Forest and Stream. 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
Copyright, 1904, by Forest and Stream Pubushing Cow 
/ ' . ^ 
'''''''''' ^iJ^'^^rnlSf-'''°''-\ NEW YORK, SATURDAY, JUNE 11, 1904. \i;o. ulBb^l'^^^^^.'Yo.K. 
The Forest akd Stream is the recognized medium of entertain- 
ment, instruction and information between American sportsmen. 
The editors invite communications on the subjects to which its 
pages are devoted. Anonymous communications will not be re- 
garded. While it is intended to give wide latitude in discussion 
of cunent topics, the editors are not responsible for the views of 
correspondents. 
Subsaiptions may begin at any time. Terms: For single 
copies, $4 per year, $2 for six months. For club rates and full 
particulars respecting subscriptions, see prospectus on page iii. 
PURIFYING WATER SUPPLIES. 
Nothing is more important than the purity of the water 
which we drink, yet it is within the experience of most 
n.eii to liave drunk bad water. In fact, it is not unusual, 
in large towns, for the water at certain seasons of the 
j'car to have a bad taste and perhaps a bad odor, and so 
(o be very disagreeable to use. Possibly the unusual 
taste, smell and color may not be unhealthy, but being 
disagreeable they are supposed to be so, and a remedy 
for these conditions is constantly sought. This often 
ti kes the form of cleaning out the reservoirs, under the 
impression that the bad odor and taste come from dead 
fish in the water. Sometimes the water becomes so bad 
that it is refused not only by men but by domestic animals 
iis well. In very many— if not in all— cases this trouble 
is caused by the presence of low forms of vegetatioii, as 
aigcc, in the water. 
A bulletin recently issued by the Department of Agri- 
culture offers a method of destroying or preventing the 
growth of algas and certain pathogenic bacteria in water 
supplies. The bulletin gives the results of extended in- 
vestigation and experiment by Dr. Geo. T. Moore and 
Karl F. Kcllerman. Dr. Moore is the physiologist in 
charge of the laboratory of plant physiology, and Mr. 
Kcllerman is his assistant. - 
These investigators have shown that it is practicable 
cheaply and quickly to destroy objectionable algaj in small 
lakes and ponds and storage reservoirs by the use of ex- 
tremely dilute solutions of sulphate of copper, or of metal- 
lic copper. They have shown also that an extremely dilute 
sdlution will destroy typhoid and cholera bacteria at or- 
dinary temperatures in three hours, a fact of possibly 
enormous importance. 
It is shown that— contrary to the general belief— cop- 
per in small quantities is not injurious to man or to 
mammals. Metallic copper and its oxides have been 
eaten by dogs with no noticeable effect, even though the 
quantities were considerable, and a sheep to which cop- 
per was daily administered lived for 128 days. On the 
other hand, plant life is very susceptible to copper. An 
enormously dilute solution will affect the growth of 
seedlings when applied to their roots, and will destroy 
and prevent the growth of algse. 
It thus appears that animal life is less susceptible 
Ic injury by copper than is plant life, and that among 
animals the higher the life the more resistant it is to the 
copper. The critical concentration for game fish is higher 
than for others. Black bass in good condition have en- 
dured concentrations of i to 50,000 for many weeks with- 
out apparent discomfort, while I to 100,000 was sufficient 
to kill German and mirror carp in a few hours, and i 
tc 500,000 killed the most susceptible in a few days. 
In the case of algae, a dilution of i to 1,000,000 would 
be sufficient to prevent the growth of any algse which 
would tend to pollute the water. Such a dilution is abso- 
lutely harmless to man or to mammals. In order to ab- 
sorb an amount of the copper sulphate sufficiently great 
to be possibly unpleasant or dangerous, it would be 
necessary to drink 50 quarts of this water in a day. More- 
over, as the copper in the solution speedily combines 
with the algae, and is precipitated in other ways, the 
amount remaining in solution after the first few hours 
would be practically nothing. 
;The method of treating water is a very simple one. 
