MARCft r4 1903.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
209 
the need of keeping such a reservoil' mtact, regardless 
of the price of timber and pulp. In every town around 
the mountains one hears that "there must be some 
way of getting the hard wood to marl<et." With tlie 
trees all gone, it wiH be seen, even by the man who 
measures things by dollars, that the forest standing 
on the mou.ntains is in a better market than any con- 
ceivable as sawed timber, simply as health and cleanli- 
ness to the lodwland cities. 
And then, some day, the time will arrive when even 
the descendants of Chas. Day will see that the spirit- 
ual health of mankind and easy access to the preserva- 
tions and cares thereof is as much more needful than 
the bodily health, as the Dids'mus idea of values is su- 
perior to that of Chas. Day. 
And by all means, keep religion out of this matter. 
Business is business, and game parks have nothing to 
do with doing unto others. Raymond S. Spears. 
Newfoundland and the Caribou. 
Severat^ articles have recently appeared in our maga- 
zines on the Newfoundland caribou (Rangifer terranovcc) , 
and the necessary information connected with its capture 
b\' the sportsman. These have been written by men who, 
having been there, are in a position to know ; and their 
unanimous opinion seems to be that at present the island 
is one A'ast game preserve. In fact, from the reports and 
midoubted success of all who have been there during the 
open season, the idea has become pretty well established 
these last three or four years that in Newfoundland a 
man with limited time would be surer of securing his 
legal number of good heads than in any other section of 
eastern North America, Labrador being the only possible 
exception. At present, however, the facilities for hunting 
and traveling are so poorly developed in the latter region, 
it is so difficult of access, so vast in extent that often con- 
siderable time might be spent in locating a "good game 
country," and the sportsman with limited time will hardly 
make the venture. 
The present conditions in Newfoundland, and the ade- 
quacy and efficiency of its game preservation, should then 
become objects of peculiar interest to American sports- 
men ; and especially to those of us who, handicapped hy 
scanty time or means, never have and never will reach 
the great game regions of the West and Northwest, but 
v/ho are compelled to take what is offered hy the East or 
nothing. 
Reports from Newfoundland have not been exag- 
gerated. I have recently returned from the island and 
found it, as it has been named, "A vast deer park." In a 
short time \vc saw about eighty deer, as they are called by 
the guides, and a friend who was there for three weeks 
at the same time counted over sixty stags alone, to say 
nothing of does and fawns. A year ago last fall, Dr. 
Henry Van Dyke, who. was on the island early in Sep- 
tember, informs me that the caribou were plentiful; while 
Professor Thompson and Mr. Scudder, of Princeton, N. 
J., had no difficulty in securing first rate heads. This 
was not during the period of the great migration, but in 
late August and early September, when the deer were 
for the most part living singly or in small companies 
around the ponds and heavily Avooded river bottoms, and 
before they had collected in herds on the open barrens. 
It is no unusual occurrence, later in September and dur- 
ing October, when their southward migration is inter- 
cepted, to see forty or fifty deer in the course of a single 
day. 
At present the caribou are abundant : There is no doubt 
about it. Plow long this will continue is, however, a 
different question, for if present conditions mean anything 
their numbers cannot fail to become very rapidly 
diminished. 
The A^ery nature and habits of the animals will tend 
to hasten and facihtate their destruction, for of all our 
big game they are the easiest to locate, to stalk, and to 
successfully bring to bag even by the most inexperienced 
tyro. As compared with the Virginia or red deer in its 
ability to elude the sportsman, the caribou, at least that 
of Newfoundland, is helplessness itself, and if the two 
species coexisting in a given area were subjected to an 
equal amount of hunting, the former would in all 
probability thrive long after the latter had been exter- 
minated. 
This is, of course, merely an hypothetical instance, as 
the red deer is not found on the island, but it illustrates 
without exaggeration the relative acuteness of the two 
animals in regard to their respective powers of self- 
preservation. 
Early in the fall, Mr. P. T. McGrath gave to the 
readers of Outing some startling facts in his description 
of the annual midwinter slaughter by the Newfoundland 
fishermen; and from what T learned and saw while in that 
countn^, I am convinced that unless the Government takes 
immediate and stringent measures against this merciless 
pursuit during the winter months the caribou are doomed 
to a swift and speedy destruction. The mere fact that 
the animals are still verj' abundant is no argument what- 
ever in favor of laxity or delay. Less than fifty years 
ago the American bison, now lost to ns forever, roamed 
our western prairies in countless millions. As a suffi- 
cient thickness of snow and ice is necessar3'^ to enable the 
dog teams and sledges to make the journey from the 
coast, this slaughter does not usually take place until well 
into the winter, long after the stags have dropped their 
antlers, and when the does are far adA^anced in pregnancj'. 
