480 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Published Weekly by the 
Forest and Stream Publishing Company 
Chas. A. Hazen, President Charles L. Wise, Treasurer 
Harwood Painter, Vice-Pres. W. G. Beecroft, Secretary 
22 Thames Street. New York. 
CORRESPONDENCEForest and Stream is the re¬ 
cognized medium of entertainment, instruction and in¬ 
formation between American sportsmen. The editors 
invite communications on the subjects to which its pages 
are devoted, but, of course, are not responsible for the 
views of correspondents. Anonymous communications 
cannot be regarded. 
SUBSCRIPTIONS: $3 a year; $1.50 for six months; 
I0 'rif- nt:s a co P y - Canadian, $4 a year; foreign, $4.50 a year. 
I his paper may be obtained of newsdealers throughout 
the United States, Canada and Great Britain. Foreign 
Subscriptions and Sales Agents—London: Davies & Co.. 
1 Finch Dane; Sampson. Low & Co. Paris: Brentano’s. 
Entered in New York Post Office as Second class matter. 
THE OBJECT OF THIS JOURNAL 
will be to studiously promote a healthful interest 
in outdoor recreation, and to cultivate a refined 
taste for natural objects. 
—Forest and Stream, Aug. 14, 1873 
FOREST AND STREAM PRIZE CUPS. 
Forest and Stream takes pleasure in announcing 
that it has made arrangements to present fifty 
silver cups to as many successful anglers during 
the fishing season of 1914. The plan is set forth 
in detail on another .page,-,shut more definite infor¬ 
mation will be forthcoming within a few weeks. 
Briefly the idea is to place these Cups with fifty 
selected hotels and camps in different parts of the 
country, the cups to go to anglers who make the 
record of the largest fish caught in the waters 
tributary to that particular section. Prizes will 
go to registered guests at the hotels or camps, 
and will be awarded in accordance with records 
kept for the purpose by the management. As 
stated elsewhere, there will be no red tape about 
the contest, and the rules to be published later 
will be without qualifying conditions other than 
set forth above. The cups will be of beautiful 
design, suitably inscribed, and a souvenir of 
which the fortunate possessors may feel proud. 
UNIFORM GAME LAWS. 
This is the very old topic. Possibly it may be 
considered hackneyed. To suggest anything new 
in relation to it is quite impossible. We are as¬ 
sured, however, that the subject is not one to be 
put aside and lost sight of. It has been often 
discussed. It ought to be discussed more. We 
are making progress in the field of game legisla¬ 
tion. The country is too large for a uniform 
game law applying to its entire extent. To talk 
of a National law, prescribing the same season 
for Maine and Florida, is folly. But it is highly 
desirable, and we have faith to believe that it may 
sometime be entirely practicable, to secure uni¬ 
form laws for contiguous states which lie in the 
same isothermal belts. Such laws would be based 
on the soundest common sense. 
The one obstacle in the way of securing such 
a system is the wide and almost hopelessly irre¬ 
concilable differences of opinion prevailing among 
sportsmen respecting the proper seasons for kill¬ 
ing and not killing game. In each individual state 
this diversity of sentiment is strongly marked, 
and so aggressive that it stands in the way of 
enacting laws that would secure the greatest good 
to the greatest number. 
The right way to secure such laws is to unite 
for action. A national association for such a 
purpose has been tried. It was too big. It fell 
to pieces. If another one be organized that too 
will fall to pieces. What is needed is the associa¬ 
tion together of a restricted number of states. 
FOOD FOR QUAIL IN CONFINEMENT. 
At this time of the year, when many of our 
readers are, no doubt, purchasing live quail for 
turning out in spring, the question of their treat¬ 
ment comes up. Usually the most important point 
to be considered is that of their food. Often the 
poor little things have made a long journey with¬ 
out eating or drinking, and when they reach their 
destination are in a deplorable condition of star¬ 
vation and weakness. At such a time they should 
not be too liberally fed, and only enough grain 
should be given them to take the edge off their 
appetite. 
