FOREST AND STREAM AUGUST, 1920 
THE YELLOWSTONE PARK BILL 
To the Editor of Forest and -Stream: 
I AM opposed to the bill to dam and 
ditch the Falls River in the southwest 
corner of the Yellowstone National Park, 
if the work is to g-o on within the Park; 
outside of the Park I do not care. 
If these people wish to make a big stor- 
age lake in Idaho, they can dam Henry’s 
Fork of Snake River and flood an im- 
mense tract of country. They are not 
obliged to go into the Park to get all 
the water they can use and to get it high 
enough for all the ground they can culti- 
vate. I do not believe that they are 
using one-twentieth part of the water, 
either of Henry’s Fork, Bechler River,' 
or Falls River. 
The Falls River basin is a winter refuge 
for moose and some other game. In all 
the streams mentioned, there used to be 
a grass — (?) alga — growing on the bot- 
tom and as these streams are mostly fed 
by big warm springs that come out from 
under the Pitchstone Plateau, they do not 
freeze, and the moose live on this grass. 
I have seen domestic cattle eating it, 
plunging their heads under water to get 
it. Here the moose stay in winter, feed- 
ing on this grass and on the willows. 
There is less snow in this part of the 
Park than elsewhere. 
Moose winter also on the Upper Yel- 
lowstone, feeding on the willows and the 
lower branches of the trees. George 
Shiras 3rd can tell you about seeing them 
and their winter yards. Formerly moose 
were quite plentiful on Snake River 
around Jackson’s Lake, on up the River, 
along Lewis giver, Lewis Lake and Sho- 
shone Lake. 
The project for damming the Yellow- 
stone River at the outlet and raising the 
Lake level would flood the Upper Yel- 
lowstone Valley for a dozen or fifteen 
miles, would cover many islands now 
the breeding places for gulls and peli- 
cans and would cover all the breeding 
grounds of thousands of ducks and geese, 
as well as feeding grounds for game. It 
would flood also a good bit of the Pelican 
Creek country, another breeding place. 
If the people of Montana want to 
store the waters of the Yelowstone River, 
they can build dams at “Yankee Jim” 
Canyon, and in the Lower Canyon just 
above Livingston. To do this they would 
be obliged to buy out the few ranches 
they would flood, but why should they 
do this when they do not now use one- 
tenth of the water of the Yellowstone 
River? 
I should like to find out who is behind 
the effort to push forward this desecra- 
tion of the Yellowstone Park. Who is 
putting up the money for those reported 
schools and such other educational work? 
I have been like many other Montana 
people who complain of the Park because 
it has been handed over in a way to a 
private corporation for hotel and trans- 
portation purposes. This corporation is 
fighting all the little outsiders and trying 
to keep them from taking camping 
parties into the Park. They call them 
sagebrush tourists.” The unpopularity 
of these corporations may lead Idaho and 
Montana to advocate almost anything 
that will hurt the Park and the company. 
As managed under Col. John Pitches 
the Park made friends; but under some 
other superintendents it has made a 
great many enemies. 
There is plenty of water in the Yellow- 
stone River to irrigate all the country 
below the Lower Canyon. Besides this 
water, there are some large streams com- 
ing in from both sides below the Can- 
yon. On these streams small dams could 
be built that would store millions of gal- 
lons of water, more than enough to irri- 
gate all the cultivatable land along their 
banks; and then there is the tremendous 
flow of the Yellowstone going to waste. 
The scheme of cutting through the Con- 
tinental Divide to send the waters of the 
Yellowstone into Heart River and so on 
down the Snake, would be like cutting 
the Panama Canal through at ocean level 
to let the waters of the Pacific in to 
raise the tide of the Atlantic. In Snake 
River and its branches there is plenty of 
water that they will never use. Why 
should they talk about such hare-brained 
schemes? Let them wait a few hundred 
years, or until this water is really needed. 
Our country should first pay off some of 
its debts and not waste any more money 
on such unnecessary projects. 
Why is it that so many people — money- 
making schemers — are unwilling to see 
a few spots in this land where nature 
is left alone? They want to grab every- 
thing in sight. 
For the sake of humanity, let us try 
to make the Yellowstone National Park 
what it was set aside for, a pleasure 
ground for the people for all time. That 
means for all the people, and not for any 
one class of people. Only in this way 
can we enjoy the full benefits that were 
conceived by those who had the vision to 
establish it. 
Billy Hofer, Montana. 
FISHING IN MAINE 
T° the Editor of Forest and Stream • 
M Y Partner-in-fishing and I have had a 
good trip after “square-tails,” and I 
want you to hear about it We arrived at 
the station called Troutdale, on the 
• lame Central R. R. at noon. May 8th 
ana went across Mosquito Narrows, on 
Lake Moxie, to Troutdale Camps, newly 
opened by Mr. C. S. Pierce. 
After a fine dinner, which included a 
pound trout at each plate, A1 and I went 
i shm £- Moxie is pre-eminently a trout 
lake. There are a few salmon in it, as 
one of its tributaries, Baker Pond, is full 
of them. There was a strong gale blow- 
ing straight from the north, which did 
not look good, but we were there to fish 
S o we went out. We used live bait, part 
of the time, and Rangeley Spinner loaded 
with angle-worms part of the time. We 
finally settled on the spinners with worms 
I hat afternoon we took four half-pound- 
ers and one weighing one lb. and six 
ounces. Before we went out we were 
shown a trout caught a few days before 
weighing five and one-half pounds. While 
out on the water in the evening we saw 
one weighing three lbs. token by Mr 
Frank Hilton, Chief Fire Warden for that 
district. The next day, Friday, the wind 
blew as strong as ever. In all the fore- 
noon we took one half-pound trout. After 
dinner we got Mr. Pierce to take the oars 
and pick the fishing places for us. Be- 
ginning moderately, we took a pound-and- 
a-half fish; then two two-pounders, one 
two lbs. and three-quarters, one four lbs., 
and one four lbs. and a quarter. Bear in 
mind that these were all genuine native, 
square-tailed, spotted trout, full of pluck 
and fight, xhe flesh is deep salmon-col- 
ored, the flavor is of the best, with no 
muddy taste. The two biggest ones were 
each twenty inches long, the two and 
three-quarter lbs., 18 inches; the one and 
one-half to two lbs., about sixteen inches. 
Mr. Arthur Briggs, of Winthropi 
Maine, was on the train when we went 
up co the Lake, and told us of taking 
one of five and one-quarter lbs., the previ- 
ous Sunday. He also said that the Hatch- 
ery people dipped trout nearly every fall 
weighing over eight pounds. There is 
only one public sporting-camp on the 
Lake, and but a few private ones. The 
Lake is about nine miles long, lying 
north and south, with the inlet at the 
south end. Plenty of good fishing in near- 
by waters, both streams and ponds. I 
can get all the trout I want, right in mid- 
summer, at the mouths of the streams. 
I have fished there at long intervals for 
nearly forty years, and, honestly, I do not 
know of a sheet of trout-water I would 
rather go to. 
Merton H. French, Maine. 
