June, 1921 
FOREST AND STREAM 
255 
aside adjoining land in Pennsylvania and so cre- 
ate an interstate park, such as now exists on the 
west side of the Hudson River and includes por- 
tions of New York and New Jersey. 
The tract proposed for the Allegany State Park 
has been lumbered over, is too rough for agricul- 
ture, and so has small money value. It constitutes 
the only large area of wild land in Western New 
York which can be procured at a modest price. 
All timber has been cut from it and there remains 
on the land nothing that has any real value; yet 
this land would at once respond to protection 
against fire and to reforestation, and would soon 
become a most attractive place. 
It is traversed by many trout brooks, and within 
it are areas which could be set aside as wild life 
refuges. In these refuges, birds and animals na- 
tive to the region — including the wild turkey, which 
might readily be introduced — would thrive. 
On the northern border of this area is the Alle- 
gany Indian Reservation where still live some 
thousands of the different groups of the Iroquois 
which made the settlement of New York slow and 
difficult two hundred and fifty years ago. The re- 
gion has a multitude of attractions and is eminent- 
ly adapted to the purpose proposed in the bill in- 
troduced in the Assembly by Mr. McGinnies, to 
provide for the location, creation and management 
of the Allegany State Park. 
TO OUR READERS 
’T' HERE are a number of interesting articles in 
1 store for Forest and Stream readers. At the 
present writing two members of our staff of writers 
are away in search of high adventure, collecting 
material that will appear in early numbers. Robert 
H. Rockwell of the Brooklyn Museum is in Alaska 
seeking specimens of the giant brown bear of the 
Alaskan Peninsular and later will make a hunt in 
the Kenai for moose and sheep. The account of his 
trip will be of great interest to sportsmen who may 
have in mind a trip of like nature as he will make 
special note of the ways and means of such a jour- 
ney and being a naturalist of considerable experi- 
ence his observations on the game animals he meets 
with will add considerably to the narrative. 
Our Managing Editor, John P. Holman, is hunt- 
ing grizzlies in western Alberta and British Colum- 
bia and an account of his trip will appear in an 
early number. The country in which he is hunting 
embraces a little known portion of the Canadian 
northwest, comprising a region of great interest 
to the student of bear classification. The grizzly 
is perhaps the wariest and, in the opinion of those 
who are familiar with his life history, the noblest 
of our wild animals. His haunts are in the most 
inaccessible parts of the wilderness and the story 
of how he is hunted and the manner of his circum- 
vention will make good reading for those who are 
interested in this mighty denizen of the wilds. 
Among other articles in preparation for publica- 
tion in Forest and Stream is one by Hermann 
Hagadom on an early hunting trio of Theodore 
Roosevelt’s in the Bad Lands. Mr. Hagadorn spent 
considerable time in the localities frequented by 
Col. Roosevelt during his ranching days in the West 
and has gathered a great deal of new material 
which will be incorporated in a book to be pub- 
lished next fall, the nroceeds of which will be de- 
voted to the Roosevelt Memorial Association. 
OUR VANISHING ELK 
A BSAROKA FOREST officers are alarmed at 
the lack of elk in evidence on the fall rutting 
grounds in the northern part of the Yellowstone 
Park the past season.- No one can even hazard a 
guess as to the number of elk at present in the Yel- 
lowstone section of the Northern Herd ; but that the 
number is alarmingly small is indicated by the 
lack of elk along the Lamar River, and the lower 
reaches of Slough Creek, Buffalo Fork and Hell- 
roaring streams. 
For many years, regardless of climatic con- 
ditions, fully 60 per cent, of the Yellowstone 
band appear regularly in the open country above 
mentioned during the latter days of September or 
early in October and remain there throughout the 
rutting season. After that period, the old matured 
bulls leave the rolling open country and work back, 
often into deep snow, to the higher country both in 
the Park and the adjoining National Forest. The 
cows with their last summer calves still at side, re- 
main on that fall range until joined by the big drift 
from the head of the upper Yellowstone, when 
they all gradually work down toward the town of 
Gardiner, where in past winters some have been 
fed tame hay. Others drift out of the Park onto 
the winter range, where they have been given close 
protection from tooth and meat hunters by Forest 
officers, until spring opens and they drift back 
to the Park. 
Last fall, on the divide between Slough Creek 
and Buffalo, where usually there are from one to 
three thousand head gathered by mid-October, a 
rather careful ride over that country revealed the 
tracks of only 5 or 6 head on the unbroken snow. 
The valley of Slough Creek was likewise empty. 
Not an elk in sight where formerly one could see 
them slipping into the timber in all directions. 
The great slope and hillside to the east of the 
mouth of Hellroaring, where in the spring of 1917 
were counted 2,500 head, in one band, and where 
in most falls the grazing elk look much like great 
bands of domestic stock — not an elk was in sight — 
nor had they been there. 
In Cottonwood Basin, one of the choice late fall 
ranges for elk to stop and rest in. on their way 
down the river during the fall drift, remained 
empty during the past fall. 
On Blacktail, from Mt. Everts to Tower Falls 
Station, there were possibly 75 head where there 
should have been that many hundred. 
What is the answer? Who knows? 
Some of the wise ones of this country inform us 
with great confidence that the open fall and winter 
have caused the elk to remain back in the 
higher, more inexcessible portions of the Park. 
Of one thing there can be no question, — the elk of 
the northern herd are not in sight on the ranges 
formerly occupied by them at this time of year. 
Open falls in the past did not cause the elk to 
abandon their usual custom or habits during the 
rut. Why, then, should that be given at this time 
as a basis for belief that the usual thousands are 
yet back in the hill county? 
While an estimate of the actual numbers now 
comprising the Yellowstone band has not as yet 
been made, the American people and the sportsmen 
who have the true interests of the game at heart, 
should know the terrible fact that the shrinkage in 
this band during the past five years has been alarm- 
ing and that the shrinkage during the last year has 
been nothing less than appalling. 
