FOREST AND STREAM. 
855 
Nov. 28, 1908.] 
Game on St. Vincent Island. 
Apalachicoi.a, Fla., Nov. 12. —Editor Forest 
and Stream: In my communication of Oct. 31 
I wrote concerning the Indian sambur deer 
which I have recently introduced to this island: 
“They are immense in size—twice as large, I 
should say, as our Adirondack or Maine white¬ 
tailed or Virginia deer.” Your typo changed the 
word “twice” in the foregoing sentence to 
“quite,” thereby making it appear that my sam¬ 
bur deer, which I said are “immense in size,” 
are really only “quite as large” as the ordinary 
white-tailed deer. I am willing to admit, how¬ 
ever, that careless chirography on my part may 
have contributed to the error—a case, I suppose, 
my practice to bait the Canada wild geese, and 
when driving along near the foot of a low oak 
ridge I saw a drake mallard duck run across 
the trail which I was following and only a few 
feet in front of my team. I sprang out and soon 
ran him down as he squatted in the tall grass 
and allowed me to pick him up. On examina¬ 
tion I could not find any signs of his having 
been wounded, but I did discover that he had 
eaten acorns until his gullet was distended so 
as to form a tumor larger than my fist. 
Whether gorging himself with acorns had in¬ 
capacitated him for flying or what the cause of 
his inability to rise and accompany his comrades, 
I do not know. I brought him home and put 
him up for the night in a coop full of tame 
in that part of the island, and as there are no 
marks on the duck I am well satisfied he had 
not been “wing-tipped” or otherwise wounded. 
Heavy rains with high water in arid marshes 
have evidently driven the mallards to the oak 
ridges where various species of acorns are very 
plentiful and of which this species of ducks 
seem very fond. 
Unusually warm weather has prevented ducks 
appearing as yet in their usual abundance, yet 
I have had fair shooting—mostly at teal, mal¬ 
lards and sprigs—with now and then a spoonbill, 
redhead, widgeon and canvasback. It takes a 
good stiff cold norther to send the ducks down 
to this semi-tropical climate in large numbers. 
Wild geese have appeared in moderate numbers. 
the ScotJT—A ntelope on the alfalfa field near gardiner, Montana. 
Photo by W. S. Berry. 
Of what the legal fraternity would pronounce 
contributory negligence. 
These great sambur deer are, in fact, so large 
that they look like a small herd of Rocky Moun¬ 
tain elk, as they stalk about over this island and 
mix with the ordinary white-tailed deer, for 
which, owing to the great disparity in size, there 
is not the slightest danger of mistaking them. 
There is also a marked difference in the color 
of the two species of deer, the big sambur fel¬ 
lows being much darker in color and having 
quite dark tails instead of white ones. 
Yesterday evening I had quite a curious ex¬ 
perience. I had been down about four miles 
from our main camp to scatter corn in a small 
I bay, near my hunting lodge, where it has been 
ducks of his own species which I use for decoys 
to shoot over, first having taken the precaution 
to thoroughly clip one of his wings. The great 
hard tumefaction in the region of his gullet, 
which was so conspicuous last evening, has all 
disappeared, and he seems very lively this morn¬ 
ing, and I think if he will only tame down he 
may make a valuable addition to my flock of 
live decoys. 
Just about the same time that I discovered 
the incapacitated duck crossing my path, three 
flocks of mallards, of probably not less than 
eighty to one hundred, rose from a scrub oak 
ridge on my left, and this fellow being unable 
to go away with them, was evidently making his 
way on foot to a pond close by. 
There has been no shooting as yet this season 
and a little later no doubt we shall see plenty 
of them, 
I went out a few evenings ago and was not 
gone over an hour from my hunting lodge when, 
just at sunset, I saw a beautiful large buck stand¬ 
ing broadside to me about one hundred yards 
distant. It did not take long for me to draw 
a bead on him with my .351 automatic rifle, at 
the crack of which he fell in his tracks. On ex¬ 
amination I found that the expanding bullet had 
done great execution, having fractured one of 
the vertebra in the base of the neck and also 
cut off the large blood vessels of that region, so 
he was bleeding like a stuck hog when I reached 
him. The ordinary bullet, or a soft-nosed one, 
might have done as well, though I doubt if it 
