Nov. 9, 1912 
FOREST AND STREAM 
591 
man by far, in his own mind and that of Uncle 
Esek, too, than his big' uncle, who strode 1 along, 
tall and gaunt and pale, with an empty sleeve 
pinned upon the breast of his rough jacket. 
Mother was delighted to see her young huntsman 
and heard again and again his story of how he 
killed his first wild turkey. 
In the afternoon he went to the village on a 
mule, actually wearing his uncle’s spurs, and 
there got a letter from father, who was with 
Lee up in Virginia, which to the little boy seemed 
as far away as the very border of the world. 
Uncle said to the little fellow when he came 
back and brought the letter, “Well, Jimmie, 
you’ve won your spurs.” In all the Confederacy 
there was not a prouder or happier boy, and 
mother had to smile at him through her tears, as 
she read, half aloud and half to herself, that 
letter from father, written on paper, one side 
of which had been already used for some other 
purpose, and contained in an envelope which had 
also been used and had been turned and re¬ 
gummed. And Uncle Esek was there, too, to pay 
his tribute, for he said, “I sholy knows dat 
Marse Henry will be proud of dis boy when he 
hears what kine uv er hunter he is. He’s er 
gwin ter be a man, pint blank like Marse Henry 
hisself.” To Uncle Esek this was the crowning 
compliment, and the little boy so took it. 
Dana’s FIRST THIS YEAR IN TIOGA COUNTY, PA. 
The Brilliant Autumn Time. 
Written from memory by E. Platt Robinson from Frank 
Forester’s ’Field Sports in America.” 
It is brilliant autumn time, the most brilliant time of all, 
When the gorgeous woods are gleaming ere the leaves 
begin to fall; 
When the maple leaves are crimson, and the hickories 
shine like gold, 
When the noons are sultry hot and the nights are frosty 
cold. 
W hen the country has no green, but the sword-grass by 
the rill, 
The willow in the valley and the pine upon the hill; 
When the pippin leaves its bough and the sumac’s fruit 
is red, 
And the quail are piping loudly from the buckwheat 
where they fed. 
When the sky is blue as steel, and the river clear as glass, 
W hen the mists are on the mountains and the network 
on the grass; 
When the harvests all are housed and the farmer’s work 
is done. 
And the woodlands are resounding with the spaniels and 
the gun. 
I doubt not, thousands of your readers have 
never seen these lines, and they are good enough 
to be printed every year at this season in every 
sportsmen’s journal in the country. 
I have known your paper many years, but 
never when it was better or even as good as at 
present. E. P. Robinson. 
Packer, Conn., Oct. 16. 
Blue Foxes on St. Paul and Otter 
Island, Alaska. 
In past years much has been printed in 
Forest and Stream with regard to the breed¬ 
ing of the blue foxes in semi-domestication in 
Alaska. This appears to have been carried on 
more successfully in the Pribilof Islands than 
anywhere else, for on a number of islands it has 
hopelessly failed, the foxes mysteriously disap¬ 
pearing or becoming so few that their owners 
became discouraged and gave up the business. 
Three years ago James Judge, of Washing¬ 
ton, D. C-, gave a detailed report of the blue 
fox industry on St. George Island, and now in 
Volume VIII., of the Annual Reports of the 
American Breeders’ Association, he gives some 
notes on the blue foxes of St. Paul, Otter Island 
and other islands of the Pribilof group. 
On St. George Island, where the foxes are 
fed during the winter, it is the practice to trap 
the animals, the finest being branded and turned 
out for breeding purposes, while the poorest in¬ 
dividuals are killed for fur. During the winter 
of 1907-08, 985 foxes were caught there, of which 
446 were killed for fur and 539 released. During 
the winter of 1909-10, the number caught was 
778, of which 421 were set free and 357 killed. 
Food is abundant on St. George Island, and the 
foxes there are well fed and flourishing. In 
earlier years when the killing of seals and sea 
lions was carried on to a greater extent, they 
were somewhat more numerous than now, and 
at that time more than 1,000 a year were killed. 
