Nov. i8, 1905.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
418 
wounds. On the other hand, I have never found a bullet 
in any squirrel, nor any wounds showing conclusively 
that bullets had caused them. 
Opinions as to the style of glass to use for squirrel 
shooting are almost as numerous as the men who use the 
telescope. It is often argued that the full length glass is 
best for hunting. Theoretically it may be, just as the 
best -rod in theory should be one piece; but we have our 
fishing rods made in several pieces, for convenience in 
carrying, and while we must admit they may be some- 
what inferior to one-piece rods, we find them quite satis- 
factory in fishing as well as in dodging crowds at the 
ferries and railway stations. So it is with the short 
telescope; it is not much in the way after its owner has 
become accustomed to the different balance it imparts to 
the rifle, and while he must take better care of it than 
open sights, in time he does not notice the change, and 
handles his rifle somewhat roughly, after all, being care- 
ful not tO' drop it or lean it against any smooth surface, 
so that it might fall to the ground and possibly disar- 
range the alignment. But whether the long glass is bet- 
ter or not, the manufacturers are turning out thousands 
of short telescopes to-day, and these give the best of 
satisfaction. 
The diameter of the telescope tube is much discussed, 
it being generally conceded that a large tube is better 
than a small one; but here, again, the convenience and 
compactness of a small, short tube offsets, to a limited 
extent, the advantages of a wider field of view and bet- 
ter definition in dark places. I will not attempt to say 
the glass I prefer is even as good as larger and longer 
ones for the- average squirrel shooter, for it is only four- 
teen inches long and five-eighths-inch in diameter, its 
power being 'six. It has given complete satisfaction, 
however, but it should be explained that it is placed on 
the left-hand side of the rifle, as near as possible level 
with the open sights on top the barrel, so that if' there 
is not light enough for the telescope, the merest shifting 
of the eye brings the open sights into correct alignment. 
It is true that the placing of the tube on the side of the 
barrel is objected to by some, but my experience proves 
that if only one set of sights is to- be placed on the 
squirrel rifle, that set should not be in a tube; in other 
! words,, there are always times when the telescope is use- 
less and at others almost so. In my own experience I 
: could contradict myself on this point, for I have hunted 
f in tall timber for ten days or more at a time without 
i firing a single shot aimed through the open sights. Still, 
f I would not be without them. With a rifle equipped thus 
■ one will often find himself trying the telescope, and 
thinking he can do better with the open sights, shift to 
them, only to return to the glass before firing. This if 
the shot is deliberate. Mine generally are. 
' Growing tired of telescopes with fancy adjustable 
mountings that were so easily changed that anyone who 
happened to examine the rifle could shift the tube equal 
to a foot or more at 100 yards ; and proceeding on the 
fact that exceedingly few shots are fired at squirrels dis- 
tant more than forty yards, I obtained a set of mount- 
• ings which, when fixed on the rifle and the tube aligned 
to center a tiny spot at thirty to fifty yards, could only 
be shifted with a screwdriver or a hammer. The focus, 
when adjusted for one person’s use, is absolutely fixed, 
and can only be altered with a screw driver. The cross- 
wires are also fixed. Windage can only be obtained by 
raising a set-screw in the forward mounting and ham- 
mering the latter to right or left. Elevation can be 
changed by turning the thumbscrew of the rear mount- 
ing, but as this is set with a steel pin — and the pin lost — 
there is no fear in that respect. To make assurance 
double sure, there is a white mark on both mountings to 
show that the latter have not shifted by accident. As a 
general proposition, if the cross-hairs are held on a 
squirrel’s eye at the moment the trigger is touched the 
bullet mark will be found pretty close to the eye; but if 
elevation or windage is needed, holding the merest dis- 
tance away from the eye will insure a head shot, pro- 
vided always one does not wobble. Should one get a 
shot at a fox or crow, even at 200 yards, holding the 
cross-hairs for either wind or elevation is as exact as 
guessing how much to turn an adjusting screw — and one 
never suffers through forgetting to restore the sight to 
its proper place after firing a shot. On such a tube there 
are no knobs, hooks, points or other protuberances to 
catch on limbs or in one’s clothing, and altogether it 
gives good satisfaction. 
