246 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
fSEPT. 28, 1 00 1- 
CHICAGO Aro^THE WEST. 
The Dttcfc Flight. 
Chicago, Sept. 20.— The ordinary date for the arrival 
of the first flight of teal at this latitude is Sept. 22. This 
year the birds made their appearance somewhat earlier 
(hail usual, and on Wednesday of this week, Sept. 18, 
they appeared at different places along the Illinois River. 
At Hennepin Club Mr. W. W. McFarland in one day 
bagged 145 teal and wood ducks, one of the largest bags 
ever made in that club, and the largest of which one 
lias personal knowledge at any point near Chicago for 
many years. It is impossible to state whether tliese 
were Northern birds, or simply the collections of local 
birds of the adjacent marshes, where the shooting had 
been more general than on the preserved ground. 
The following letter of inquiry as to duck shooting 
dates is from Mr. Thos. E. TaUmadge, of Chicago: 
"I was at Rice Lake, Wis., last October. We did not 
fish the lake at all as none of the guides seemed to think 
that there were fish in it. We, however, secured good 
duck shooting — wood duck and mallards — as they came 
there to roost in the evening. What, in your opinion, is 
the best time in that locality to shoot ducks? We had 
very warm, wet weather, and on the last day we were 
there (Oct. 15) occurred a great flight of mallards, which 
made me think that possibly we were there too early for 
the best shooting. The ducks were all in large flocks, 
preparatory, I suppose, to migration. They decoyed 
easily. Ap I wish to return this fall to that locality, I 
would be most obliged for your opinion as to the proper 
time. What other lakes are good for ducks in Northern 
Wisconsin?" 
The best reply for Mr. Tallmadge is to ask him to 
read the columns of the Forest and Stream regularly. 
In these days the duck flight is a spasmodic and some- 
what transient affair, more especially in these lower lati- 
tudes, and it depends altogether on the state of the 
weather in the North. Cold storms drive the birds down, 
and if they find a good marsh, showing good feed and 
good protection, they drop in there to rest until the cold 
weather catches them again. Thus localized for the time, 
they work about more in rough weather. Given a few 
days of good duck weather, they usually get such a 
pounding that they get up and leave for some other 
place. Hence, an available flight is only a matter of a 
few days. 
In the farther North these conditions do not obtain 
in all regards, as the birds are less disturbed. I have 
already mentioned an early flight of teal below Chicago. 
It would seem fair to suppose that the last week of this 
month and the first week of October would be a good 
lime to visit Rice Lake. As to the locality of this par- 
ticular Rice Lake, it is difficult to tell, for a county which 
is located in Wisconsin or Minnesota, and which does 
not have a half dozen "Rice Lakes" in it, is in rather 
hard luck, yet, in general terms, it is pretty safe to head 
for any lake which is named Rice Lake, for the name 
comes from the wild rice plant, which is the best possi- 
ble feed the ducks can obtain in the Northern country. 
Given big beds of wild rice and one is safe to have shoot- 
ing. The Manitowish River of Wisconsin has such rice 
beds, and there are lots of ducks in these at this writing. 
Out in Minnesota, in the wild rice lakes, near Cabe- 
kona camp, visitors are killing a dozen birds a day with- 
out any trouble. There is no more delightful form of 
wild fowl shooting than that offered on these wild North- 
ern lakes, such as that which Mr. Tallmadge mentions. 
Usually there are not so many gims present as prevail 
at this latitude, the birds work nicely, and are fat and 
delicious from feeding on this bountiful and beautiful 
wild gram. 
More Ducks. 
Sept. 21. — Mr,. Chas. Muercke, of Nippersink, on Fox 
Lake, 111., came down town to-day in a very much ex- 
cited frame of mind. He says that the teal are there 
simply in thousands. He killed 40 day before yesterday 
and 60 yesterday, and says that any one who came up 
there right away would have good shooting. The birds 
come in late in the evening and go out early in the 
morning, departing to some unknown region during the 
day. 
Carp and Canvas Backs. 
A.Wisconsin paper, the Fox Lake Representative, pre- 
dicts a good duck season at Fox Lake, Wis., for the sin- 
gular reason that the carp have eaten up nearly all the 
wild celery of Lake Koshkonong, the once famous can- 
vasback water, and that hence the birds will take up with 
Fox Lake instead, the latter having a good stock of wild 
celery, and no carp. 
