May, 1921 
FOREST AND STREAM 
213 
stroys much game close to the larger 
cities and villages but, taking the State 
as a whole, his effect is very small. 
The man who puts several of his 
friends, a cargo of stimulants and a lot 
of ammunition into a car and sets out 
for a day’s “time” does more damage to 
the game than all the other classes com- 
bined and arouses more hard feelings 
because his actions seem to come clearly 
under the heading of malicious mis- 
chief. When Jack Jones finds himself 
shut out of the pasture of neighbor 
Smith where he has always hunted and 
puts a load of shot into one of the cows 
we feel provoked but can forgive him 
more easily than we can the banker who 
cuts a fence and turns the cattle into 
a corn field because it is too much 
trouble to climb over. We feel like 
using a 45-90 rifle on him next time. 
If our present force of game wardens 
were compelled by law to spend most 
of their time protecting the landowners 
and their actions were advertised by 
long lists of trespass convictions with 
heavy penalties they would do vastly 
more to protect the game than ten times 
as many could do under .the present sys- 
tem of game protection. 
As presiding officer at a meeting, 
mainly of farmers, the writer once had 
the pleasure (?) of trying to put through 
a resolution aimed to promote the pro- 
duction of game on the farms. This was 
finally passed as a mark of respect to 
the president but that officer was left in 
no doubt as to the fact that a large ma- 
jority did not want more game because 
more game means more hunters. How- 
ever, he had the assurance that if the 
landowners could he protected most of 
those who spoke in opposition would try 
to increase the game on their farms. 
The farmers of the state have a piti- 
fully small protection against sheep- 
killing dogs but if they could get even 
that small amount of redress against 
marauding hunters they would greatly 
increase the amount of game they have. 
However, this would have to be kept up 
for many years before it would have 
much effect because the farmers have 
reason to be suspicious. The game pro- 
tectionists are in much the same case as 
a noted one of their number whose 
writings are given less consideration 
than they deserve by those of us who 
have read one of his earlier writings and 
remember how he gloats over the steal- 
ing of an elephant. Thousands of years 
ago the question was asked, “Can any 
good thing come out of Nazareth?” The 
farmers are now asking whether any 
real reform can come from the group 
now in control of the game situation. 
Many statements which will go all 
right with city people seem rather far- 
fetched to the farmers. We are told 
that cats are only marauders when we 
feel sure they kill more mice than the 
marsh hawks. We are told that robins 
are our best friends when our observa- 
tion goes to show that they do more 
harm than either cats or marsh hawks 
and possibly more than both together. 
It makes a very impressive statement 
to say that a tree sparrow will eat so 
many thousands of seeds of ragweed but 
much of the force is lost when we tell 
how many such seeds one plant will pro- 
duce. What is needed is the courage to 
be honest and say that the greatest rea- 
son for protecting the birds is the fact 
that the world would be a dreary place 
without them. 
Some men, reported to be members of 
sporting clubs, have offered rewards to 
“get” some one who had caused their 
arrest for flagrant game law violations. 
If similar rewards were offered for the 
arrest of those, members or not, who 
disregarded a trespass notice, the cause 
of game protection would be greatly 
helped. Alfred C. Weed, 
Wayne County, N. Y. 
ANTELOPE IN NEBRASKA 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream : 
I NOTE with interest the article in 
your February number on “The Van- 
ishing Antelope.” For thirty years past 
I lived in what is now Garden County, 
Neb. At the early part of that time 
antelope were still quite numerous, as 
I remember counting seventy-five in one 
bunch near my ranch. 
After the Kincaid law was passed 
and settlers came in, the antelope rapid- 
ly decreased in numbers, as there was 
much poaching done. The temporary 
settlers moved on. Now antelope are 
increasing again in numbers. 
About a year ago in driving west a 
few miles from home one snowy and 
misty morning I drove near ;a bunch of 
them, counting twenty-eight of all ages. 
