298 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Feb. 19, 1910. 
The Grouse’s Worst Enemy. 
Sandy Hook, Conn., Feb. 11. — Editor Forest 
and Stream: To the best of my recollection we 
have been making laws for the protection of 
grouse or partridges for the last sixty years. 
As one who has passed the three-score-year- 
and-ten mark, I can easily remember how 
plentiful the grouse were from 1850 or 1855 
down to 1870 or 1875—until mankind began to 
find what fascinating sport it was to hunt them 
over a good dog. During all that time such 
enemies as foxes, hawks, minks, coons and 
skunks were very plentiful. About this time 
began a gradual decrease till 1885 or 1890. Then 
the decrease became more rapid until December 
and market shooting were prohibited, and this 
gave them a new lease of life. However, this 
protection was not sufficient to cause them to 
increase. In order to bring this about we must 
have State game refuges, must cut down the 
time limit to shoot, and reduce the number that 
may be killed during a season. 
The foxes and hawks— enemies of game birds 
_were formerly so plentiful they were a terror 
to the farmer. It was no uncommon thing for 
a fox to destroy nearly a whole flock of turkeys 
in daylight. Sometimes they would kill twelve 
or fifteen at a time. Hawks were so plentiful 
and bold they would swoop down on a lot of 
chickens and take one, even while the good 
housewife was feeding them, in spite of her 
screeching and shaking that old linsy-woolsy 
apron—an(J still the grouse did not decrease. 
Foxes and hawks never take a grouse into a 
hole to eat it; they always leave the tips of the 
wing and tail feathers and a few bones to tell 
the story of their destruction. If the foxes and 
hawks eat the birds they would surely leave 
their mark. 
Let us be frank about this matter. Is not 
mankind the greatest and most destructive 
enemy of the grouse? I for one plead guilty to 
the charge. Suppose every man that hunted 
grouse even for two weeks should leave them 
on the ground just where he killed them. What 
kind of a showing would it make against all of 
the other enemies of the grouse combined for 
one year? I will wager that beyond any doubt 
it would snow them all under. 
Now, fellow sportsmen and everybody, par¬ 
don me for again repeating the need of estab¬ 
lishing State game refuges; of shortening the 
shooting season and reducing the number of 
birds to be killed during that season. These 
are three essential points to consider if we wish 
the grouse to increase. The refuges give them 
a home in which to breed and multiply unmo¬ 
lested by mankind. As they become plentiful 
they will fly out to help stock adjoining cover. 
The season should be shortened, and on the 
last end. As the leaves get off and the birds 
come together when it gets cold, one can then 
kill more birds in a day than he could in three 
days in the early part of the season. 
Another dangerous thing for the birds has 
lately sprung into existence—the automobile. 
We must take it into consideration. Gunners 
can speed from place to place and get two or 
three days’ shooting in one. The number to be 
killed during the season under the present law 
in my State is five grouse for a day’s shoot, and 
thirty-six for the whole season. Even honestly 
lived up to, this is more than the grouse could 
stand; but it is not always lived up to, and here 
is where a great leak comes in. Some good 
shots are hired by the day by men that could 
not kill one bird a week on the wing. But if 
the hireling can kill six, eight or ten, he passes 
some of them over to the other fellow to carry, 
and if he has to disclose his bag, he has only 
what the law allows. While he is allowed to kill 
only thirty-six in the season, he can take a 
chance and smuggle in as many more. I would 
put the limit at ten or twelve for the season— 
that is as many as any true sportsman ought to 
kill until the birds increase—and their chance 
to smuggle would be greatly diminished. 
Give the sportsmen enough shooting to open 
the safety valve and let off the pressure. But so 
restrict us that the birds will increase. Then 
as they become plentiful, the same power that 
shortened the time can give us a few days’ more 
grace. It is very easily handled. Suppose we 
put $1,000 in a bank; it will draw 4 per cent., or 
$40 in a year. We can spend that and not lessen 
the principal. But with the grouse, instead of 
spending our 4 per cent., we have been spend¬ 
ing 6 per cent., thereby spending our increase 
and 2 per cent, of our capital. Now let us try 
spending 2 or 3 per cent., and add the balance 
to our capital stock for ten or fifteen years and 
note the difference in results. I think the re¬ 
sults would be highly gratifying, and our pleas¬ 
ure as well as the grouse would be greatly 
increased. 
Fellow sportsmen, let us give this a trial. It 
is all to gain; you can not possibly lose. I am 
pleading for the noblest game bird that ever 
spread a wing—the grouse or partridge. Let 
us heip him to increase. E. Taylor. 
Fur Sales Large. 