If it be indeed true that these pestiferous fish have 
ruined the feed on the formerly mragnificent wild fowl 
water of Koshkonong, then, indeed, there should be 
written against the carp one of the bitterest protests ever 
yet penned It is well known that the carp have destroyed 
inanv and many a good duck marsh in Illinois and Indi- 
ana. One recollects very well how Col. C. E. Felton, of 
this city, was laughed at, in a meeting of the Illinois 
State Sporting Association, for introducing a resolution 
against the German carp as a destroyer of duck marshes; 
yet the passing years have proved the justice of that con- 
tent-on If these fish have ruined Koshkonong they have 
done a bad job, indeed, yet they could ascend the Rock 
River from the Mississippi and reach that water di- 
rectly. ' 
Plenty of Quail. 
Law or no law, Bobwhite holds his own in Illinois. 
For this fall, at least, there will be as good shooting as 
we ever had in this State, 
Minnesota Congressional Trip. 
Congressman Tawney, of Minnesota, who held promi- 
nent part in the Congressional expedition two years ago 
in the interest of the Minnesota National Park, has been 
in charge of a similar expedition, which was to have 
^t.^rted this week for the same country which was for- 
merly visited. Congressman Tawney_ had more than 
twenty Senators and Representatives in his party, and 
there "exists no doubt that all of these would have been 
delighted and benefited by their journey to what little 
there is left of the ancient Minnesota wilderness. The 
death of President McKinley put an end to all present 
plans for this trip. Col. John S. Cooper, of Chicago, 
the original parent of the Minnesota National Park, is 
at present at his country place near Oconomowoc, Wis. 
News in the Rockies. 
Billy Hofer writes from Gardner, Montana, under date 
of Sept. 17, teUing how the sad news of the national 
calamity has penetrated into the Rocky Mountains. It 
is well known that Mr. Hofer guided President Roose- 
velt on one or two of his hunting trips in the West. The 
locality to which he refers is probably in the neighbor- 
hood of the Two Oceans Pass. He writes as below: 
"Have just returned from a trip with a Baltimore party, 
B. N. B.iker ;md others. Was camped where I had been 
with Mr. Roosevelt when I heard of the shooting of 
President McKinley. 
"One of the party, E. Stanley Garry, got a cinnamon 
bear, not as large as yours, that took nine shots to kill, 
mostly -30-30. It came for them (Collins was Garry's 
informing guide) from the first shot, putting its head be- . 
tween its hind legs and rolling down hill to within twenty 
feet of Garry, when it stood up. Then Garry shot it in 
the head. Quite a number of bear. We did not have 
time to hunt." 
Nearly Across. 
Mr. Graham H. Harris, President of the Board of 
Education of Chicago, is back this week from an extended 
trip in the AVest which occupied the greater part of this 
summer. He did some fishing in the Yellowstone Park, 
and tlien headed straight West, and did not stop until 
he got to the Sandwich Islands. Mr. Harris spent con- 
siderable time with the Honolufuans. and says that the 
countrv is not wnthdut its charms, though the climate 
he did not like. He says he was so nearly across the 
Pacific he could see the Filipinos from where he was. 
Mysteries of Illinois Game Laws. 
We have just seen the wisdom of Judge Trimble, who 
pleads that Sunday 'is the same as Saturday; of course, 
.we remember the famous Texas justice of the peace who 
decided that the liqvtor law was "unconstitutional"; now 
we have yet another instance of legal wisdom in the case 
of Justice D. Browne Armour, of Carroll county, III. 
Mr." E. K. Stedman, of Mt. Carroll, 111., graphically re- 
ports the instance as below: 
"On Aug. 7 I arose early and started for a day's fish- 
ing. I walked along the shore about a hundred yards, 
laid mv rod bv while filling my pipe, had just lighted it 
and was ready 'to begin operations, when two gentlemen of 
sporting tendencies — viz., John Johnson and Henry Rip- 
ple — threw a trammel net around the log beside which I 
was going to drop a line. Then up one side of the bayou 
and down the other they went, setting their net around 
every brush pile, log and fallen trunk until they had made 
a complete canvass of every 'hang out' for game fish. I 
went home, fishless, disgusted and mad. 
"I wrote a letter to our mutual friend. Dr. S. P. Bart- 
lett, of the U. S. Fish Commission, stating the facts. Dr. 