The required number of pounds of copper sulphate should 
be placed in a coarse bag— as, for example, a gunny- 
sack— attached to the stern of a rowboat near the surface 
of the water, and rowed slowly back and .forth over the 
reservoir, making each path of the boaf about 15 or 20 
feet from the last one. This has alwaj's proved effective. 
Against the lower forms of plant life it is a certain 
remedy, and it seems quite possible that it may be 
(]e§tructive also of certain insect larv^, like the mosquito, 
Experiments with the typhoid, cholera, and some other 
baccilli, have already been alluded to. The great value of 
this copper disinfectant is its efficiency, its harmlessness 
to man, its cheapness, and the ease with which it can be 
applied. 
On the other hand the investigators warn the public 
against a general and wholesale use of this remedy. They 
declare that the microscopic investigation of waters is 
necessary before it can be known how to treat them, and 
that each body of water must be considered as a special 
case requiring a particular prescription. 
The matter is one of such universal interest that we 
may imagine that a vast number of experiments will be 
made on the subject, to the very great benefit of the 
public. 
NEM^ JERSEY AND PIGEON SHOOTING. 
The status of trapshooting in New Jersey, as it con- 
cerns pigeon shooting, is not approved by the shooters 
at large. Several times since the New Jersey Legislature 
at its recent extra session passed a comprehensive law 
prohibiting the shooting of any kind of bird from the 
iTaps, the daily papers of Philadelphia have recounted 
tliat the Riverton Gun Club, through one or more of its 
members, purposed to test the constitutionality of that 
law. 
The club's plan of procedure, according to rumor, is 
simple and direct. After the law goes into effect on July 
4 next, a club member or members will publicly shoot a 
pigeon or pigeons at the traps on the club grounds at 
Riverton, N. J., thereby inviting prosecution, and insti- 
tuting the test case. 
The case, in the event of adverse decisions, will be 
carried up from court to court till the highest court of the 
State makes final adjudication on the constitutionality of 
the law. 
Whether these rumors truly present the position and 
purposes of the Riverton Gun Club in respect to this 
matter, we do not know ; but we do know that there is 
a broad undercurrent of opinion among New Jersey trap- 
shooters favoring the institution of such test case. 
This law, hostile to live bird shooting at the traps, 
imposes special loss and hardship on the Riverton, Carte- 
ret and Westminster clubs; for, apart from the per- 
sonal deprivation concerning pigeon shooting as a sport, 
the new law renders useless an elaborate and costly trap- 
shooting equipment, which, after July 4, will be of little, 
if any, more value than old junk. 
The Riverton Gun Club's grounds, club house, stables, ■ 
traps, etc., are said to represent a cash outlay of $7S,ooo. 
It is quite to be expected that this club would object 
to a law which so radically affects all its interests. 
However, from the viewpoint of trapshooting sentiment 
or investments, or both, a test case, if it ever should 
reach the judicial stage, affords no ground for a reason- 
able hope that any judicial decision would be rendered 
favorable to the contentions of the trapshooters. 
Opposed to pigeon shooting are too much adverse pre- 
cedent, too much contemporaneous law in other States 
which effectively prohibits pigeon shooting, and too 
much watchful, forceful public opinion everywhere which 
views the practice with uncompromising hostility. Other 
States than New Jersey this year entirely prohibited it 
within their borders. 
If we examine briefly the law of the State of New 
York, which is considered sufficient law to suppress pigeon 
shooting, we find that it is a general law prohibiting 
cruelty to animals. It, nevertheless, is considered as 
being quite sufficient to suppress pigeon shooting, on the 
ground of cruelty alone. In 1874 Mr. Henry Bergh offi- 
cially interfered with the shoot of the New York State 
Association, held at Coney Island. As a consequence, he 
v/as sued for damages in the city court. Judge MacAdam, 
before whom the case was tried, dismissed it on the 
ground that the general statute prohibitive of cruelty to 
f nimals applied to pigeon shooting. 
As a result of the earnest efforts of New York trap- 
shooters, pigeon shooting by members of sportsmen's 
clubs or incorporated societies, was legalized by statute, 
as per Section i, Chapter io7, New York Laws of 1S75. 
