708 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Something About the Breeding of Water Fowl 
An Expert Observer Finds Many Queer Things of Interest in the Present Efforts at Artificial Propagation— 
The Future, However, is Promising 
A NOTHER season has passed and game con¬ 
servationists in California are reviewing 
their work, considering results and dis¬ 
cussing errors made this year that can be reme¬ 
died another. At the State Game Farm many 
hundreds of pheasants and quail have been re¬ 
leased and many added to the flocks that are 
to be carried over for breeders. There are 300 
ducks on the farm pond including twenty-five of 
the rare fulvous-tree duck variety. These are so 
tame and easily handled it is believed they will 
be as dependable for a duck farmer as mallard, 
wood duck and teal. Plans have been made to 
run a certain amount of water over several 
acres of pasture, in this way forming into a 
sort of marsh for the ducks’ benefit, thereby con¬ 
siderably more than doubling the capacity of the 
pond and giving room, it is thought, so at least 
1,000 ducks can be raised next year above farm 
requirements. This will be the nesting place of 
a large flock of home-raised" mallards which, 
with not a few teal are no longer wild but as 
thoroughly domesticated as their tame cousins. 
A noticeable thing about water fowl is that 
the shyer kinds, those that are very smart and 
very wary in their natural state are the most 
ready to adapt themselves to the new conditions 
found on a game farm and to recognize man 
as their master. It was only yesterday that two 
“honkers” in a private pond followed the writer 
as a dog might and ate pieces of bread from his 
hand, while mallards, sprig and tree ducks at 
the Game Farm, mallards particularly, know no 
more fear than barnyard fowl, hardly enough 
to keep them from underfoot when a person is 
walking near them. But mud hens and ruddies 
always keep as far from human visitors as they 
can and although the mud hens are home raised, 
it surely takes them a long time to learn that 
n;an is their best friend. Quail, released on the 
farm, stay there, showing no desire to leave 
sometimes even coming into the pens where they 
were laised, for food and shelter. The ducks are 
pinioned, yet were they not I feel quite certain 
that like the quail they would stick to a good 
thing, stay around and grow fat without having 
to hustle for a living. 
There are many persons breeding pheasants 
in California. The birds do very well as long" 
as kept in the breeding pens, so well in fact that, 
caused by a rather overstocked market, the price 
for the more common ring-neck variety has 
dropped as low as $3 per pair, with about $10 
a pair the ruling figure for the fancy ones. Yet 
these same birds which increase so rapidly in 
captivity, as soon as released and forced to shift 
for themselves do very badly. By degrees they 
grow small in number and beautifully less until 
now it is doubtful if there are in a wild state 
many more than the 5,000 that have been released 
in California during the past few years. The 
By Edward T. Martin. 
whys and wherefores of their failure to increase 
have given rise to much debate and caused many 
arguments. The writer claims the fault is large¬ 
ly with the carnivora. The Game Commission 
says, “Unsuitable climatic and food conditions,” 
but the result of an experiment with Hungarian 
partridges at the Pacines Ranch in San Benito 
County, rather gives the carnivora claim the bet¬ 
ter of the argument. A year or two ago on 
this ranch under management of Dr. Henry J. 
Macomber, experiments in conservation were 
made “just to see the game around.” No shoot¬ 
ing except of predacious birds and beasts was 
permitted on the 14,000 acres comprising the 
property. Mounted guards were placed to do 
patrol duty and special efforts made to destroy 
Tree Ducks Raised on California Game Farm. 
all carnivora, from rats and weasels to wolves 
and mountain lions. 
The first efforts in game propagation were 
made with quail which were fed and encouraged 
in every manner to make the ranch their home. 
They liked it, became very tame and finally were 
considered as much a part of the ranch belong¬ 
ings as the poultry, the hens and turkeys, and 
during any September evening of the last two 
or three years, they would come on the lawns 
and about the buildings in droves of two or 
three hundred, more in places where grain had 
been scattered for their benefit, utterly fearless 
and regarding the people on the verandah of the 
ranch house with as much curiosity as the hu¬ 
mans did them. 
Pleased by the way the quail thrived in their 
wild state with but little care, a few pheasants 
were obtained from the State Farm, which in¬ 
creased until this year there were 170 of them 
laying in specially built pens. As fast as the 
young were able to care for themselves, they 
were released to keep the quail company. It is 
hard to say just how many of them have reached 
maturity, because some of last year’s hatching 
joined those of this year, often bringing with 
them healthy broods of 8 or 10 chicks each, tame 
and glad to get the abundant food and water 
placed where they could reach it so handily. 
The success with quail and pheasants prompted 
the ranch management to branch out and this 
year nearly an acre of well watered bottom land 
was enclosed with inch mesh wire netting, roofed 
with two inch. In the pen thus made were re¬ 
leased 65 pair of Hungarian partridges. Else¬ 
where the trouble with this variety of birds has 
been that when liberated and expected to breed, 
they would go away and stay away, never com¬ 
ing back any more. Consequently it was not 
thought advisable to accord them the same lib¬ 
erty given quail and pheasants. Their enclosure 
was some little distance from the pheasant pens 
and also away from the ranch buildings where 
lights, noise and the passing of people back and 
forth, might alarm the very shy birds and pre¬ 
vent their nesting. No one was permitted near 
the cage except their keeper to bring his 
daily dole of food, and him the birds soon got 
to know and also to expect what he Drought. 
His report showed many nests, plenty of eggs 
and a hatching of at least 500 young partridges 
was expected, some of which the intention was 
to release as the pheasants had been, while others 
were to be added to the flock of breeders, also 
as an attraction to cause those turned loose to 
stay around. Weeks passed. Not a single brood 
of young could the keeper see. Weeks grew 
into months. Still no signs of a hatching; then 
the management decided an investigation should 
be made even at the risk of disturbing the nest¬ 
ing birds. Result, nothing was found but a lot 
of broken egg shells. Every nest had been 
raided by squirrels of which there was a con¬ 
siderable colony on a nearby rise of ground. 
Every egg, and there must have been 800, eaten 
and the experiment with Hungarian partridges 
for 1915 a complete failure. So squirrels were 
added to the list of undesirables, many killed and 
as a preventive against those remaining, an out- 
hanging board nailed around the top of the pen 
which also was newly roofed—this time with 
inch mesh wire—for the depredators unable to 
force their way through the sides had run up 
to the top and entered through the roof which, 
built only to keep the partridges in, would not 
keep the squirrels out. The nests of the quail, 
probably because more scattered, had escaped 
and it seems likely the squirrels had first been 
(Continued on page 735.) 