There is something, altogether fascinating about squir- 
rel shooting with a telescope-sighted rifle of small 
caliber. This is particularly true of the present time, for 
ammunition has been improved greatly of late, and it is 
now possible to purchase a .22 caliber rifle taking one of 
the more powerful rim-fire cartridges loaded with 
smokeless powder, which will give good satisfaction on 
squirrels, while one has no bother over reloading am- 
munition. In this way he can purchase a box or two of 
fresh ammunition before going away for a few days in 
the woods, and the better cartridges are clean to carry 
and handle, all of their lubrication being within the fin- 
ished cartridge, so that they can be carried in the pocket 
until needed. These little cartridges shoot very flat at 
all squirrel-shooting distances, so that a slight error in 
holding will not always result in a miss ; and make so 
little noise, that the game is not frightened clean out 
of the woods when one fires a few shots. 
While the big game must be followed further and fur- 
ther away from civilization, there are squirrels to be 
found in almost every patch of woods within. a few miles 
of one’s home ; permission to shoot on private land is 
not difficult to obtain if one is known to be careful, and 
the sport is one that may be enjoyed during a single 
afternoon as well as when one can command several days 
of leisure. Perry D. Frazer. 
Third Rail Kills Rabbits. 
The third rail, recently introduced by the Long Island 
Railroad as a transmitter of motive power for its trains 
to the new Jamaica race track, kills more small game 
than all the sportsmen. Rabbits and squirrels suffer in 
greatest numbers, and quail and other game are occa- 
sionally found. The rabbits are found along the track 
eveiw morning, having been shocked to death by the rail 
.--is^ew "Tork Times, 
Concerning Bears* 
Editor Forest mid Stream: 
The editor of Our Dumb Animals, George T. 
Angell, and a , correspondent of the Springfield Repub- 
lican, are responsible for a controversy “in the matter of 
shooting bears.” At least, I judge so from the annota- 
tions made by Mr. Angell to the reprint of an article 
from the Springfield Republican in Our Dumb Ani- 
mals. Mr. Angell is engaged in a laudable enterprise, 
that of engaging humane sympathy for the brute animal, 
but to a “man up a tree” it would appear that neither 
Angell nor the correspondent know very much about 
bears. The correspondent says “the bear is a specially 
inappropriate animal to select for killing in mere sport. 
He is largely a vegetarian, is timid and clumsy, and rarely 
attacks man except in self-defense.” I wonder where 
that correspondent took his lessons in zoology, especially 
as it relates to “b’ar” ? Certainly , not in the native 
habitat of bruin. From what I have seen and heard the 
bear is peculiarly the animal above all other quadrupeds 
to test the courage of man, in a hunt, even when man is 
well anned. 
Not long ago I was reading of an Englishman who 
had hunted in all parts of the world, saying that, on 
the whole, the bear was a gamier animal to hunt than 
either the lion or tiger of Asia or Africa; that he would 
rather . face any lion or tiger than the average grizzly 
bear; that the latter was the fiercest and most indomit- 
able of all quadrupeds in battle, whether it be with brute 
or human animal. 
In my intercourse with Western men I have met many 
w’ho had killed their “b’ar” in their day, and none but 
attested to its bravery and ferocity. The man who has 
fought his bear is a hero. Before me lies a work by 
Francis Fuller Victor, telling of. the “Wild West” as it 
was fifty to seventy-five years ago. He relates some 
of the experiences of the famous Joe Meek as a bear- 
killer, bearing testimony as to the aggressiveness of the 
bear. Indeed, in this country — in northeastern' Cali- 
fornia — it is generally deemed foolhardy for a person to 
attack a bear single-handed, or unassisted by dogs, no 
matter how 'well armed. A bear will stand a great deal 
of punishment, and a large amount of lead before he 
will succumb, unless struck in the beginning of the at- 
tack in a vital spot. Bruin has been known tO' continue 
a fight for some considerable time after his heart had 
been shot to pieces. As a rule, he is of wonderful vital- 
ity, strength, activity and quickness. Some species of 
bears are less aggressive than others, and there are those 
who will run to hiding at the sight of man, but even 
■these when brought to bay are dangerous game to the 
hunter. Hunting bear with firearms is at all times pre- 
carious adventure. 
It is said in California that even the grizzly is chang- 
ing his character; that he has lost his aggressiveness, 
and will seek covert on the approach of man, whereas 
formerly he would voluntarily give battle, and at times 
had been known to charge a company of men when he 
had not been even provoked to battle. 
Grizzlies are not as plentiful as they once were in the 
.Sierra Nevada Mountains. What few that are met with 
nowadays are shy of man. Instinct has taught them 
that man with a modern rifle is an invincible foe. Never- 
theless, hunters are very chary of the grizzly and will 
seldom attack him unless with the aid of good dogs, or 
with a companion who also has courage and is endowed 
with coolness. 