The repeal of this statute by the New York Legislature 
rjot long since, left in force the general law as to cruelty 
to animals, which, under Judge MacAdam's ruling, pro- 
hibits pigeon shooting. No one has judicially questioned 
the efficiency or cpi^stitutionality of this law. ' It has 
entirely suppressed all overt pigeon shooting in the State 
of New York. 
The general law concerning cruelty to animals is also 
invoked against pigeon shooting elsewhere. Under it, 
in Chicago, on May 13, 1902, in a pigeon shooting case 
prosecuted by the Humane Society of the State of Illi- 
nois, the defendants were convicted, and the appeal, at 
first contemplated, was abandoned. That decision has 
since been accepted as good law in Chicago. 
On the other hand, there are precedents under similar 
general laws quite opposed to the foregoing. In the case 
of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania vs. Denny, et al., 
in 1892, the judge decided that the defendants had not 
been guilty of any cruelty in shooting pigeons at the 
traps. 
Again, in an appealed case of a Pennsylvania court in 
1887, in which Mr. A. Nelson Lewis was tried for pigeon 
shooting on the ground of cruelty, Judge Paxton, as 
Chief Justice, reversed the decision of the lower court. 
He held that the facts, as presented to the jury, did not 
bring the case within the general law on cruelty to ani- 
mals. These cases, as precedents in later years, seem to 
be ignored. They have a restricted significance since they, 
in the main, represent an issue between the Humane 
Society and the trapshooters. The public at that time 
was passive, and manifested no particular interest in the 
matter. Pigeon shooting then was practiced by only a 
few, and had not attained the importance of a national 
sport. 
Since then, a general public opinion has been aroused in 
relation to this subject. Under the general laws con- 
cerning cruelty to animals, the humane societies seem to 
be fully equipped with all needed legal support to prose- 
cute successfully any overt act of pigeon shooting at the 
traps. 
The general laws in a number of States having many 
times proved to be amply sufficient to suppress pigeon 
shooting, how much more forceful, then, is the specific 
statute of the State of New Jersey, which sharply and un- 
qualifiedly prohibits every kind of live bird shooting at 
the traps? The mere assertion that it is unconstitutional, 
in social discussion, conveys a certain sentimental feel- 
ing of gratification to a majority of trapshooters, but the 
setting forth of the specifications of the pigeon law un- 
constitutionality before a New Jersey court is quite an- 
other matter. The rights of the people in the abstract, 
and the statute law in the concrete, do not always concur. 
Weighing the matter on its merits, without prejudice,- 
we cannot perceive that there is even a remote chance for 
a test case to result in favor of pigeon shooting. And if a 
test case should result in favor of the shooters, what 
then? With the generally hostile public opinion against 
pigeon shooting in New Jersey, the next Legislature of 
that State to a certainty would amend any defects in the 
pigeon shooting law, and the test case would be in that 
large realm known as labor in vain. 
Mr. John W. Titcomb, Chief of the Bureau of Fish- 
culture of the National Fisheries Bureau, has returned 
from Argentina, in which country he has spent nine 
months in the investigation of the waters and the intro- 
duction of food fish there from the United States. The 
enterprise has been successful in a most gratifying degree. 
A hatchery was established at Lake Nehnel Huapi, the 
headwaters of the rivers Limay and Rio Nigro,. a point 
325 miles from the last station on the Southern Railroad, 
whither the eggs shipped by the United States Govern- 
ment were conveyed. These comprised 1,000,000 whitefish 
eggs, 1,000,000 lake trout, 50,000 brook trout and land- 
locked salmon. In addition to these, there have just been 
shipped 1,000,000 rainbow trout eggs and 5o,ckx) steelhead 
eggs from California and Washington. 
.. »l ■ 
That story of Wymore's park system, as projected 
by a reader of Forest and Stream, and achieved by a 
growing public sentiment, inight well be used as a tract 
for distribution over the broad land to every village and 
city which is now without a pleasure spot the citizens 
may call their own. What Wymore has done. New York 
and other great cities are doing. Congested tenement 
districts have been converted into breathing places with 
shade trees and greensward and music, and the beneficent 
results are told in the decreased criminal calendar an4 
the lessened death rate. 
