Jan. 30, 1909 ] 
FOREST AND STREAM 
177 
The Purchase of Cat Island. 
New Orleans, La., Jan. 20 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: In an area of 750 square miles out in 
the Gulf of Alexico the Audubon Society of 
Louisiana and the Federal Government own and 
control twenty-five bird breeding islands. We 
started this experiment five years ago with prob¬ 
ably three hundred pairs of birds, and although 
during the last two breeding seasons we lost 
fully 400,000 eggs through unprecedented high 
tides, yet nevertheless we were able to show an 
increase of fully 62,000 birds during the last 
breeding season. These birds are principally 
laughing gulls, black skimmers and Forster’s 
terns, together with some other species of no 
considerable numbers. Reports from the islands 
up to the present time are so favorable and the 
outlook for next season so propitious that I look 
forward to one of the most successful seasons 
we have ever had. Anywhere from 250,000 to 
400,000 birds will be raised on those islands and 
turned loose on the waters of the gulf. 
Last September, Governor Jared Y. Sanders, 
of this State, who by the way is deeply in¬ 
terested in game conservation, honored me by 
appointing me the first president of the first 
game commission of this State. As a fellow 
worker he appointed a disciple of Izaak Walton, 
a well known and prominent medical practitioner 
by the name of Dr. Oscar Dowling, and we two 
began the work of game conservation in this 
State. We are slowly accumulating a lot of 
valuable information on the subject, and later 
we will give same to the public. The prodigality 
of game and fish life in our land and waters is 
astonishing. In money value it represents a 
commodity that equals five millions of dollars 
annually, and the prospects are that within a 
few years, through rigid protection of the game 
and fish during the breeding seasons, we will 
increase the game and fish to such proportions 
that it will represent an annual value of ten 
millions of dollars. I make these statements in 
order that the readers of Forest and Stream 
may understand the conditions existing here, and 
to indicate what we are attempting to do in the 
line of the conservation of the faunal life of 
this climate, and to show that I am in a position 
to call attention to the possibilities of the Cat 
Island project which was referred to in the 
columns of this paper last week by the well 
known nature student and writer, Herbert K. 
Job. 
Mr. Job’s article outlined what it was pro¬ 
posed to do with the island and suggested that 
the readers of Forest and Stream announce 
their preference for one or the other of several 
propositions. 
The work is so great and its possibilities so 
wonderful that I suggest that the enterprise be 
conducted under the auspices of the National 
Association of Audubon Societies of which Wm. 
Dutcher, of 141 Broadway, New York, is the 
honored president. I think all money subscribed 
over and above actual cash purchase rights 
should be invested in an exploitation of the 
oyster industry, which can be made a valuable 
part of the experiment. I believe that, with a 
rigid economical expenditure on right lines, the 
oyster industry can be made valuable and profit¬ 
able. From what experts familiar with the de¬ 
tails of the oyster business in this latitude tell 
US there is no doubt that returns from scientific 
oyster cultivation on the property can be made 
a valuable adjunct to the enterprise, and I think 
that all returns from that industry should imme¬ 
diately be invested in the improvement of the 
property. If this were done for say three or 
four years, the island would show the most 
wonderful exhibition of faunal life to be found 
anywhere, and I believe that sportsmen and 
nature lovers throughout the whole country 
ought to consider it a privilege to be able to 
become a part of this unique experiment. 
Sportsmen in the North and West may ask 
what interest they have in the matter, but if they 
could see the slaughter of the shore birds in the 
spring as they go northward they would realize 
what it means to them. 
If we were permitted to stop this killing and 
allow the unnumbered host to go northward fully 
refreshed from their long journey across the 
gulf, every sportsman in the North and West 
LAUGHING GULLS ON ONE OF THE ISLAND RESERVES 
IN THE GULF OF MEXICO. 
Photographed by Herbert K. Job. 
would begin to notice the increase and gain in 
bird life in his own territory, and as far as the 
ducks are concerned, if they were permitted to 
live in content and without being disturbed dur¬ 
ing the winters, they would leave there in such 
numbers and condition in spring that sportsmen 
all over the country northward would benefit by 
their protection. 
