FOREST AND STREAM 
streams and steep mountains. The idea of tree¬ 
ing a fox will be laughed at, but our gray foxes 
tree readily enough here, and the same is true 
through the South. Though not so good at 
climbing as a coon, I have shot them forty feet 
from the ground on an almost perpendicular tree.” 
This was simply branded a lie of the lowest 
order by men who had run foxes in the East 
all of their lives. They admitted that while they 
had treed foxes on trees that leaned forty-five 
degrees, never had they heard of treeing foxes 
on straight, up and down, trees. However, it 
is true. Californian foxes are very different 
from the eastern foxes. The Californian fox 
is small, and weasel-like in its actions, and has 
very nearly, what, one writer says, are cat claws. 
As this writer points out nearly all of the live 
oaks of this furthest west that grow on the 
foothills are crooked, rough-barked, and hardly 
one grows on a slope from the ground, so that 
it would not be much of a task for a fox, dog 
or even a goat to climb one. 
787 
But finally we have the version of Addison 
Powell, said to be second to the greatest author¬ 
ity on big game in North America, concerning 
tree-climbing Californian foxes: 
“That the California fox can climb trees has 
been proven to my satisfaction. I once doubted 
their ability to ascend any but leaning trees or 
those with spreading limbs, but I finally found 
that my hounds treed them where the trees were 
straight, and it was forty feet to the first limb!” 
Weekly Reports From Our Local Correspondents 
THE FARMER AND PROTECTION. 
Beacon, N. Y., December 8, 1914 - 
In the issue of Forest and Stream of Decem¬ 
ber 5th, your editorials “The Farmer and Pro¬ 
tection” and “Shooting on Sunday” put forth 
views on the subject which to me are contrary 
to the American spirit and adverse to the general 
interest of sportsmen at large. 
The farmer or land owner has an unquestion¬ 
able right to post his lands against trespass or 
hunting and when he does this it is for his own 
protection or good and not for the purpose of 
holding out or placing in the market a hunting 
privilege for the city man to buy or control- 
Those of us who live outside of the large cities 
and enjoy the privilege of hunting on lands in 
this vicinity, do so with the full knowledge that 
if it was not for this privilege accorded to us 
by the farmers and owners of upland cover, we 
would have little or no opportunity for hunting 
or a day in the field. 
Your suggestion to have the city -man co-oper¬ 
ate with the farmer and the farmer to post his 
lands with “no hunting” signs is a direct appeal 
to the owner to close all shooting privileges, un¬ 
less the same are bought up or controlled by 
clubs or individuals—an endeavor to convince 
the farmer that the wild game on his land is a 
commercial asset. The farmer may post his 
land and keep the shooting for himself, but the 
wild game in the State is the property of the 
State and no individual has a legal title to a 
single, solitary wild game bird or animal when 
it comes to the question of the right to sell the 
privilege to kill them. 
The American sportsmen who are not mem¬ 
bers of game preserve clubs and unable to afford 
the expense of acquiring shooting rights, do not 
wish to see our country drift into the conditions 
which obtain in Europe where there is no free 
shooting and the game wild and propagated goes 
with the land. 
In regard to Sunday shooting, the greater 
number of farmers and land owners are invari¬ 
ably against it. Sunday shooting has been the 
cause of a large number of land owners posting 
their property against all hunting whatever. The 
enclosed clipping relative to Sunday hunting near 
Stormville, N. Y., shows the attitude of farmers 
on this question. 
When the owner tolerates hunting on his prem¬ 
ises during week days he is by all means en¬ 
titled to a respite for one day in the week, the 
game also is deserving of one day free from 
disturbance. On Sundays the farmer is usually 
away from the outlying portion of his land and 
he objects to being disturbed on that day, while 
on week days he may give little attention if he 
knows where the hunters are and what they are 
shooting. 
It is not good policy for sportsmen to prejudice 
the land owner by promiscuous Sunday hunting, 
it is the land owner to whom the sportsmen out¬ 
side of the club or preserve must look for the 
privilege and pleasure of a day in the field. 
Yours very truly, 
CHARLES B. VAN SLYCK. 
The clipping, from a Stormville, N. Y., paper 
is as follows: 
Farmers of this section complain that hunt¬ 
ing parties from other neighborhoods are in¬ 
vading this immediate section every Sunday and 
making considerable disturbance and do more or 
less damage- It does not appear to be the special 
business of the game protectors to prosecute for 
Sunday hunting. But it looks as if somebody 
ought to take measures to have the nuisance 
abated. 
On one of the farms near here one day last 
week, it is said that four wandering dogs were 
shot at by a farm hand and three of the animals 
were killed. The owners of the dogs thus dis¬ 
posed of are said to be making a loud protest, 
threatening prosecution or civil suit. We hear 
that the man who did the shooting claims that 
the dogs were chasing a deer and that the flee¬ 
ing animal was almost exhausted when he came 
to its rescue with his gun and by shooting the 
dogs stopped the chase. 
MINNESOTA AUDUBON SOCIETY. 
“Help Feed the Winter Birds.” 
Winter is here with its cold and storms. Many 
of our winter birds suffer from lack of food 
during the severe cold and it is everyone’s duty 
to furnish them with food and shelter whenever 
possible to do so. 
In Minnesota the following common beneficial 
birds stay with us all winter: The Chickadee, 
Nuthatch, Bluejay, Hairy and Downy Wood¬ 
pecker, Junco, Tree Sparrow, Snowbunting and 
Bobwhite or Quail. 
A single Chickadee has been known to destroy 
over 5,000 eggs of the cankerworm moth in one 
day. The Bobwhite is known to feed on 129 
different kinds of weed-seed and on 125 species 
of insects. As many as 100 potato beetles have 
been taken from the stomach of a single bird. 
The Tree Sparrows in a state the size of Iowa 
will in one winter consume 850 tons of weed 
seed. 
What food to provide: Suet and pork rinds 
tied to the branches of trees is good food for 
some birds, while grain, nuts, seeds, sweepings 
from barns and corn cribs, scraps of meat, bread 
crumbs, etc., are good for all the birds. A little 
grain distributed in sheltered places will often 
save large numbers of quail from death by 
starvation. 
Our winter birds must have plenty of food 
in order to withstand the cold. 
“Will You Help?” 
J. W. FRANZEN, Sec’y, 
Public Library, Minneapolis- 
FARMING DOES NOT SOLVE GAME 
PROBLEM. 
Hagerstown, Md., Dec. 7 - — Joseph Kalbfus, 
game and fish commissioner and secretary of 
the Board of Game Commissioners, has arrived 
at the conclusion, after extensive investigation 
and experiment that “game farming” is not the 
solution of the preservation of certain kinds of 