Both sexes are killed indiscriminately, although the stags 
at that time arc usually poor and thin, not a sufficient 
period having elapsed since the rutting season to Avarrant 
the best of meat. It frequently happens that the fisher- 
men in their efforts to get only the best and fattest, kill 
more animals than are really necessary or than it is pos- 
sible for them to "pack out;" the choicest carcasses are 
accordingly taken, the others are left to rot where they 
fall. The great majority of these fishermen are hunters 
neither by nature nor instinct. They know no more about 
the interior of the island nor the habits of the deer than 
a NcAV York cab driver does about game in the Adiron- 
dacks. They are usually piloted over the barrens by 
some guide who knoAvs the country and the most favor- 
able localities for taking the deer en masse. In this way 
the whole fishing community of the coast obtains its en- 
tire winter supply of meat, worth from three to five cents 
p&T pound. 
The Newfoundland Government seems to he sincere in 
its endeavor to protect the game, and some of its more 
recent legislation, notably the laws prohibiting shooting 
in the water and from the railroad track, is wisely con- 
ceived and has long been needed. In their general policy, 
however, the laws haA'e the common failing Avith those of 
so many of our big-game regions, and do not operate as 
an efficient protective agency, because they do not strike 
at the root of the evil. Last year great latitude was 
allowed the alien sportsman, but at present an exorbitant 
license fee keeps him from the island ; Avhile in either case 
no adequate remedy has been offered to curb this Avinter 
slaughter by the native NcAvfoundlanders. 
In rgoi the $40 non-resident license allowing the holder 
to take three deer seemed to many a wise and reasonable 
arrangement. The mischief was done, however, by allow- 
ing another license of $80 for seven caribou, which, of 
course, Avas much too large a number for any one man 
to he allowed. Last year a party of four camping to- 
gether legally killed twentj^-five deer. This season, how- 
ever, the Government, in its effort to protect the game 
from alien sportsmen, has gone to the other extreme, and 
seems to have done its utmost in prohibiting him from the 
island by imposing a non-resident license fee of $100. Of 
course the Game and Fish Commission must have a suffi- 
cient revenue to enforce its laAVS, but why should the 
caribou hunter be called upon to pay it all? Hundreds of 
salmon and trout and oitananiche are taken every season 
from the rivers of the west coast, yet no license, not 
e\en $5 per rod, is required. 
The results of this most short-sighted policy can, of 
course, be easily anticipated, and will prove more disas- 
troits to the half-destitute Newfoundland guides than to 
the sportsmen, who will undoubtedly seek elsewhere for 
their big game. The great forests of Quebec, Ontario and 
New Brunswick are well stocked, ea.sy of access, and the 
latter Province offers deer, moose and caribou for a $25 
license. 
In September last I found quite a number of men at 
Alexander Bay who had previously obtained employment 
for $2 a day as guides, veiy glad to earn $t a day as 
"packers," or human beasts of burden. "De hunters is'ent 
a'conuuin to de country dis year on account of de high 
license," was a frequent answer to my inquiries concern- 
ing the prospects for a successful autumn season. The 
people living along the line of the railroad vs'ere for the 
most pa'rt in a wretched condition, glad to get work at 
almost any price. 
American sportsmen should be encouraged by al! 
means; and intelligent legislation, adequate protective 
laws on the part of Newfoundland will give to her people 
an ever-increasing means of livelihood, and to the sports- 
man a wonderful country for the future. 
