518 
FOREST AND STREAM 
September, 1918 
The Hon. Florence Amherst and her gazelle hounds 
a man was charged with night-poaching. 
The keeper managed to get hold of his 
lurcher bitch and through her was able to 
identify the man. He at once admitted the 
offense. It was evident that rather than 
lose his canine stock-in-trade, he would 
pay the penalty of his “crime.” The Squire 
told the magistrates that he had tried the 
bitch and found she could run down and 
kill six out of every seven rabbits put up. 
Couldn’t he, even as a magistrate, keep the 
lurcher? “O no!” was the reply. “We 
will fine the defendant $25, but you must 
give him back his dog—she’s his property.” 
So the poacher got out of it very well con¬ 
sidering that rabbits are now worth $1 a 
pair (wholesale) in the vicinity of where 
the above happened and there are thou¬ 
sands of rabbits to be illegally poached 
every night of the year, there being no 
close season because of the great increase 
of these animals through the system-^of 
trapping that has destroyed the many and 
various natural enemies of the conies, such 
as foxes, weasels, etc., and thus destroyed 
the balance of Nature. 
I HAVE before referred to the excellent 
long dogs of the Canadian prairies and 
it must be said that after the thresh¬ 
ing was over and all could join in the fun, 
we saw a great deal of sport on those 
great expanses in what the late General 
Sir William Butler, in its early days, 
called “The Great Lone Land.” We were 
Staying about 16 miles south of Rounth- 
waite and there were a good many coyotes 
an the neighboring bluffs. It really was a 
beautiful though weird sound to hear them 
in full cry just as the sun was going down, 
as we lay in some old buffalo wallows 
waiting for ducks or anything else to pass 
over. I had not heard prairie wolves be¬ 
fore, and on whispering over to mv 
mate, I was informed as to what all 
the “music” was about. At first it was 
thought it was the result of the voices of 
scores of children as they were released 
from some school. A moment’s reflection 
was enough to point out that all the prairie 
around there couldn’t produce enough 
juveniles to kick up all that row! Hence 
the whispered enquiry. And it was on our 
way home that the first hunt was arranged. 
Our friends gave one of those delightful 
farm house parties, the invitations being 
generally given at the Church on Sundays. 
At the party our plans were laid and a 
meeting place arranged, after chores were 
finished. There was an excellent collection 
of dogs from the sportsman’s and broad¬ 
minded dog fan¬ 
cier’s point of view. 
I had before coursed 
kangaroo with cross¬ 
bred longtails in Aus¬ 
tralia. Here in Can¬ 
ada were dogs of 
similar build and 
quite as handy or 
useful looking. They 
were in capital con¬ 
dition, one of our 
friends bringing half 
a dozen, of which 
two were the result 
of a direct cross be¬ 
tween a fawn or red 
Russian wolfhound 
dog and a blue griz¬ 
zle Scottish deer¬ 
hound bitch. They 
followed the sire in 
color and had the 
distinguishable some¬ 
what arched loins 
and great depth of 
girth and keel of the 
Russian. As it after¬ 
wards proved, they 
were smart on their 
feet and perfect devils 
with their teeth. 
It was not long 
after we started that 
a. coyote leaped out 
of a straw pile and 
made the best of his 
way for a bluff yon¬ 
der—his happy hunt¬ 
ing ground and a place literally 
swarming with snow-shoe rabbits. 
There was a wild “how, how!” 
and we were “off,” the men in sad¬ 
dles, the ladies driving. The dogs 
converged from the long line of 
mounted beaters. There was a 
scramble over the stiff stubbles 
that had not yet been burnt off. A 
pure-bred greyhound led his field 
of other dogs, and getting up to his 
snapping game he turned him off 
and into the paws of his unrelenting 
enemies which had almost squeezed 
the ghost out of him ere we came 
up with the murderers! Here, in¬ 
deed, was an instance of what long 
dogs could accomplish when called 
upon by the farmer to help rid him 
of Em undesirable animal. 
I 
A WELL-KNOWN breeder of 
Scottish deerhounds, in Aus¬ 
tralia, was, and I presume 
still is, M. C. Davis of Melbourne. 
Now the deerhound, as before men¬ 
tioned, is used for running down 
the kangaroo in the various parts 
of the island-continent. If a dog 
goes to the throat of an old-man 
kangaroo, it will be sooner or later to his 
certain death, since the marsupial uses his 
tremendously severe cutting claws on his 
hind feet to protect himself. The power in 
the hind quarters of the animal is very 
great. We have only to see the kangaroo 
when extended and in his enormous leaps 
when pursued by dogs to recognize the 
muscles and sinews of his hams. Thus it 
is a case of “keep away from the screws” 
or the hind feet of the ’roo that will rip a 
A fine specimen of Irish wolfhound 
