336 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Feb. 26, 1910. 
had 01'ten been on the mountain above timber 
line in the summer. Every few minutes, both 
day and night, we could hear avalanches com¬ 
ing and saw many of them with the glasses. 
The first thing necessary was to get camp in 
good shape. I cut a small spruce for boughs 
for the Boss’ tent, and then dressed a goose. 
We had three, which insured us fresh meat for 
the morrow. 
Next morning we arose early, and after 
breakfast, the guide decided we would go a 
few miles up the river to some skunk cabbage 
flats. When within a half mile of the place my 
dog scented game, and we approached the flats 
very carefully and saw where a small bear had 
been digging skunk cabbage. Later we found 
another track much larger than the first one. 
In climbing the mountain, we found it very 
different from past experience. Here one could 
hardly make a slip without coming in contact 
with a devil’s club, which manages to get a 
foothold wherever there is a spoonful of earth. 
For many years I had been in the habit of seiz¬ 
ing anything I could reach when climbing 
mountains, or when I stumbled. I found that 
I would have to stop doing this, but old habits 
being hard to break on short notice, I got my 
hands full of thorns. 
Next day the guide and the Boss went a few 
miles up the east fork of the river, while the 
helper and I went down on the delta and visited 
a place where the year before he had shot at 
a bear. We saw lots of old signs where bears 
had rooted up the grass the year before; also 
many geese and ducks, but did not care to 
shoot. While we were walking along in the 
open I saw an eagle sitting on the top of a very 
big hemlock. I called the helper’s attention to 
it. He asked if I could kill it, and I replied 
that I believed I could if I knew the distance, 
for I could hold on it, and my sights were so 
fine I could draw a nice bead on it; that if I 
missed I would over or under shoot. He said 
that he could do that, too. 
“Well,” I said, “your front sight would cover 
a horse at that distance, and if you hold at the 
eagle you would have to hold below it and 
guess for the center, while with my sight you 
can hold where you want to hit.” 
I handed him my .32-40. He leaned against 
a big spruce, and after sighting for a while, 
handed me the rifle. Then he tried his. When 
through sighting, he said he could not have be¬ 
lieved there was such a difference and made me 
promise that when we got back to camp I 
would fix his sight. I asked him how far it was 
to the eagle, and he said it was between 300 
and 400 yards. I therefore raised my peep sight 
to what I thought would be 350 yards, drew a 
bead on the eagle’s breast bone as near as I 
could and fired. As I was vising a high-power 
cartridge, it did not seem to be a second before 
the eagle dropped. The helper went for the 
bird, and when he got back, he asked: “Where 
did you hold? ” I told him. “Well, you drew 
center; it is the best shot I ever saw.” 
The Boss and guide got back late, very tired. 
They had climbed to some deep snow, but had 
seen no bear signs. 
Next morning me started up the river. The 
boys poled the boat. When we had gone about 
a mile, we began to see trout. They were about 
eighteen inches long and so numerous that they 
covered the bottom of the pools. I had taken 
my fishing tackle with me, and anticipated great 
sport, but although I tried for an hour, I did 
not get a strike or a fish. The Boss and I 
walked where we could get along through the 
devil club, but it took us about three hours to 
make the four miles to the foot of the first 
jam. 
This jam had first been caused by a slide 
from the mountain. Judging from the size of 
the trees growing up in it, it looked as if it 
had been forming for fifty years. It was about 
one-quarter of a mile long, and from the sign 
it must have been the home of otter and many 
/ 
other water animals. 
On our return the guide saw a goat. We 
landed and looked at it with the binoculars. 
The Boss decided he wanted a shot. I looked 
over the ground carefully and told him the 
ridge he would have to go up, and that* he 
would find it the biggest job he had ever 
undertaken. Near where the goat was feed¬ 
ing, there were perpendicular cliffs that were 
hundreds of feet high. The Boss and the guide 
started. The helper and I told them we would 
leave the boat and work our way down to a 
big bar, where they could pick us up, as it 
would take them over an hour to reach the 
bench on which the goat was feeding. 
We visited several sloughs where there was 
skunk cabbage, and found a number of bear 
tracks, but all had been made several days be¬ 
fore. In an hour we heard the report of the 
big guns—four in quick succession, and in a 
few seconds a couple more. Later we learned 
that they had got close to the goat, but could 
not see it until it started to run. The Boss 
fired the first four shots and failed to stop it. 