Nine-tenths of the people who go to Newfoundland for 
caribou are successful ; the other tenth usually miss. For 
the large majority, however, real success only exists as 
far as the procuring of heads is concerned. Of course, if 
the ambition and desire of the sportsman is merely to get 
antlers the easiest possible Avay, the present method of 
taking the game Avill strongly appeal to him — a method 
involving much killing but very little hunting. There are 
many rnen who go regularly every fall to Grand Lake or 
the vicinity of Howley, and return laden Avith trophies, 
well pleased with the trip and satisfied that they are real 
big-game hunters. The genuine sportsman, however, the 
one who puts the hunting before the killing, who enjoys 
the stalking more than the shooting, Avhose success is ap- 
preciated only after a day or week of hard tramping over 
a rough country, will not care for the hunting in New- 
foundland as it is carried on at present. In fact, a num- 
ber of gentlemen, old Adirondack and Maine sportsmen, 
AA^ho recently returned from the island reporting good luck, 
reluctantly confessed to me that after all it was rather 
unsatisfactory. "Too easy, too much like shooting cows 
in a pasture." It would seem absurd to condemn a region 
merely because game is too plentiful and very easily ob- 
tained, but too great an abundance (how rarely it occurs) 
may, under certain conditions, become just as demoraliz- 
ing as too great a scarcity. And I do not criticise NeAv- 
foundland_ as a game country, but merely the usual 
method of hunting as compared Avith another possible one. 
If the reader will glance at a map of the island he will 
see on the western coast a long narrow peninsula stretch- 
ing one hundred and fifty miles northward to the 
southern extremity of Labrador. In this great tract 
thouands of deer spend the summer months, and when the 
fall migration commences all are compelled to cross the 
railroad track at the narrow base of this peninsula on 
their southward journey. During September and Octo- 
ber a continuous stream of the animals traverses the com- 
pi^ratively small area around Sandy Pond and Howley; 
and it is to such places as these that the great majority 
of sportsmen repair. A camp is put up along the line 
of the railroad or on the shore of some suitable pond 
nearby where the deer are known to cross in numbers. 
The hunters merely sit still on the summit of a neighbor- 
ing knoll or hill and wait for the caribou to come along, 
scanning the barrens Avith field glasses and picking out 
the heads they wish. In the height of the season forty or 
fifty deer are often in sight at once, TIte stags are thor- 
oughly examined, the size of the antlers noted, and the 
one possessing the finest is accordingly singled out and 
shot. No particular skill is required to get within one 
hundred or even fifty yards of his game, provided the 
hunter strictly observes that most important rule, "Keep 
Avell to leeward." Should the animal be approaching 
along a "lead" or runway, the sportsman's fire is reserved 
until he is absolutely sure of hitting the mark. Even 
concealment is often unnecessary, for a caribou cannot, 
or at any rate does not, discriminate betAveen a bush and 
a man at one hundred j^ards, provided the latter remains 
motionless. But even should he be detected, a good 
standing shot may ahvays be obtained while the animal 
stares stupidly at the intruder. During the rutting season 
many an old stag has met his death by means of a very 
simple deception employed by the guide. The latter 
merely Avalks in a stooping posture, through bushes high 
enough to conceal his legs. Avith a pair of antlers held 
aloft. A dry branch of the proper shape is easier to pro- 
cure and Avill answer the purpose just as well. A fre- 
quent plan is for the sportsman to remain in camp all day, 
but with a guide posted as lookout on a neighboring hill, 
who gives the signal when game is observed. One gentle- 
man usually posts his guide in a tree top, and when a 
stag is sighted an electric button is pressed; the animal 
is according stalked and killed with little more excitement 
and often far less trouble than is required to stick a pig 
in a barnyard. 
This method of having the game walk up almost within 
sight of the tent, of course, does neither appeal to nor 
satisfy the man who wants real hunting, and by whom the 
killing is only appreciated when it comes at the end rather 
than at the beginning of the hunt. To such a man the 
writer can heartily recommend a trip similar to one taken 
by him in companj^ with Frank and Nevin Sayre, of 
South Bethlehem, Pa., ear\y last September. 
Plitherto the preA'alent notion among sportsmen has 
been that all the caribou migrate southward every fall, 
returning the following spring; and this is true to a cer- 
tain extent. The deer do moA'e tOAvard the south in the 
autumn, but by no means do they all go northAvard at the 
close of the winter. The whole central and southern 
interior, comprising one-half the area of the island, con- 
tains the year around vast numbers of non-migratory ani- 
mals, or those that have lost the instinct to migrate. This 
great Avilderness, almost unknown to sportsmen, is the 
pernianent home of thousands of caribou that, never hav- 
ing seen the railroad, have consequently escaped the mur- 
derous fusillade at Howley and Grand Lake. And it is 
in the interior that the very finest heads are to be obtained 
at the present time. The reason for this is obvious. The 
herds which are accustomed to regularly cross the rail- 
road track have been examined with the glasses and 
sorted over so often during the last ten years that a 
great many of the real old stags have long since fallen. 
