16 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
the day before. When the sun was just up 
Williams said “Geese,” which made us all lie 
low, and we could see six coming directly at 
us; when they were close in, another flock 
could be seen following them. The first ones 
lit within fifteen yards of the box, the others 
dropped in without the usual circle of inspec¬ 
tion. Then another lot was seen heading for 
us, and so it was, until there must have been 
seventy-five geese within one hundred yards 
of where we were. I have held my fire under 
exciting circumstances, but never more than 
this. The three of us filled the box like 
sardines, and the chances for active gun hand¬ 
ling were not the best. Soon, Williams gave 
the order to fire, and when the field cleared, 
six remained. 
With ten mallards and six geese, which had 
been shot by eight o’clock, our time was up. 
We turned the decoys loose and drove them 
to the yard, highly pleased with our little 
outing. We strapped four pairs of geese and 
six brace of ducks to the rig, leaving the re¬ 
mainder with our host, and then we were ready 
to say “good-bye” to one of the best fellows 
that ever said “Come ag'ain.” 
Fred P. Latham. 
Massachusetts Fish and Game Pro¬ 
tective Association. 
Boston, Mass., Dec. 25 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: On Tuesday afternoon, the 21st, a 
meeting of the legislative committee of this as¬ 
sociation and the affiliated clubs was held to 
consider and act upon certain proposed changes 
in the game laws. A proposal to shorten the 
shooting season on upland birds, quail, wood¬ 
cock and ruffed grouse was rejected by the meet¬ 
ing, no change at present being the prevailing 
sentiment. 
A vote to authorize the fish and game com¬ 
missioners to set apart game preserves and to 
prohibit the killing of protected birds and ani¬ 
mals therein for a period of years in accord¬ 
ance with a* bill drawn and presented to the 
meeting by President Charles was passed. 
A movement to abolish the present fish and 
game commission and to establish in its stead a 
commission of one member to be paid a salary 
of $4,000 per annum, whose duty should be to 
care for the protection and propagation of in¬ 
land-game and fish, and to place all sea and 
shore fisheries in charge of a deputy commis¬ 
sioner, in accordance with a bill drawn by the 
president, was discussed at some length, but final 
action thereon was deferred to a future meet¬ 
ing. 
One of the reasons assigned for the proposed 
change was that while the sportsmen are con¬ 
tributing a large sum to the Commonwealth as 
the result of the hunters’ license, too small a pro¬ 
portion of the money appropriated for the de¬ 
partment of fisheries and game is now expended 
for their benefit. It was apparent from the dis¬ 
cussion that in the clubs of Western Massachu¬ 
setts this sentiment is prevalent. 
On Tuesday evening a large number of the 
members of the association and their friends 
gathered at the Brunswick Hotel for dinner and 
to listen to a lecture by Frank M. Chapman, of 
New York, which was given under the auspices 
of the Ivers Whitney Adams Fund. 
Henry H. Kimball. 
Wyoming’s Elk. 
Cheyenne, Wyo., Dec. 22.— Editor Forest and 
Stream: The elk game season is over in Wyo¬ 
ming. From the standpoint of the hunter, the 
season just passed has been rather unsatis¬ 
factory, for the fall months have been un¬ 
usually mild and free from snow, and as a re¬ 
sult, the vast bands of elk, which have been 
estimated by the State game warden to number 
50,000 head, did not come down from their 
mountain fastnesses until the close of the 
season. 
To reach the elk country in Western Wyo¬ 
ming requires a long trip of several hundred 
miles from the nearest railroad point, and those 
who go out in quest of these magnificent game 
animals are as a rule bent on securing an old 
buck with a good spread of horns—a rare 
trophy of the hunt. The season being warm 
this year, the wise old bucks were slow in 
coming down from their summer feeding 
grounds high up in the mountains, and hunting 
parties found more cows and young bucks than 
those with good antlers. It is estimated by 
game wardens and guides in the game districts 
of the State that not more than 2,500 or 3,000 
elk were killed by hunters this year, a very 
small per cent, of the herds and even a small 
part of the natural increase. Elk have been so 
well protected under the State laws and by 
public feeding that they have during the last 
few years increased very rapidly. 
Some hunters are proposing a law which will 
allow hunters to kill but one buck elk and one 
doe, as it is claimed that the great desire for 
good heads has resulted in the destruction of 
too many bucks for the proper increase of the 
herds. 