This experiment does not appeal to the sports¬ 
men of our State because our own game re¬ 
sources are so vast that there is no incentive to 
go outside of the limits of the State to enter 
upon an experiment in the conservation of game 
such as is contemplated in this Cat Island pro¬ 
ject. If the game is to be conserved, it must 
be done by men who are really and vitally in¬ 
terested in the project, and those men are the 
sportsmen who live to the eastward and north¬ 
ward and west of us. 
The island contains a forest of timber which 
could be sold for probably $10,000. This has 
never been looked after, and is just as nature 
produced it. If it too was conserved on lines 
of scientific forestry, it could be made a won¬ 
derful example. When it comes to fishing I 
hesitate to tell the readers of Forest and Stream 
what our waters can do in that respect. Gentle¬ 
men fishermen who have fished all over the 
world tell me that the fishing in this latitude is 
unsurpassed and within a short distance of the 
shores of Cat Island there is tarpon fishing as 
fine as can be found anywhere. 
Those who make an investment in this enter¬ 
prise can always look forward to the invest¬ 
ment becoming more valuable as the time slips 
by. Mr. Job and myself intend to give the 
work a general supervision. If, however, some 
man can be found interested in forestry and 
game conservation to take complete supervision 
of the enterprise, it would be a wise investment 
to put him in active charge of it. If a man like 
Mr. Job would take charge of the island it would 
become in a few years the show spot of the 
Western hemisphere. 
Frank M. Miller, 
President of the Board of Commissioners for the Pro¬ 
tection of Birds, Game and Fish, and former presi¬ 
dent of the Audubon Society of Louisiana. 
Rabies. 
West Philadelphia, Pa., Jan. 15.— Editor 
Forest and Stream: Having very recently lost 
three valuable setters from rabies, my attention 
has been particularly drawn to the various cases 
of this disease as mentioned in the daily papers 
and to the statement accompanying same, some 
of which are hard to reconcile with what the 
veterinarians tell us. 
For instance a fatal (of course) case was 
recently noted near Norristown, Pa., where a 
person had been bitten by a mad dog two years 
ago. Now, in my own experience, one dog, 
practically without warning, developed rabies, 
and as he had been “scrapping” with the other 
two that same day, they were securely penned 
up and he was sent to the University of Penn¬ 
sylvania Veterinary Hospital where he was put 
out of the way, after allowing his trouble to 
develop rather more fully. It required fourteen 
days for the disease to manifest itself in an 
eight-months’-old pup and four days longer in 
the four-year-old dog. Both of these cases were 
of the “dumb” form, while the first one ex¬ 
hibited a most active case. I was told by a 
specialist that 120 days after exposure to inocu¬ 
lation would be a sufficient quarantine. While 
in this instance I was only obliged to keep them 
a short time, I have felt interested to learn if 
the poison could lie dormant in the human sys¬ 
tem for any such time as is mentioned in the 
Norristown case, or much longer even, one in¬ 
stance of nine years having been cited to me as 
authentic. You may have noted the case last 
month of the girl near Atlanta, Ga., whose hand 
had received “a slight abrasion.” She was in¬ 
oculated through this by a horse which had been 
bitten by a mad dog. These apparent facts and 
the unusual prevalence of rabies in this section 
just now would seem to make the time ripe for 
a thorough investigation of the subject through 
your columns. In your issue of (about) Aug. 
2, of last year, was an interesting article on the 
subject, but so much remains unsaid that an ex¬ 
perience meeting by your interested subscribers 
should prove very enlightening. McLowry. 
THE NATURAL FLAVOR 
of the richest and purest cow’s milk is re¬ 
tained in Borden’s Peerless Brand Evapor¬ 
ated Milk (unsweetened). It is especially 
adapted for use either plain or diluted on 
breakfast fruits or cereals. In coffee and 
chocolate it is much better than fresh cream. 
It enriches all milk dishes.— Adv. 