Some settlers in the neighborhood last 
year chased the antelope with dogs, a 
foolish business, unlawful, unsports- 
manlike and altogether unprofitable. In 
my mind nothing will disturb them more 
or tend to drive them from the coun- 
try than such chasing with dogs. 
It has been a matter of pride land 
pleasure to note the increase again of 
this beautiful animal in our Nebraska 
sand hills country. 
George Richardson, Nebraska. 
BELGRADE FISH AND FISHING 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream: 
D URING the past ten years it has 
been my good fortune to fish for a 
great part of each season on Great 
Pond, the largest of the Belgrade Lakes 
of Maine; and I have never seen any 
other small body of fresh water con- 
taining so many species of fish. My 
personal captures include land-locked 
salmon, brook trout, small-mouth bass, 
pickerel, both white and yellow perch, 
chub, sunfish, horned pout, eels and 
smelt; and I know of at least three wall- 
eyed pike that have come from the same 
pond in the last two years. 
The great majority of the salmon 
caught in this pond are taken either by 
trolling or still-fishing with live smelt, 
and in the former method a smelt with 
a small double spinner seems to be one 
of the best lures; although a baited fly 
run about a foot under water is also 
very good. The fish run from two up 
to seven or eight pounds as a rule, but 
the record for the pond is fourteen and 
three-quarter pounds. 
From the time the ice goes in the 
spring right up to the end of the fishing 
season there is always a good chance 
to get trout by trolling. During July 
and August trolling deep with a long 
line is practically a necessity, but in the 
early season it is well to experiment at 
different depths, as the location of the 
fish varies greatly from day to day. 
For surface trolling early in the season 
when the fish are on top of the shoals 
a very good rig to use is a smelt on a 
three foot leader with two small swiv- 
els, but with no spinner; this makes a 
very taking lure, and also one that al- 
lows the maximum of play on the part 
of the hooked fish. But when using a 
spoon or spinner of any kind I always 
prefer the humble “night-walker” to 
any other bait. 
Superficial weather conditions do not 
seem to affect the fish in the matter of 
striking, as I have had equally good re- 
sults on clear, hot, windless days and 
during cold, wet and blustery northeast 
storms. But it has been my experience 
that when the barometer is either low 
or falling, the deeper the trolling is done 
the more successful it will be; but when 
the glass is high or rising a light rig 
used within a foot or two of the sur- 
face will give better results. The above 
remarks apply to all the trolling for 
trout in Great Pond, whether it is done 
on the shoals or over the deep water. 
These trout are also constantly taken 
on fly on the rocky shoals and around 
the mouths of the streams that feed the 
lake, and as they range from one to five 
pounds, with an occasional larger one, 
they afford great sport. In the early 
season they are short, thick and ex- 
tremely active; but in September, as is 
only natural when the spawning time is 
approaching, they are thin and in very 
poor condition. 
The small-mouth bass seems to be the 
fish that has given Belgrade its reputa- 
tion as a fisherman’s paradise, and in 
many ways the reputation is well 
earned. While these fish do not run 
large, as a rule, there are great numbers 
of them, and catches of from fifty to 
one hundred in a day are by no means 
unusual. Fortunately the law only al- 
lows six fish a day killed to a rod, and 
these must be at least twelve inches in 
length. 
For several years I have practically 
restricted myself to fly fishing, as there 
is less danger of injury to the fish, and 
I, of course, return most of my fish to 
the water; but in live bait fishing it is 
only too often the case that the fish re- 
turned is either dead or so badly injured 
that it dies in a very short time. The 
above remark does not apply to the use 
of grasshoppers, as fish caught in this 
manner are usually hooked in the lip. 
While these Belgrade bass average 
rather small in size, they are very active 
fellows, for out of over seven hundred 
that I handled on the fly last season only 
one failed to jump clear of the water, 
and that was a fish that was foul hooked 
in the gill cover. He was a bass of 
about sixteen inches, but in less than a 
minute he was lying alongside of the 
boat on his back, with gills and fins 
barely moving. In five minutes after 
being unhooked he seemed to have com- 
pletely recovered, and the last that I saw 
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