On St. Paul and Otter Island the conditions 
are quite different. On St. Paul the foxes were 
first fed in 1897, and this feeding has been con¬ 
tinued in the winter up to the present, although 
for many years the foxes scarcely ate the food. 
They seemed to care nothing for the seal meat 
and salmon that was relished by the St. George 
foxes, and it was only in 1907 that they began 
to eat the food offered with any regularity. Dur¬ 
ing the fail of that year a quantity of whale 
blubber came ashore and the foxes fed on it. 
They were given salted salmon that had been 
freshened, and the carcasses of a couple of mules 
shot the previous autumn. In the winter of 
1908-09 they seemed to go more regularly to 
their food, much of which, however, was eaten 
by the gulls. Foxes of course follow the beach, 
feeding on the wash, so long as the beach is 
open, but when the ice comes down in January, 
the beach is closed to them, and this is their 
season of scarcity. 
Because the foxes on St. Paul will not go 
regularly to their food, while the skins are prime, 
the natives were permitted to use steel traps for 
a period of six days, beginning Nov. 28. This 
resulted in a catch of 130 blue and 35 white fox 
skins. At Otter Island, from Dec. 6 to 14, one 
white and nineteen blue foxes were taken. It 
will be noticed that the proportion of white skins 
is unusually large, but in former years the per¬ 
centage of white skins in the catches of St. Paul 
varied between 1 and 10 per cent. The percent¬ 
age of white foxes in the catches on St. George 
Island down to 1901 tallied closely with that on 
St. Paul, but efforts have been put forth to ex¬ 
terminate the white foxes on St. George Island, 
and apparently with some success. 
Of the foxes taken on St. Paul Island, about 
51 per cent, were males. Immediately after 
death ninety-three males and seventy-six females 
were weighed as they were caught. The weights 
on St. Paul varied between 8j/> and 15 pounds 
for males, and 7 and 13 pounds for females. On 
Otter Island the weights varied between 7 and 
10^2 pounds for males and 6 l /2 and 9 pounds for 
females. This would seem to show that the St. 
Paul foxes were well fed and in good condition, 
while those on Otter Island were ill nourished. 
From May until January, the St. Paul foxes have 
comparative abundance of food from the bird 
rookeries, seal rookeries and the killing fields. 
On the other hand, as there are no seals on 
Otter Island, the foxes there have food in plenty 
only from May until September. 
Of the numbers examined, thirty-nine were 
yearlings and fifty-five males, and thirty-five fe¬ 
males were of breeding age. As litters of new¬ 
born foxes are known to number from five to 
twelve, the mortality among the young foxes 
must be very great, and here is opened a great 
field for study. 
The skins taken on St. Paul Island were of 
unusual high quality, the fur long, dark and lus¬ 
trous, while those from Otter Island were poor 
in quality, with short fur and many of them 
streaked with gray. 
It seems altogether conceivable that the ob¬ 
servations made on blue fox breeding on islands 
of the Pribilof group may result in discoveries 
which will once more set the blue fox industry 
of Alaska on its feet. The young foxes have a 
thousand enemies, of which we know little or 
nothing, but that eagles, ravens, gulls and num¬ 
bers of predatory birds are perpetually on the 
watch for them is quite certain. Mr. Judge’s 
papers on this subject are of very great interest. 
Should Mu&krats be Protected? 
The St. Bernard (La.) Hunters’ Association 
held a meeting last week and discussed the vari¬ 
ous hunting laws, especially those in ref¬ 
erence to trapping. President Grinyer said the 
Legislature should not have passed a law pro¬ 
tecting muskrats, and on the contrary there 
should be a law paying a bonus for each musk¬ 
rat slain. He said the muskrat destroys the 
levees and also kills the alligators. It was stated 
that several of the hunting laws should be 
amended relating to those who are making a 
living trapping and hunting. St. Bernard parish 
joins Orleans parish and is only a short distance 
from New Orleans. The general hunting laws 
and the new amendments are meeting with con¬ 
siderable opposition, especially the restriction 
which confines the trapping season from Novem¬ 
ber to January in each year. 
The make-up. the text, the illustrations and 
the typography of Forest and Stream are 
designed to appeal to sportsmen. 
