648 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Live Notes From The Field 
Being Weekly Reports From Our Local Correspondents 
All good sportsmen declare the new law pro¬ 
tecting wild fowl during the spring season is a 
good thing and Miss Bernice Deloe of Chicago 
Junction, O., will agree with them. Yet, she 
spent many lonesome, impatient mornings in 
March and April when the canvas-backs and 
red-heads were flying north in numbers. Long 
morning sleeps or latest best-sellers will not 
take the place of the gun and hunting skiff in 
the affections of this good-looking, healthy and 
most unusual girl. To her it will be an almost 
unbearable wait until the fall hunting season 
opens again. 
To arise at four o’clock on a cold winter 
morning, set out with your shot-gun on your 
shoulder for the extensive marshes of San¬ 
dusky Bay and there get out your hunting skiff 
and decoys, push out into the tall marsh grass 
waters and then wait for the ducks as they 
come flying southward—it’s a great sport. Any¬ 
one of the several hundred or more sportsmen 
there every morning during the duck season, 
huddled down in their skiffs, with their great 
hunting coat collars turned up to ward off the 
stinging wintry wind will tell you that. 
But among the many hunters scattered 
through the marshes each morning during the 
past season, there could be found no more eager 
and competent shot than Ohio licensed hunter— 
or huntress if you will—No. 14,451. That was 
Bernice Deloe’s number. For be it known that 
during the duck hunting season, there was never 
a morning but she awakened in the wee hours, 
donned her hunting togs, poled her skiff to a 
point of vantage, braved the biting cold of a 
wintry morning, bagged a goodly number of 
ducks or mud-hens, and returned to her father’s 
cottage before most girls have had their last 
wink of beauty sleep. The other girls may find 
parties, dances and beaux lots of fun. But give 
Bernice her old double-barrelled on a morning 
when the ducks are flying low and she’ll vow 
there’s nothing more heavenly. 
Bernice Deloe is really a good shot. She 
always handles her boat alone, and shoots at the 
flying fowl with all the confidence and ease of 
the seasoned hunter. She knows all the little 
tricks of the trade—when the ducks will be 
plenty, how high they’re likely to fly, and the 
places where they’ll likely alight. Though she 
is the only woman hunter among the hundreds 
in that big expanse of marsh waters, it is usual¬ 
ly the case that when the day’s bag is counted, 
she has as many or more than the best of the 
male shooters. 
Of course she doesn’t affect finery in pursuing 
the much-sought-after canvas-back. She wears 
high-top rubber boots, thick warm stockings, 
loose heavy bloomers, a short skirt, rough, heavy 
man’s hunting coat and a cap. Thus garbed, 
Miss Deloe could hardly be termed attractive in 
a feminine way, yet she makes the picture of a 
healthy, strong American girl. She is twenty- 
two years old. 
William Deloe, her father, is a locomotive en¬ 
gineer. Several years ago he erected a cottage 
on Pine Creek, near Sandusky Bay, that he 
might enjoy the duck hunting which the San¬ 
dusky marshes afford. Here his wife and 
daughter came to remain during his hunting ex¬ 
cursions. Soon Bernice became interested in the 
sport and accompanied her father. Then she 
took to going out alone in the hunting skiff. So 
enthusiastic did she finally become that, for the 
past two seasons, she and her mother have re¬ 
mained at the cottage all during the duck sea¬ 
son, Deloe joining his family when his runs per¬ 
mitted. Now Bernice is more enthused over a 
good “duck day” than is her father. 
The fatigue and exposure which keep many 
men out of the duck-hunting game seems no 
hardship for this young woman. To be the good 
Ohio Licensed Huntress 14,451. 
huntress she is, she must brave the rough, cold 
weather which is generally prevalent when the 
ducks are flying in numbers. And she does it 
with the same genuine pleasure and excitement 
that her girl friends feel in appearing at a smart 
function in a new gown. 
TROUT PLANTING IN PENNSYLVANIA. 
Uniontown, Pa., May 5.—Twenty-four cans 
containing 3,600 brook trout have been received 
from the state hatcheries at Bellefonte and 
freed in several mountain streams near Union- 
town. Twelve cans were shipped to Ephriam 
Hague, Frank Balsley, Charles Hagan and 
Amadee Hagan and twelve cans to Charles O. 
LaClair, Harry Gorley, Tom Gorley, H. W. 
Steele, Henderson Johnson and James Collins; 
Half of the trout were freed in Mill Run, Whar¬ 
ton township, and the other half distributed 
among Cheeney, Sandy and McIntyre creeks, in 
Wharton township. 
Other shipments of fish to this section of 
Fayette county have failed to arrive in Union- 
town and the local sportsmen are righteously in¬ 
dignant over this failure of the State Depart¬ 
ment of Fisheries to ship brown and brook trout 
for the streams in Southern Fayette county. No 
one is prepared to say the fish were not shipped, 
as the State authorities never fail to notify who¬ 
ever orders the fish that they will arrive at a 
certain time. Neither is any one willing to ac¬ 
cuse the sportsmen in northern districts of 
claiming the fish and taking them from the 
train while enroute to Uniontown. But the fish 
never were received and local sportsmen want to 
know why. It is said that an investigation will 
be made. Although this treatment is said to have 
covered a period of several years, it came to a 
climax last week when fifteen cans of fish fail¬ 
ed to arrive, and investigation showed that the 
cans had been taken from the train at Con- 
nellsville and Dunbar. About two months ago, 
five of seven cans said to have been billed to 
Uniontown, and not arriving here, were claimed 
by the State Department of Fisheries to have 
also been taken from the train at Connellsville. 
A messenger had made a fifteen mile trip over 
the Chestnut ridge of the Allegheny mountains 
to Uniontown to receive the fish and free them 
without delay in the mountain streams. 
FISHING IMPROVED 75% IN OHIO. 
Sandusky, O., May 8.—The state agricultural 
commission is taking one or two car-loads of 
live game fish out of Sandusky every week for 
distribution in inland Ohio lakes and streams. A 
C. Baxter has charge of the work of trans¬ 
planting black and rock bass from Lake Erie to 
the inland waters. 
“We have attained some great results,” Baxter 
says. “Fishing has improved 75 per cent, on the 
Ohio inland waters since the stocking of the 
streams was started by the state. There has 
been a great awakening of interest by the 
sportsmen of Ohio and fish and game protective 
associations have been organized in every inter¬ 
ior county since the work was begun. Through 
these organizations, the sportsmen have given 
us great co-operation and nowadays there are 
few violations of the fishing laws. When viola¬ 
tors are arrested, everybody in the community 
aids in the prosecution. 
“The demand for game fish for the interior has 
become so great that we have difficulty in supply¬ 
ing all. But I think I can truthfully say that 
the inland Ohio sportsmen need no longer go to 
the Lake Erie bass islands or Northern Michi¬ 
gan for his angling.” 
The state’s fish car “Buckeye” has been in 
service for several years. Next fall, the commis¬ 
sion will put on a new steel car, to cost about 
$25,000. This car will have larger tanks. 
Most of the transplanted bass are picked up 
by the deputy fish and game wardens at or 
around the Bass islands. 