New Orleans, La., Feb. 11.— Editor Forest and 
Stream: A report from Morgan City says 
that the amount of money realized from the sale 
of furs in that place, the Terrebonne section and 
St. Mary parish, has been enormous this season, 
aggregating at least $2,000 a week. It is stated 
that mink furs have sold as high as $4.50, while 
muskrats, which sold'last year for six and eight 
cents, are bringing thirty to thirty-five cents. 
Trappers who were satisfied last year with $15 
a week are this season realizing from $60 to 
$100 a week. The result has been that scores of 
people who never trapped before are now en¬ 
gaged in that business. Agents for large fur 
houses are visiting the camps of trappers and 
hunters in inaccessible places and offering enor¬ 
mous prices for skins. The mink and the musk¬ 
rat are the favorites and raccoons are also sell¬ 
ing well. The money derived from the sale of 
furs this season to the trappers in Louisiana 
will probably aggregate at least $200,000. The 
fur hunting season closes on March 1 in Louis¬ 
iana. 
The Tallyho Club of Chef Menteur has elected 
the following officers: G. H. Brockman, Cap¬ 
tain; Louis Bamburger, Lieutenant; William Mc- 
L. Faysso, Secretary and Treasurer. They will 
serve for one year. 
A large party of custom house officials and 
attorneys of this city enjoyed a big rabbit hunt 
near St. Gabriel, Iberville parish. The party 
succeeded in bagging forty-eight rabbits. They 
were <*r.!tertained at the plantation home of Simon 
Le Blinc. F. G. G. 
Another White Canada Goose. 
Detroit, Mich., Feb. 4 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: I was greatly interested in an article 
which appeared in your number of Jan. 22 headed 
“Unusual Wildfowl in Currituck,” calling atten¬ 
tion to a Canada goose killed at the Princess 
Anne Club, in Virginia, which was practically 
white. I inclose a photograph of a similar bird 
which r killed about four years ago on a pre¬ 
serve which is part of the Walpole Island reser¬ 
vation in Ontario. The bird, wfiich is beyond 
question a Canada goose, differed from the one 
you mention in being very much whiter I be¬ 
lieve—and weighed fourteen pounds when placed 
in the hands of a taxidermist some days after 
being killed. The feet and legs, while not show¬ 
ing clearly in the picture, were perfectly black. 
In this connection presumably the same bird had 
been seen four or five consecutive years previous 
to the time it was bagged by Indians and mem¬ 
bers of the club, and had on more than one 
occasion been shot at. 
The article also speaks of hybrid mallard 
blackduck. We have two very good specimens 
mounted at our club which are known to us as 
“Brewers,” and it is not unusual to have one or 
two shot during a season. The specimens we 
have mounted are very large, handsome birds, 
showing the bronze mallard strain on the breast 
and on the curling tail feathers, while the char¬ 
acteristics of the blackduck are strongly marked 
elsewhere. H. G. Meredith. 
[The photograph referred to—which is unfor¬ 
tunately too faint for reproduction—appears ex¬ 
actly to resemble the Currituck goose referred 
to in Forest and Stream of Jan. 22. The hybrid 
ducks are no doubt known as “Brewers” from 
their resemblance to Audubon’s figure of 
Brewer’s duck—a hybrid.— Editor.] 
California Ducks and Snipe. 
San Francisco, Cal., Feb. 9. — Editor Forest 
and Stream: Duck shooting is now practically 
at an end. Heavy rains have been falling and 
streams are now overflowing their banks, enab¬ 
ling the birds to keep well out of shotgun range. 
At the present time the best sport is being had 
along the bay shores where canvasbacks and blue- 
bills are congregating, and but few sportsmen 
are now visiting the preserves at the old shoot¬ 
ing grounds. The marsh feeding places have 
been vacated by the birds for the overflowed 
lands where there is now an abundance of green 
feed. There is now so much overflowed land 
and so many puddles that the ducks are badly 
scattered, and it is rarely that they are to be 
found now in large flocks. 
The preserves at Suisun have been closed and 
only a few enthusiasts are now making the trip 
to this favorite hunting ground. Ducks have 
been rather scarce here for the past month and 
high water is now interfering with what sport 
there might be enjoyed. Captain Seymour is 
preparing for next season’s operations and has 
purchased a tract of land comprising 210 acres 
and will interest several other sportsmen in the 
formation of a new gun club. These grounds 
are near the preserve of the Cordelia Club and 
can be reached by launch. The Harriman pre¬ 
serve, formerly the hunting place of the late 
Herman Oelrichs, has been purchased by a 
wealthy sportsman and will be fitted up for next 
season on an elaborate scale. 
