Jan. 9, 1909.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
55 
them from running dogs and killing deer when¬ 
ever they please. 
The department knows these things, local 
game protectors know about them, as do sports¬ 
men, summer visitors and the general public in 
the mountains, and to that extent that the so- 
called protection of fish and game has become 
a byword. 
The sportsmen of this State are paying over 
$100,000 per year for hunting licenses to help 
support game protection. What are we going 
to do about all this? Are we to have protec¬ 
tion that protects? Clarence L. Parker. 
Antelope and Automobile. 
Lowry, Mont., Jan. 2. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: I am a subscriber to your valuable 
paper and I read the aecount of hunting small 
game in autos. I inclose a clipping from a Great 
Falls paper, giving an account of the general 
game situation here and of hunting antelope in 
automobiles. 
While a majority of the local hunters have 
been successful in getting game this year, hunt¬ 
ing, on the whole, has been unusually poor. 
There has not been a great deal of snow and 
the woods are dry as tinder. The crackling of 
leaves and twigs as the hunter, heavily shod, 
stalked through the woods and along creek bot¬ 
toms, made it difficult to get a shot at game. In 
the main range, where there was early snow, 
conditions were better. 
Game birds have been extremely scarce this 
year, owing to the unusual floods last June, when 
a large proportion of the young were drowned. 
Local sportsmen have secured comparatively 
few. It is possible that several years will elapse 
before they are as plentiful as of yore. 
There has been a large killing of antelope this 
year. In fact, the slaughter has been so great 
as to threaten extermination of the species in 
this part of the State unless the graceful little 
animals are again placed under the protection 
of the law. Owing to the fact that it has been 
unlawful to kill them in recent years, the ante¬ 
lope, at the beginning of the season, were not 
as wild as might have been expected, and they 
were easy prey for the hunters. A method of 
slaughtering antelope that has caused consider¬ 
able criticism among sportsmen, and to which 
a stop should be put by law, is running them 
down in automobiles. It is a comparatively easy 
matter to get them in this way if conditions are 
favorable. If a band of antelope is found on 
a level bench of considerable size, a light, steady 
speedy machine can single out an animal and 
overtakeJt with little difficulty. Recently a far¬ 
mer living north of the city was coming to town 
and stopped to open a gate. While he was doing 
so, an antelope, hard-pressed by an automobile, 
ran in between his horses for protection and was 
saved by him from its pursuers. An antelope 
is not a long-distance runner, and af the end 
of a mile is about all in. There is a law pro¬ 
hibiting the hunting of deer, antelope and other 
animals with dogs, and another law should be 
framed making it illegal to hunt antelope with 
motor cars. 
I think that to pursue antelope by automobile 
is a eruel shame, and the laws should prohibit 
it. When I first came here the antelope were 
in large bands of fifty or one hundred or more. 
Now the largest band I have seen during the 
last few years is eighteen. I am afraid they 
will soon become exterminated and they should 
be protected for another five years. 
I am a range rider. The animals on the range 
here in Teton county are mostly coyotes and 
antelope. J. H. C. 
Poor Shooting in Connecticut. 
New York City, Jan. 2. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: Last summer you asked me to let 
the readers of Forest and Stream know what 
the game outlook was in the neighborhood of 
my farm in central Connecticut. As a matter 
of fact, the prospect was so poor that I did 
not have the heart to write about it. 
Now, that the shooting season for igo8 in 
YELLOWSTONE PARK BEAR. 
Connecticut is over, I will let you know what 
T found. 
In spite of the fact that some of the young 
men clubbed together and bought several dozen 
quail four years ago, I could hear of only one 
bevy for many miles around. 
As far as I could observe no one shot into 
this bev)', and some days ago a neighbor who 
has been looking out for them informed me that 
all had got safely through the open season. 
Grouse, I think, were a trifle more numerous 
than last year, but numerous is a poor word 
to use in speaking of them, for they were woe¬ 
fully few. 
Eight grouse I kept watch of all through the 
season until Thanksgiving day, but I fear some 
were killed at the end, for two weeks ago I 
could find but four of them. 
This hunting grouse, but not shooting them, 
was rather discouraging to young Dan, my set¬ 
ter, who likes to see a bird fall after he has 
stood it for me. Woodcock were about as plen¬ 
tiful as last year. My best bag was four in 
one morning and a dozen in all for the season. 
This, where but twenty years ago twelve, was 
but a fair morning’s work. 
English snipe appeared on the marshes in fair 
numbers in October, but owing to the dry 
weather ducks were entirely absent. 
Fewer hunters were out than ever before in 
recent years, and I was told that less ammuni 
tion was sold than last year. 
I am glad to say that many of the younger 
generation abstained from killing grouse, realiz¬ 
ing that they were dangerously close to exter¬ 
mination. Gray squirrels were fairly plentiful, 
but were badly killed off before the season 
closed. Cottontails were numerous for us and 
a goodly number survived. 
Two weeks ago several dozen Hungarian par¬ 
tridges were turned out, and while gamy look¬ 
ing fellows, are not in my opinion in the same 
class with our native quail and grouse. In 
November, while riding through a large piece 
of woods, I was surprised to see where a buck 
had scraped the velvet off his antlers against 
a young hickory tree. A new trolley railroad 
was in the process of construction not a hun¬ 
dred yards from where the buck had been, and 
some of the workmen informed me that he 
often came out of the woods and watched them 
at work upon the line. Joseph E. Bulkley. 
In North Carolina Mountains. 
Hayesville, N. C., Dec. 28. —Editor Forest and 
Stream: Here I am 144 miles by rail with six¬ 
teen mountain road miles added from home. I 
am stopping with one of the best men in the 
county, one who loses no opportunity to make 
one feel he is more than welcome. His name 
is W. T. Bumgarner. 
This is the fourth year I have come here, 
consecutively, to find birds which are here—par¬ 
tridges (quail) and plenty of them. We have 
brought in some eighty of them. A friend came 
with me and we reached this spot on Tuesday 
afternoon late, but not too late to go out and 
get a lot of quail for breakfast, Wednesday 
morning. 
Wednesday we shot enough for him to carry, 
thirty-four and one woodcock, home on Thurs¬ 
day. To-day a young man, Mr. Anderson, of 
Hayesville, who is a capital shot, came out and 
joined me, and we brought in thirty-six more. 
We did not make an early start nor did we 
stay out late. 
It has been too warm for comfort; more like 
April than December. 
Some sportsmen have been to this county who 
have attempted to dodge the ten dollar license 
required from nonresidents, so that the game 
warden had to come out after them a week or 
so ago. I am told they have been here before 
and are from Pennsylvania. 
Attempts like this to dodge the law are likely 
to injure innocent sportsmen who, under no 
circumstances, desire to do anything unbecom¬ 
ing true sportsmen. 
With one or two good dogs there is no trouble 
here to find from ten to fifteen or twenty eoveys 
of birds in a day, and if a man can shoot at 
all, he can bag his twenty to thirty birds and 
not rush himself or dogs. Any man ought to be 
satisfied with twenty or thirty birds a day, and 
if he can shoot, he can get them with a double- 
barreled gun and rest part of the day. If he 
wants more he is unreasonable. I am not in 
favor of “pot hunting” and leaving nothing for 
the future. Ernest L. Ewbank. 