Bear are yet very abundant in this region of California 
■ — embracing the mountainous portion of Sierra, Plumas, 
Butte, Yuba and Nevada counties. I hear they are plen- 
tiful also in other portions of the Sierra Nevada Moun- 
tains, but I speak now of the region in the five counties 
of which I have personal knowledge, and which I have 
traversed in the past eighteen months to more or less of 
an extent as a prospector hunting for gold ledges, or de- 
posits of auriferous- gravel. My trips have led me among 
the high lava-capped ridges and to the volcanic peaks 
which attain altitudes of 7,000 to 8,000 feet above the 
level of the sea, and whose slopes are covered with a 
dense growth of pine, fir and spruce. The deep ravines 
between the ridges make suitable haunts' for bruin, and 
I have ample evidence that the latter exists in great num- 
bers. The bears of hereabouts are mostly black and 
brown. They make great havoc, with the young stock of 
the isolated mountain ranches, and some of the farmers 
have to wage constant warfare against' bears. 
The creatures seem to have an unappeasable appetite 
for pork on the hoof, and hang about the ranches at all 
times of the year, except when they are in hibernation, 
ready to pounce upon and carry off any pig that is not 
too heavy and bulky. They will also go so far as to en- 
ter a sty when pressed by hunger, and select any. choice 
little porker that they may fancy. 
A boar or full-grown sow will not hesitate to fight a 
bear, but the bear will avoid encounters with such, and 
resort to cunning to gain his prey. The depredations of 
bear upon some of the ranches are a constant loss to the 
ranchmen. There is but little or no corn raised,^ and it 
is too expensive to haul in for feed, so the swine are 
turned into a meadow to feed on grass, and later into 
the woods to fatten on acorns. It is then that bruin gets 
after piggy with success. 
In this region the ridges and ravines are so thickly 
covered with manzanita, chaparral and a variety of 
other brush that it is almost a physical impossibility for 
man to go through the same, it being necessary even con- 
stantly to keep pruning shears at work to keep trails and 
wagon roads open, brush growing almost spontaneously. 
This brush makes perfect cover for bear and other like 
“varmint.” It gives immunity to bruin from the two- 
legged hunter with a gun. The ranchmen have recourse 
mostly to the Newhouse steel trap. Bruin, when caught, 
is ignominiously knocked in the head with an ax, and his 
carcass thrown to the very hogs he himself would have 
devoured. I know many ranchmen who number their 
bear killings by the score. 
Nor does bruin stop in his raids on domestic stock at 
pigs, calves and colts often fall prey to him. And he 
iust dotes on sheep. Flock masters find it _ necessary 
every year, in some of the summer mountain ranges, 
to hire professional bear hunters to clean out the var- 
mint. The grizzly is especially fond of mutton and will 
in a fortnight do much havoc to a flock. Furthermore, 
he will, for a change of diet, help himself to a full-grown 
cow or steer when he can’t get a pig, calf or. colt. The 
lonely prospector has difficulty, too, in keeping his pack 
and riding animals with him in the mountain solitudes, 
when bear are around. As soon as burro, mule or horse 
get sight or scent of bruin they will start for the valleys 
unless kept tethered close to prospector’s camp,- and even 
that is no safeguard, as the bear will frequently raid the 
prospector’s camp and loot his cache, larder,- meat safe, 
or smokehouse, whichever it may be that he has his pro- 
visions stored in. Bear are really so numerous and trou- 
blesome in this part of California that they are a 
nuisance. 
That “the bear is largely a vegetarian,” as asserted by 
the correspondent of the Springfield Republican, is an' 
assertion of no- material importance in this discussion, 
but the statement might be qualified by saying that the 
bear is preferably a flesh-eater if he can get it. He will 
eat anything and everything that , a man will eat, except 
a few specialties to which he singularly objects, but it is 
not flesh. As to his liking for variety, the bears in the 
national parks that frequent the garbage cans of the 
hotels do not show any partiality to vegetable matter 
over flesh, as the offals of the table and kitchen. And 
when it comes to fish, bear of all kinds seem inordinately 
fond of them, and it is a common sight, in the head- 
waters of the streams in the Northwest, that are tribu- 
tary to the Pacific Ocean, to see bruin industriously fish- 
ing for salmon. 
As a matter of fact, the bear family is o'mnivorous._ In 
captivity, I know, though, bears have been exclusively 
fed upon vegetable matter, and they thrived upon it. 