Then both shot and wounded it. They followed 
a few hundred yards, when the goat went 
around on to a cliff too dangerous for them to 
follow. On the return to camp we saw three 
other goats. The next morning at daylight the 
guide and Boss started for them, and after 
they had gone, I said to the helper, “You take 
your gun and go up on the mountain back of 
camp and get us a goat.” “All right,” he said 
and started. When he had gone, I took my .22 
and a canoe that was cached below camp, 
crossed the river and started for a goost. 
Seeing a couple of geese, I kept on, finally 
getting a big tree root between me and them, 
and on looking,'thought they were a little over 
200 yards. I raised the sight and killed the 
biggest one, while the other only walked away. 
Later I heard the report of a rifle, and then 
another. From the direction I thought it must 
be the helper. On my way to camp I heard 
four shots, and thought they were fired by the 
Boss or guide, as they sounded too far up for 
the helper. I crossed the river and went to 
camp, just as four native hunters came for 
their canoe. They had gone up the river a 
month before trapping and cached their canoe. 
They reported fur scarce, and that they had 
not seen a bear track. They were much in¬ 
terested in my telescope, and from their actions 
and talk, they thought it drew the game up 
close or it would not kill. They took a part 
of their dunnage in the canoe and departed. 
The helper came in a little later. He had a 
yearling goat. He said he had seen two about 
eighty yards from him. He shot at the head 
of one and struck it a few inches back of the 
eye, the bullet taking the whole top of the 
head off. The other ran a short distance, 
stopped, and as it looked back, he shot at its 
neck and cut it nearly off. He was shooting 
a high-power .35 special loaded with soft point 
bullets. 
About three o’clock the Boss and guide came 
in. They had made a big round and had shot 
at a goat, but missed. The Boss and guide had 
seen a band of goats on the mountain between 
the rivers and decided to get one. He shot at 
a goat and killed it, but when it fell, it rolled 
down over a cliff and its horns caught in a 
tree and held it. 
Next day we started back. We were laughed 
at because we got no bear. Here, nearly all 
the geese build their nests in the trees, some 
at least eighty feet from the ground. We had 
a pleasant trip to Seattle, and thus ended one 
of the finest trips ever made by 
Lew Wilmot. 
The Speed of Ducks. 
Los Angeles, Cal., Feb. 15.— Editor Forest 
and Stream: An unusual opportunity for ac¬ 
curately estimating the speed of ducks on the 
wing was offered a carload of Orange county 
club men one day while the “Duck Special,” as 
the 3:15 car on the Newport line is popularly 
known, was en route to Los Patos. There is 
a wide diversity of opinion regarding the speed 
of flying ducks. Therefore the unusual spec¬ 
tacle of a band of bluebills racing an electric 
car whose speed could be estimated very closely, 
afforded an opportunity that a large number of 
experts were by chance on hand to avail them¬ 
selves of and compare notes. 
The bluebills were of the smaller variety 
(Aythya afhnis ) and rose from the tide slough 
within easy gunshot of the car, which was travel¬ 
ing at the rate of forty-five miles an hour. The 
flock numbered about thirty birds, and from the 
rise held its own, then began to forge ahead, and 
when under waA r was traveling at least half 
again as fast as the car. Three feet to the car’s 
two was the way some of the hunters estimated 
it. Finally the bluebills tacked across the track ' 
at an angle and still they continued gaining, 
from which it seemed that at the height of their 
speed they were going quite twice as fast as the 
car or approximately ninety miles per hour. 
There was no wind and every man who was 
on that car is fully convinced that the ordinary 
traveling gait of bluebill ducks is about a mile 
and a half per minute. We all know that upon 
occasion they can go past one in a blind at a 
pace that no figures seem capable of exaggerat¬ 
ing. Close to the surface of the water, and as 
direct in their flight as an arrow, they fairly 
whizz through the air, wing tips all but dipping, 
and it must be a quick sure snapshot who can 
swing fast enough to stop them. 
It is a moot point among local club men 
whether the canvasback is the fastest duck. I 
believe a majority would pin their faith to the 
green-winged teal here. Canvasbacks generally 
fly straight and do very little dodging, after the 
manner of the diving ducks, whose relatively 
small wings and heavy bodies are not as well 
adapted to such aerial gymnastics as the makeup 
of the teal. Edwin L. Hedderly. j 
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