The State of Wyoming last spring came to 
the rescue of several hundred ranchmen of 
Jackson’s Hole, a rich agricultural valley, situ¬ 
ated south of the Yellowstone National Park, 
a district cut off from the outside world by al¬ 
most impassable mountain ranges. These 
Western settlers were not endangered, as of 
yore, by wild bands of hostile Indians, nor by 
the more recent depredations of outlaws, which 
only a few years ago brought terror to the 
early residents of the Rocky Mountain region; 
but their farms were being annually devastated 
by vast herds of wild elk, which under the pro¬ 
tection afforded them by the strict game laws 
of the State and by the rough and irregular 
topography of the country, have been increas¬ 
ing so rapidly that they became a very serious 
menace to the interests of the stockmen and 
farmers. 
Driven down from their mountain fastnesses 
of the rugged and criss-cross ranges of the 
1 etons, Gros Ventre and Wind River moun¬ 
tains, where the largest herd of elk in the 
world make their summer home, these animals 
seek the lower altitudes of the valley when the 
snows become too deep in the mountains for 
them to reach the grass. Last winter from ten 
to fifteen feet of snow covered the summer 
feeding grounds of these beautiful animals and 
headed by their leaders, they suddenly sw-ept 
down thirty-five thousand strong, like an army 
of invasion, upon the peaceful ranches in the 
valley, and with starvation staring them in the 
face, not only threatened to devour everv 
vestige of forage growth, but to wipe up the 
[Jan. 1, 1910. 
farmers’ hay stacks. If deprived of their 
winter’s supply of hay, the farmers had no 
means of feeding their domestic stock, which 
would be in a worse plight than the elk. 
By a hurried appropriation of $5,000 for feed¬ 
ing wild elk the last legislature not only pro¬ 
tected the interests of the farmers, but saved 
thousands of elk from imminent danger of 
starvation. A peculiar situation was presented 
to the lawmakers who made this appropriation. 
With the extermination of the buffalo by ruth¬ 
less slaughter still fresh in the minds of the 
older solons, and the threatened extermina¬ 
tion of the elk by natural causes after the 
State had for years used every precaution to 
protect and nourish them, and with urgent tele¬ 
grams from numerous ranchmen who de¬ 
manded protection from animals which the 
State’s laws respected even more than domestic 
stock, the legislators were compelled to devise 
some means for immediate relief. 
The first consideration was for the elk, not 
from any particular sentiment of pity for their 
deplorable plight, but because the State’s law¬ 
makers considered them one of Wyoming’s 
most valuable assets. Figured only at the mar¬ 
ket value per head of cattle, they are worth 
over $2,000,000 to the State; but as the elk are 
the attraction which annually brings hundreds 
of hunters and pleasure seekers to this State, 
who spend thousands of dollars for game 
licenses and transportation into the game 
country, they are said by the State game 
warden to be as valuable as the sheep, which 
produce $10,000,coo in Wyoming wool annually. 
The condition of elk last winter was most 
pitiable. Snow began to fall upon the moun¬ 
tains early in the fall, and the ground was soon 
covered with a deep blanket of snow that 
thawed and froze successively until with the 
opening of spring there were from ten to fifteen 
feet of snow in the mountains and from four 
to five feet in the lowlands. Being cut off from 
grazing, the elk subsisted for weeks on shrubs 
and small branches of trees and even ate the 
bark from trees. They came down upon the 
ranches and with no regard for rail or wire 
fences, within a few hours devoured haystacks 
and other forage that was being preserved for 
cattle-. They became as tame as cattle, and 
ranchmen could not even save their hay by 
watching night and day. 
The settlers in the Jackson’s Hole held mass 
meetings and decided to begin a systematic 
feeding of the elk. They procured private do¬ 
nations of hay and money and hired men to 
.feed the elk. Hay was purchased at $5 a ton. 
and this was hauled up and down the valley on 
sleighs and thrown off to the elk as they fol¬ 
lowed the load. 
As soon as the State appropriation of $5,000 
was made in February, the game warden went 
into the elk country and for two months carried 
on a systematic feeding of elk. Every scrap 
of available hay was purchased at the same 
price charged the settlers’ relief committee, and 
men were hired at twenty cents an hour to dis¬ 
tribute it. The elk soon learned the location 
of the feeding grounds, and they came down in 
vast numbers from the mountain districts and 
followed the sleighs. The hay. was thrown off 
in small bunches and was widely distributed, 
so that all of the starving elk might get a share 
of the food. The hay crop was exhausted be- 