There is a man in Pennsylvania who raises bears as an 
industry, and I believe he feeds them nearly altogether, 
if not quite, upon vegetable stuff, the two principal items 
being sweet corn and watermelon. The polar bear, per- 
force, must, because of his habitat, subsist .upon fish, etc., 
exclusively the greater portion of the year. 
But take the dog. Most dogs are fed or like meat of 
any and all kinds. Yet, the dog can be trained, after he 
is weaned from his mother milk, to subsist entirely upon 
vegetable matter. Shepherd dogs and collies, very often 
never get any other food than oatmeal mush. These 
dogs are brainy, industrious and at once both gentle and 
brave. I have also seen an ugly pet pug fed upon delica- 
tessen ranging from sauerkraut to ice cream and angel’s 
food. Excuse me, however, and I will give an- essay on 
dogs some other day.* I just wanted to show that ani- 
mals, notorious flesh-eaters, may become, by necessity or 
training, habitual vegetarians, and to demonstrate by 
these facts that the correspondent of the Springfield Re- 
publican don’t know so much about bears after all. 
I could, furthermore, go on and tell a whole lot o-f 
things about bear that he and Mr. Angell seem never to 
have heard or read, but just at present I simply want to 
resent the imputation that our worthy President was en- 
gaged in child’s play when he went hunting bear in 
Colorado. 
I agree, however, with the statement that there is 
“danger of having whole species exterminated, which, to 
the zoologist, the evolutionist and the lover of nature, as 
well as sometimes to the agriculturist, are of the utmost 
‘sympathetic interest.’ ” No true sportsman will deny 
this, and Forest and Stream and other journals pub-, 
lished in the interest of venatic_ sports, are as zealous in 
their advocacy in the preserving and perpetuation of 
species of animals, wild, rare or otherwise, as is Our 
Dumb Animals and its humanitarian publisher, George 
T. Angell and his contributing correspondents. The hun- 
ter, trapper and fisherman may be no less humane than 
the farmer. 
There is another thought in connection with this mat- 
ter of shooting bears. In an annotation to the article 
“No Sympathy with Bear Killing,” Mr. Angell says: 
“We have read, first and last, a good deal advocating the 
belief that the smaller animals suffer very little when 
attacked and destroyed by the larger.” Mr. Angell in- 
ferentially making this a plea for the salvation of brum 
from an untimely death by gunshot at the hands of ma'n. 
This on the proposition that the bear or any of the other 
large carnivori might be intended as the instrument, pro- 
vided by a Divine Providence, to mercifully destroy the 
smaller wild animals when they become old and sick and 
liable to die.. of. starvation. . . , 
I rather think, apropos to the paragraph immediately 
foregoing, that Mr. xLngell’s early education in natural 
history has been sadly neglected. There is no library 
available to me at this moment— I am writing in a cabin 
in the wilderness— or, I think, I could give the names pf 
books and authors that would enlighten Mr. Angell in 
those matters that he seems so deficient in. To_ the best 
of my knowledge and belief the smaller wild animals are 
usually eaten literally alive by those carnivori of which 
they are the “legitimate” or ‘ natural prey. If they 
suffer at all, they certainly must suffer then. Carnivori 
seldom select -“sick” animals for their prey, but will, 
of course, quickly pounce upon a wounded animal. Some 
species of animals -will promptly kill their own kind 
when the latter Take sick; they will also kill those born 
deformed, but the reason is only surmise to me. Again, 
weasels and wolves will often kill out of pure wanton- 
ness, purely for the sake of killing, and not because of 
necessity. A weasel will often kill more poultry in one 
night than he could consume in a month. Coyotes and 
wolves frequently hold high carnival in attacking a band 
of sheep and wantonly destroy large -numbers in excess 
of their needs for the present or immediate future. 
“The poor creatures out in Colorado preying on ber- 
ries, and at the worst only now and then on some other 
wild beast I” Forsooth! The bears and other ^poor 
creatures” may be of that kind “out in Colorado, but 
they are of a different kind here in California. At least 
the bear are. They eat berries in season, also roots, 
large fruits and any and all kinds of garden produce, 
when the ranchman and his dogs are away to town, but 
just the same his ursine majesty does not disdain 3. hog 
or two now and then by way of variety. The bear is tio 
epicure, but he is a gourmand, and were it not for his 
valor, strength and ferocity, would be held in_ contempt, 
even as is the coyote by the cowboy of the plains. 
California has, however, placed the bear upon a high 
pedestal of respect by making the animal the chief fig- 
ure in its coat of arms and seal. Bruin also had a place 
on the flag once. Notwithstanding all this, the bear is 
