial bird shooting, and some of 
them own good dogs. It is understood that where these 
crack shots gun it is almost impossible for a partridge 
to escape. 
Reports from guides and others in the backwoods sec- 
tions of Maine say that partridges are really very plenty. 
Many of the fishermen who have stayed at the many 
Maine resorts for the fall fly-fishing will take in the 
partridge shooting. A guide writes from the vicinity of 
Patten, Aroostook county, that the partridges are more 
plenty than he has ever before seen them. Another 
writes that on the Megantic preserve the shooting will be 
excellent, with deer very plenty. The Patten guide just 
noted says that moose and deer are about the same as 
last year. From Norcross come reports of great numbers 
of partridges, with moose and deer as plenty as last year. 
From the upper end of the Twin Lakes come reports of 
great chances for bird shooting. Ducks are numerous, 
with partridges plenty. Moose and deer in the section 
of Maine between Norcross and the Allaguash waters, are 
positively abundant. Tourists who have made the cele- 
brated canoe and carry trip from either Norcross, or 
through the old carry from Moosehead, to the Chesun- 
cook waters, thence up the lakes and over the carry to 
the Allaguash and down to the St, John, are very enthusi- 
astic about game in that part of the country. All the 
partridges — both ruffed grouse and spruce — are to be had 
that one could possibly care for, with black duck, wood 
diick and teal very plentiful. Prof. J. F. Moody, of 
Auburn, Me., and his son. J. F. Moody, Jr., returned 
the other day from a three weeks' trip, starting with a 
canoe at Norcross, thence up through the lakes and car- 
ries to the Allaguash, and down to Frederickton. They 
write that it was a glorious trip. They paddled their own 
canoe, camping where night overtook them. They saw 
118 deer and eleven moose. The deer, in some cases, 
would scarcely get out of the water to let them pass, all 
being in easy range. They frequently paddled up to 
within SO feet of big bull moose. They pronounce it a 
great game country for the hunter who has the time and 
the courage to make the trip in the open sea.son. 
Special. 
CHICAGO AND THE WEST. 
The Student and His Friends. 
Chicago, 111., Sept. 14, — The desk of the Student is in_ 
the room adjoining my own. We told about him on a 
little quail hunt last fall. At that time we didn't allow 
him to carry his gun loaded, for fear he would kill sorae- 
bod\'. This fall he became permeated with a fierce en- 
thusiasm to go out and slay some prairie chickens. He 
came in and borrowed my pet chicken gun. which I was 
going to use myself on opening day — a light-weight affair 
which has a very good record attached to it — and in com- 
pany with one or two friends of this city and one or two 
more of Minneapolis, got out into the chicken 
country. As luck woitld have it, he fell into the hands 
of Game Wardeii Stephens, of Detroit, Minn., a most 
fortunate thing for the entire party. It seems that Mr. 
Stephens had ducks and chickens to burn, and that the 
little party during their stay killed something like 104 
birds, nearly all prairie chickens. The Student was gone 
from home something like ten days, and when he reached 
his desk he was the happiest fellow that any one ever 
did see. 
"Just look at my arm," he said, and he stripped up 
his shirt sleeve, showing an arm absolutely black and 
blue from shoulder to elbow, and part of the chest hardly 
less discolored. 
"That gun of yours is a corker," said he. (I had told 
him not to shoot over 2^ drams in the gun.) "It kicked 
me pretty near to death, but you ought to see me reach the 
birds. I killed thirteen birds all by myself that I know 
of, and that is more than any one else in our party is 
able to say. Fun? Why, it was out of sight. I never had 
such a good time in my life. Say, those dogs of Mr. 
Stephens',, they just kept going back and forward like 
they were machines, and when they came to birds, they 
pointed them the finest you ever saw. Then the birds 
would go up and we would whang it into them. I never 
had such a time in all my life. That is the furthest West 
I ever got, but I want you to hear me, hereafter I am 
gomg to spend all my vacations out there. We all made a 
solemn oath that next year would find us up there with 
Stephens. We went duck hunting for a little while, and I 
got into the mud up to my waist, and one of the fellows, 
who took the slats out of the bottom of his boat went in 
so far that we had hard work to find- him. You see, the 
duc)<:s were sitting in the water and wouldn't fly^ So I 
got out and tried to scare them in to the decoys." (Of 
course he did, and he found you can't drive ducks into 
decoys.) "I killed one or two teal that came over and 
one mallard. There was one awful big green-leaded 
mallard' that got out of the rushes, <^nd I smashed it to 
him. I had to take off my clothes and wade into the 
mud to get that duck, but I wouldn't have taken a hun- , 
dred dollars for him. It was the prettiest duck you ever ' 
saw ! 