Bartlett forwarded the letter to President Cohen, of the 
State Commission, with a kind endorsement, and in a 
few davs Mr. S. D. Sites, a State game warden, introduced 
himself to me. I went with him to the scene of opera- 
tions, and we captured two trammel nets, on^: seine and 
two hoop nets. We made seven arrests, of which four 
pleaded guilty, paid their fines and costs, and the other 
three stood trial. 
"Here a fimny thing occurred. The lawyers found an 
amendment had been added to our fish laws which made 
it permissible to seine anywhere at any tirne with anything 
on or in any waters within the jurisdiction of the State 
of Illinois. The State's attorney and the Justice of the 
Peace before whom the case was tried said it was so. 
But out of pure good-heartedness and love for their fel- 
lowmen, they made these men who were^ not guilty of 
any wrong-doing pay the costs of constable's and justice's 
fees, and dismissed the case for *No cause for action.' 
"I take great pleasure in stating that this decision was 
rendered by D. Browne Armour, of Carroll county. 111., 
hoping that any members of the bar who do not think 
such decisions can be made wnll see wherein they err. 
W. S. Markley was State's attorney in this wonderful 
case, and, as I said before, sometimes they do and some- 
times they don't convict when it comes to fish laws. 
"I wish to say that Mr. Bartlett and Mr. Cohen acted 
promptly and courteously on my request; that the man 
sent me' Mr. Sites, was a first-class man in every respect, 
and performed his duties in a gentlemanly and business- 
like manner. But what can a man do Avhen he bumps up 
against such wisdom as that which makes an innocent 
person pay costs of prosecution in a criminal case, which 
is dismissed for 'want of cause for action' ? I might add 
that the justice who rendered the decision in the case has 
been taking a vacation ever s-ince 'without any [apparent] 
cause for action.' " 
The same writer is g'ood enough to add some facts re- 
garding tire game supply and game laws in this vicinity, 
which is naturally a very good sporting region, but which 
seems to be much infested by law-breakers : 
"I have noticed two coveys of prairie chickens on our 
bottom lands during the past month, and there were some 
ducks here, bitt they are all gone now. Been gone about 
two weeks. Ducks are migrating, so I sxippose they 
migrated. 
"One day a couple of weeks ago while at Sand Slough, I 
found a boat with fifty dead snipe and plover and four 
ducks, also dead, under the seat. I know the number, for 
fish were, not biting well, so I stopped and counted them. 
Ho one seemed to own the boat. I waited an hour and 
nobody came to claim the game. There "are about fifty 
people camped at this place, but none of them knew who 
had such a boat. They had none of them heard any shoot- 
ing. Maybe those birds were migrating also — I don't 
know. 
"There has not been any satisfactory hook-and-line fish- 
ing around here this season — seines everywhere. I never 
remember, though, of having noticed as many snipe and 
plover breeding here as there have been this season. The 
banks of the lakes and creeks are thick with them. 
".'Vnd here is anuiher curious thing. I took down the 
statutes the other day to look at the snipe law, and here 
is the way it reads : 
*' 'It is hereby declared tmlawful to hunt, kill, etc, any 
jacksnipe, Wilson snipe, sand snipe, plover, etc., or any 
other kind of snipe and plover, etc.. * * * between the 
25th day of April and the ist day of September, of each 
succeeding year.' 
According to that I can kill them, not this September 
nor next September. It really places a prohibitive law on 
snipe and plover, or, at least, that's the way I sense it. 
"Lots of quail here, and every farmer has his farm 
posted, and they mean business, too. If the lawmakers of 
this grand State can't protect the quail, the farmers can. 
If our brainy, gifted and eloquent Assemblies won't look 
out for the game, we will have to ask the farmer to help 
us out, and I hope that every farm in this county will 
be posted, and honor each farmer who will stick by it. 
"The water in the lakes is very low. There is not much 
duck food here at present. There may be a flight in late 
October or early November. I hope so, don't you?" 
E. Hough. 
Hartfoed Building, Chicago, III. 
Shore Bird Shooting. 