Small deer are still A'cry abundant, but there is no doubt 
about it that the grand old patriarchs, the forty and fifty 
])ointers, are not nearly as frequent as some years ago. 
One has merely to examine the quality of the heads 
shipped from Port au Basques to see that a thirty-five 
pointer is considerably above the average, Avhile many of 
the antlers are but little larger than those of a good sized 
red deer. 
It is then to this vast central region, in size twice that 
of the State of New Jersey, four times the area of the 
Adirondacks, a country of unknoAvn streams and lakes, 
of broad open barrens and wooded hills, that the sports- 
man is recommended to direct his attention. 
Last fall the writer was one of a party of three who, 
with Bob -Stroud, of Alexander Bay, as head guide (and 
a better man is not to be found), made a successful trip 
into the interior. Our destination Avas one of the many 
unfrequented lakes up at the headwaters of the Terra 
Nova River, to be reached partly by water, partly by 
"packing in" over the barrens. The season was a dry one, 
and consequently the river, lower than usual, finally be- 
came too shallow to float our canoes, which were of the 
heavy or Newfoundland type. In addition to this the fre- 
quent and serious mistake was made of taking in too 
large an outfit. Plenty of "truck" is all right where water 
is not at a premium, but in a country Avhere portages are 
frequent and difficult, and where the last fifteen or tAventy 
miles must be "packed in" over a rough country, all 
superfluous provisions and clothing are worse than use- 
less. Aside from these little inconveniences, however, 
the trip Avas made at a time and under conditions suitable 
for a very successful one. We started early in Septem- 
ber, just as the stags had commenced to rub off the vel- 
vet, but before the setting in of the chill fall nights and 
biting Avinds which later make the heaviest blankets and 
sleeping bags a necessity. A great majority of the small 
deer had already commenced to collect on the high lands, 
Avhile the stags, tardy as usual, Avere still living around 
ponds and in the heavily AA'Ooded river bottoms.. The 
signs around all the Avater courses indicated that early 
in September at least that particular region was unmis- 
takably a "stag country." Taking advantage of this fact 
we devoted our time and attention more particularly to 
the small marshes and stream beds of the lowlands, and 
consequently saw a goodly proportion of large deer. 
Along one sluggish stream, "Butts Brook" by name, six 
stags, all well antlered, were jumped at intervals during 
one afternoon. One of these, a grand old fellow with a 
snow-white neck, stopped just a moment too long in lais 
mad flight to gaze at us. ITe had probably never seen a 
man before, and stood wondering and astonished, truly 
the noblest creature of the northern Avilderness. A few 
days later we were plodding wearily along a runway 
Avhich led o\'er endless wet boggy barrens to Island Pond. 
It had been a demorali^.ing morning, hot and humid. 
Nothing had been seen since early sunrise but the vin- 
dictive black fly; and caribou fat is a wretched substitute 
for "fly dope." We had just about arrived at that dis- 
heartened Avish-I-hadn't-come stage, and felt very mitch 
like quietly subsiding into the bog. But in hunting, as in 
fishing, it is at some such inopportune and apparently im- 
possible moment that something always happens; and 
stmething did happen; and the effect was magical on the 
spirits of the party. On rounding a clumps of bushes, 
Stroud, Avho was in the lead, suddenly stopped short and 
grasped my arm, pointing at the same time to something 
sticking up over the grass some distance ahead. At first 
sight it looked like a couple of dry branches, but an in- 
stant later two magnificent stags leaped to their feet, 
Avheeled about and stood staring and astonished. At the 
first report one, struck in the head, collapsed right in his 
tracks; the other, after Avaiting a moment as if for his 
dead companion to rise, broke into that peculiar swinging 
lope and struck out over the barren toward the uplands. 
Five minutes later, on the crest of a high ridge, we could 
see his dark form and great branching antlers silhouetted 
against the sky as he rushed with headlong strides far 
away into the wilderness. 
Yes, Newfoundland possesses many hidden secrets for 
those of us who will seek them out. Secrets for the 
angler as well as the sportsman. Her lakes, which have 
never yet wet a line, can be counted by the hundred; 
and in her inland waters the ouananiche attains a size and 
perfection rarely exceeded on the continent. But to those 
of us who would find real success, let it be sought in the 
vast central interior, the home of the caribou; where the 
beaver still builds his dam in peace and the wild geese 
breed free and unmole-sted as an hundred years ago. 
William ARmuij JBABgoi«^-« 