"But talk about dogs! You ought to have seen those 
dogs. Say, I bought me a dog ! I am going to keep it in 
my house here in the city somehow. I paid Stephens $5 
down, which was all I had at the time, and I am going to 
give him the rest as quick as he wants it. He is going to 
finish training it for me, and I will get it- some time in 
October. He is a red sort of dog, Irish .setter or pointer, I 
think they called it; has brown and (liver .spots. I guess 
he's Irish. Anyhow, it's a bird dog. At least its brother 
is, and so is its mother. You hear me, I'm going to have 
a gun and dog of my own if I don't do anything else. 
There is something the matter with your gun, though, and 
I guess I won't borrow it any more. My arm got so sore 
that on the last day it made ine sick at my stomach to 
shoot any more, and T could hardly open the gUn to get a 
shell in. I had to give it up and climb up on the wagon. 
I think I'll get a gun that does not kick quite so much. 
.And then when you see my new dog, I think you will 
allow I am strictly in it. That's the way my vacations go 
after this. I promise you." 
And very much worse spent the Student's vacations 
might be. Too bad the gun kicked him and .spoiled his 
fun. Next year he will be advanced student enough to 
know that you must not shoot t;4 ounces of shot and 3J4 
drams of powder in a 614-pound gun. But the enthusiasm, 
the youth, the ;:heer joyousiiess of the Student's story — 
how it does carry one back, and how it does, forsooth, 
carry one afield ! I am very sure that I enjoyed the 
St^^dent's chicken hunt almost more than I did mf own, 
e^'e^ if he did have my pet gun along. 
Twin Lakes Game Presetvcs, 
Messrs. Dick Mott, Will Read', J. ¥1. Stout and Dr. W. 
E. Fellows, together with a number of Des Moines. la.. 
sport.smen. have bought 500 acres of land adjoining Twin 
Lakes, in Calhoun county, la. There was formerly a hotel 
at Twin Lakes, and this will serve as a club house, and 
will be kept open during the hunting season. No one 
will be allowed to shoot on the grounds excepting club 
members. Twin Lakes, la., are located in one of the 
old-time hunting grounds of the writer. Calhoim county 
was formerly not to be surpassed as a prairie chicken 
country, and numbers of ducks were to be found on the 
lakes, both local birds and travelers in season. The lakes 
are of the shallow, mud-bottom variety common to centra>l 
,Iowa, but in the old times used to furnish a certain num- 
ber of good-.sized pickerel. Twenty years ago all this 
country was virgin grass ground, and the idea of a shoot- 
ing club or a game law wonld have been scouted by the 
few farmers wlio then occupied the country, 
Illinois Chickens. 
Reports continue to show that the prairie chicken crop 
in Illinois was by no means an inconsiderable one. Mr'. 
E. L. Palmer, of Sycamore, III., states that a great nianv 
birds were killed adjacent to', that town this past week. 
One party of Chicago gentlemen bagged thirty-eight birds, 
two local men killed twenty-eight, and many other.s had 
success of sinailar proportions. 
Dr. C. VV. Carson, of this city, says that friends told him 
that there was fine prairie chicken shooting all over the 
northern and western part of the State of Illinois, naore 
especially around .such points as Geneseo and New Boston, 
which are near the Mississippi bottoms. At the latter 
point some splendid bags were made, two gentlemen from 
Rock Island killing sixty-eight chickens in one day. Dr. 
Carson says he heard of several other bags of 50, 40. etc., 
made-in one day by respective parties. These bags were 
sometimes made by two guns, sometimes by as many as 
three or four guns shooting over the .same dogs but the 
total numbers arc quite sufficient to show that the prairie 
chicken crop was very far in advance of the. average, 
Hon. Hemstead VVashburne, of this city, hunted with 
a friend at his favorite grounds near Morris, 111., not 
fifty miles out of the town, and bagged nineteen birds on 
opening day, certainly a very satisfactory showing in v!ew 
of all the circumstances, 
Out-of-Town Shooting. 
Mr. J. L. Jones i.s back from a week's chicken shooting 
in^ Minnesota. He w^s located near the Manitoba line and 
had very fine sport indeed. He and a friend had a daily 
average of about 25 birds to the gun — certainly all the 
sport one could ask. 
Messrs. Joy Morton and Paul Morton, of this city, are 
recently back from a special-car trip over the Santa Fe 
system, during which they spent most of their time near 
Port Arthur. Tex. They had splendid shooting on prairie 
chickens, not far back from the Gulf coast in the big Lone 
Star State. They declared their intention of going down 
again a little later to enjoy some of the duck shooting. 
They say no Northern man has any idea of the quality of 
the sport in that part of the country. 
Mr. John W. Gates, the iron and steel magnate, and his 
son, Mr. C. G. Gates, last year shot in the same coun- 
try where the Messrs. Morton have been this fall. At 
that time they had 30,000 shells sent down to them, and 
it is thought that their ammunition order for this fall will 
run at least as much. 
Hon. James H. Eckels, formerly GomptroIIer of the U.' 
S. Currency, leaves for Denver, Colo., next week, well 
outfitted for a trip m the Rocky Mountains, for which he 
will make Denver his going-in place. 
Mr. W. B. Mershon, of Saginaw, Mich., captain of the 