The true sportsman who has a natural love for the gun 
and the exhilarating pleasure derived \rom hunting in the 
upland partridge and woodcock, or on the salt meadows 
where small bunches of sandpipers in July may be seen, up 
to the larger sicklebill curlews which fly rapidly south, 
skirting the clouds in September during a heavy northeast 
storm; the enthusiast who specially delights in shooting 
shore birds over decoys and who sits for hours in the 
blind scanning the four points to catch sight of or to hear 
the call note of a solitary specimen, will, at times, under 
the most favorable conditions, be doomed to disappoint- 
ment, and his patience be well nigh exhausted. The great 
salt meadows, so-called, lying between Plum Island on 
the south and Hampton River on the north, over which I 
have shot a number of years, cover an area of two miles in 
length and three-quarters in width, bordered on the left 
by a heavy growth of pines, and on the right by the At- 
lantic Ocean, with its numerous pond holes thereon, form 
a grand place for the birds to feed on in their journey 
from the north. 
In July sandpipers and summer yellowlegs will be seen ; 
in August winter yellowlegs, golden plover, and black- 
breasters, will fly in fairly good numbers ; while Septem- 
ber brings grass birds and curlews, with straggling win- 
tens, which remain to the last. 
These birds are early risers, and are on the wing scurry- 
ing and calling from one pond to another long before the 
gunner in the blind can discern them. 
Early morning and evening afford the best shooting, 
and he is a wise shooter who does not take up his decoys 
until the sun sinks low and the shades of night appear. 
■ Seldom will it come to the experience of the sportsman 
to witness a large flight of these birds. The only true 
flight, as far as number and variety go, occurred on these 
meadows during the line storm of September, 1884, be- 
tween the iith and 14th. This northeast storm com- 
menced at 10 A. M.,and at 3 P. M. was a blinding and be- 
wildering tempest of rain. I was alone in the blind, rafts 
of birds filled the air at all points, including sandpipers, 
grass birds, yellowlegs and curlews, wheeling like a long 
column of soldiers in mid-air, completely dazzled by- the 
storm. Bunches of golden plover flew by the blind not 
over ten feet high, paying not the slightest attention to 
the call or decoys. All night the storm continued, and at 
7 A. M. clouds of grass birds could be seen flying hurried- 
ly south. At 10 the storm broke, the sun came out, and 
at II not a bird was to be seen. I never before or since 
observed such a sight. The number I killed was eighty- 
six birds, and the smallest was a grass snipe. 
But the sportsman's imagination must not run too high 
as regards the number he will kill; he should be able to de- 
test readily the kind of birds that approach the decoys, 
and know how to whistle correctly their call note. 
The size of the bag greatly depends on this, besides, of 
course, knowing what to do and how to shopt when the 
birds alight. 
On the wdiole, if the birds fly fairly well, a week spent 
on these meadows is well enjoyed. One will delight in the 
beautiful scenery, the sound of the surf as it breaks on 
the beach, the splendor of the sim as it sinks in the hori- 
zon and, last, the prevailing stillness as it creeps over the 
meadow as he journeys homeward from the blind. 
John Leary. 
Cambridgeport, Mass. 
Maine Game* 
Some excellent hunting reports are just coming in 
from Megantic Preserve. Mr. W. R. Buckminster and 
Mr. J. E. Crawley have made a record there of 84 par- 
tridges, I bear, i buck and i doe deer. The partridges 
were all shot with the rifle; the result of a hunting trip 
covering a period of three weeks. The birds were all 
used for the camp table. It is further reported that par- 
tridges are very plenty on that preserve. Mr. L. G. 
Burnham, of Boston, is at the Club House, Megantic 
Preserve. Partridges are reported plenty about the Mid- 
dle Dam, Richardson Lake, Me., and at York's Camp, 
above Rangeley. Dr. E. H, Stevens and Stillman F. 
Kelley and son, of Cambridge, Mass., have recently re- 
turned from a fishing and hunting trip to Carry Ponds, 
Me. They had good sport, and are much pleased with 
the location, which is not a new one to Dr. Stevens, by 
any means. The region is a remarkable one, on the 
upper Kennebec waters. The ponds, under Old Abram 
and Saddleback Mountains, are over 2,000 feet above sea 
level, and take their name Carrying Place — shortened to 
Carry Ponds — from the fact that they are in the track 
celebrated in history as traversed by Benedict Arnold, on 
his way to Canada. There are three or four of these Car- 
rying Place Ponds, and they have long been known to 
fishermen of the towns below. The march of improve- 
ment has put up fine camps there within a few y^ears, and 
doubtless the trout fishing is doomed, but never the won- 
derful mountain scenery and exhilarating atmosnhere. 
. ' ^ _ Speciai;. 
