r 
Goose Shooting in Assiniboia. 
or wing shooting no other place equals as 
mecca for sportsmen, the little town of 
ose Jaw, situated on the great transconti- 
tal line midway between Winnipeg and 
cier. Moose Jaw is most accessible for 
se in quest of royal sport, and if one is lucky 
ugh to catch the Imperial Limited, he will 
it one of the most comfortable of trains. 
L few moments after leaving the train from 
West, Jim Thompson grasped me by the 
d and said, “The geese are flying over Mc- 
tney’s Ranch and the 
; are ready.” We 
n learned that this 
int a drive of some 
nty miles over the 
iries to the shore of 
Falo Lake. It was 
good fortune to 
a glorious October 
it, the air cold and 
p, our roads lighted 
f he reflected glory of 
Northern lights. A 
pair of prairie 
ses soon brought us 
the prosperous and 
pitable ranch of the 
Zartneys. 
/e were told that the 
ii:sher was working 
the ranches near 
ut. This meant the 
se was full, but we 
roughed it for fifty 
! s in the mountains, 
our sleeping bags 
e quickly spread on 
kitchen floor, 
list before day we 
I e called, and don- 
j i our heaviest cloth- 
consisting of mackinaws, German socks, 
se hide moccasins and woolen gloves, all of 
! w color, we quickly covered ourselves with 
| alo robes and were ready for the drive 
ss the prairies to Buffalo Lake. The lake 
1 eventeen miles long and a mile and a half 
i and its banks rise quite steeply, in places 
luch as 300 feet. Coulees, gulches and draws 
k up the shores and occasionally a small tree 
le only cover one can find. We took our 
is one hundred yards apart, each man to a 
h, and threw ourselves flat on our backs, 
mercury must have been around the zero 
s the air fresh and life-giving. To the 
vard a ray of light told of the day to 
j a 
e lay absolutely still, never moving a muscle, 
hats drawn well down over the eyes, with 
enough of a window to let us know when 
ould begin to see our game. A mighty still- 
reigned, but as day broke the stillness was 
' en by the squawkings and screechings of 
untable hosts of wildfowl. It seemed as 
if all the college football rooters were gathered 
there on the shores of this lonely lake to root 
for a favorite team. The noise grew louder 
and it seemed as if a mighty babel of tongues 
would never cease rising from the still waters 
of old Buffalo. Swish, swish, a lone prospector, 
a Canadian honker passed by. The way to him 
seemed clear. The rustle of wings, the splash 
of the water and goose after goose began to 
come through the draw. Away down the prairie 
the firing began and we quickly took it up. 
Fusillade after fusillade, echo after echo, and 
the shores of the lake, with its varied hues and 
THE camera’s STORY.—I. 
Photograph by J. H. Babcock. 
its weird banks, became enveloped in the fire 
of musketry. 
They were going too high over; they turned; 
they must see us. We missed. Soon we learned 
the knack; we let them come head on and well 
over before we raised our guns, gave them a 
right and left and they were ours. The very 
air was filled with geese, myriads we thought, 
and our guns began to tell. They fell with a 
great thud around about. The hot blood was 
now quickly coursing through our veins and in 
the glory and excitement of the sport, as our 
bag filled, we took our stand, never minding 
if they saw us. We tried for long distance and 
difficult shots. Now and then a snow goose 
came head on, only to fall to the guns. The 
firing began to slacken, the warmth of the sun 
telling us that an hour or so had passed. Only 
now and then the geese flew over; the flocks 
were now many miles away in the stubble. 
All the land seemed a mass of glorious gold, 
a most beautiful harvest, and the wheat fields 
extending as far as the eye could reach, only 
to be broken by a well built ranch house or the 
smoke of the thresher. The black earth gives 
here thirty to forty bushels of grain to the acre 
and yields proportionate happiness to the ranch¬ 
ers. in these sparsely settled lands. 
1 he royal sport which the early morning gave 
us had made our appetites voracious, and a 
roasted eight-pound goose cooked by George— 
honorably discharged from the Tenth Cavalry 
after fighting Apaches in Arizona and one of 
the best camp cooks in the country—was before 
us. Breakfast over, a clear Havana, then a 
lounge on the straw stack on the sunny side of 
the barn, a slumber 
which was soon to be 
broken by the honk of 
the return flight. Miles 
away, flying toward us, 
the geese were leaving 
the stubble. Soon we 
were off trying for 
shots, and here we had 
an opportunity of watch¬ 
ing the most interesting 
football tactics in the 
azure sky—the rushes, 
the double V, the pha¬ 
lanx, the single line and 
the scouts alternating 
in changing positions. 
These maneuvers ex¬ 
tended for miles across 
the fields while the 
geese were making for 
the lake. We had some 
fairly good shooting, 
but they were flying al¬ 
most too high to give us 
much of a bag. In the 
hours to follow the 
sportsman can try for 
prairie chickens and 
yellowlegs in the big 
ravines. We found the 
chickens flying hard and fast and very wild; 
they had been shot at for at least two months. 
Around 2 o’clock we had taken our positions 
in the draws further down the lake to wait for 
the honkers to leave the water* For an hour 
the shooting was excellent; they were return¬ 
ing for an afternoon meal in the stubble. 
A long twilight in this part of the world one 
or two afternoons gave us an opportunity of 
making an occasional difficult shot on the water¬ 
line. I believe one is safe in saying that the 
myriads of geese that come to Buffalo Lake are 
hatched well within the Arctic circle and that 
in no other place are these fine birds found in 
such great numbers as in this district. The 
best flight shooting is between the middle of 
October and the first of November. Early in 
November, when the ice begins to thicken, the 
great flight southward begins and the local 
sportsman has to content himself with the sick 
(wounded) geese, as the Indians call them, left 
in the lake. 
Now and then one hears of a pot-hunter and 