The best food for quail in confinement of which 
we have any knowledge is what is commonly 
known at the feed stores as “screenings.” This 
consists of the light weight grains of wheat or 
rye with other smaller grains, and the seeds of 
the plants which may have grown in the field with 
the crop. The chief recommendation of this food 
is that there is a great deal of variety to it, and 
that it is composed of the seeds which the quail 
eat in a.^state of nature. A diet wholly of wheat 
or cracked corn, even though the birds may for a 
time appear to thrive upon it, is not so good for 
them as one in which there is more change. A 
man would soon cease to enjoy his meals if they 
always consisted of beef or mutton, and in like 
manner the quail need change of diet. An essen¬ 
tial to the well-being of these or any other galli¬ 
naceous or grain-feeding birds is plenty of gravel 
with which to triturate what they eat. Unless 
they have this, the food is very imperfectly di¬ 
gested, the birds ill-nourished and unable to with¬ 
stand the diseases which are sure to follow the 
failure to assimilate what passes into the gizzard. 
It is not enough to supply them with earth. This 
is good for them in one way, for they will roll 
and bathe in it, and keeps them free from the at¬ 
tack of insects, but it will not take the place of 
coarse sand or gravel. This they must have. 
Common building sand, if a little fine gravel be 
mingled with it, is very good; but the ordinary 
white sand of the sea beach, such as is used for 
scouring, is too fine for the purpose. 
As might be supposed, the birds will do best 
when they have a constant change of food. A few 
heads of lettuce or some leaves of spinach thrown 
to them, twice a week during the winter, will do 
much to keep them in good condition, and to 
make them well and strong at the time for turn¬ 
ing them loose from their prisons in spring. If 
they are confined in a warm room, a handful of 
canary seed sowed in some moist earth, and pro¬ 
tected until it has had time to sprout and send up 
shoots an inch high, will be eagerly eaten by them, 
and the exercise of scratching among the dirt will 
prove very beneficial. 
We have sometimes fed the birds a little finely 
chopped beef, which they devoured with relish, 
but this is perhaps pampering them a little too 
highly. 
It is well worth the while of any one who is 
keeping quails over the winter to devote a little 
time and thought to the question of his bird’s 
appetites, for on this may turn the whole success 
or failure of his attempt at stocking his grounds. 
MARKED TROUT. 
It is the custom of some of our fish commis¬ 
sioners to attach metal tags to liberated salmon, 
that when captured again, the growth of the fish 
may be noted. We once knew an angler who was 
in the habit of putting his mark on trout; but he 
did not use a metal tag. It was a rule with him 
to retain no trout that weighed less than one-half 
pound. When he landed one of less weight, he 
would carefully take it from the hook, mark it by 
biting off the upper portion of its tail fin, and 
throw it back into the water to grow. Sometimes 
he would catch these fish again after they had 
attained the proper size to find a place in his 
basket; and it was often a source of pleasure to 
him to receive a letter of thanks from some fel¬ 
low angler who had chanced to take one of the 
marked big fellows. One day this biter of trouts’ 
tails was driving along some eighteen miles from 
home, when he came to a bridge over a stream, 
and in passing saw a big trout rise. The next 
day, with his tackle, he drove back over these 
eighteen miles and tried for a rise. He found 
not a sign of trout. The next day he made the 
journey again, with a like result. The third day, 
nothing daunted, he drove out again. This time 
he pulled out a three-pound trout. The upper half 
of its tail fin was gone; and our friend has al¬ 
ways believe that it was one of his marked trout. 
OPEN SEASONS. 
One way to secure the observation of the times 
and seasons for game and fish is to make them 
known. This we are doing to the best of our 
ability by publishing every year a revised list of 
open and close seasons. That it may be correct, 
we have invited the co-operation of our readers 
in the several states. Now the request is repeat¬ 
ed. Please report to us any changes that have 
been made in the laws of your state during the 
past winter. 
ANOTHER GAME BIRD. 
State Game Warden J. C. Speaks, of Ohio, re¬ 
cently received four dozen crested California 
quail and has them in the state breeding preserve 
at London, Ohio. Later they and their progeny 
will be distributed throughout the state. 
The quail is known as Gambel’s partridge, and 
is in striking contrast to the popular “Bob White” 
known to every farmer’s boy in the Buckeye state. 
It abounds in the lonely deserts of New Mexico 
with the blue mountain quail. It is sometimes 
called the California quail, and is one of the most 
conspicuous and charming forms of life in the 
vast stretches of meso. 
Its head is adorned with a jet black recurving 
crest and it is marked on the flanks with bright 
chestnut streaked with flashes of white feathers. 
It quickly repays favors received, it is said, as it 
becomes semi-domesticated and will not migrate. 
Its movements are quick and it is alert to any 
threatening danger. 
