July 16, 1910.] 
FOREST AND STREAM 
95 
I would not have it understood that for the 
beginner the rapid-fire camera is best, save in 
one respect. It is useful in so many ways that 
the serious outdoor photographer will come 
around to it in the end, so why not at first? If 
you are a one-gun man and select a rifle with 
which to hunt squirrels in a bear country, you 
choose a bear gun, not a .22. You reason that 
squirrels may be killed with the bear gun, but 
that the .22 will not be of much use if you meet 
the bear. Be a one-camera'man, if you would 
be happy. If not, before you realize it you will 
have acquired a lot of junk you can neither sell 
nor give away. With a reflecting camera and a 
fast lens you will make the majority of your 
pictures with exposures ranging from 1/5 to 1/25 
second, but at the same time you are always 
"loaded for bear” and can fire away at 1/1000 
second speed on a moment’s notice. 
One day a friend gave me an object lesson 
along this line that was very pretty to witness. 
We were loafing along a railway waiting for 
heavy clouds to pass so that we might get a sun¬ 
set picture across a little lake, with the light 
poor and foliage heavy, calling for slow expos¬ 
ures. Suddenly an express train appeared, round¬ 
ing the bend, the fireman stoking energetically 
and clouds of smoke rolling away overhead. My 
friend took in the situation in an instant, reset 
his shutter, wound up its tension spring, opened 
his camera, reset the diaphragm, focused and 
made his exposure while the train was still in 
good position. The resulting picture was one he 
might have waited a month to secure. The train 
was two miles away before I was ready for it, 
though our cameras were similar. He was ac¬ 
customed to the making of pictures requiring 
rapid movement, while I was not. 
The question of size of the reflecting camera 
is open to argument. If it is to be carried in 
a motor boat, a motor car or on a yacht, where 
its weight is no object, and plates are to be used, 
the 5x7 will appeal to you. If you wish to carry 
it in a canoe, on a bicycle, on horseback or on 
tramping trips, the 4x5 is as large as you will 
want, while experience will probably cause you 
to lean toward the 3%x 4% or the 3 l Axsy 2 . There 
are two reflecting cameras that take these last 
named sizes, both weighing y / 2 pounds, one for 
roll films only, the other for either plates or 
films. After many trips afoot, in the snow, on 
bicycles and in canoes I prefer the 3kt x 5k2 for 
roll films because it is handiest. Beside the roll 
of six or ten films there is stowage space with¬ 
in the box for four other rolls, and in this way 
your “gun and ammunition” are always in¬ 
separable and ready for use. On a canoe trip 
do not let the other fellow carry all the pro¬ 
visions while you carry the tinware. He may be 
spilled out, and when you two foregather at 
night, your part of the outfit will furnish poor 
consolation to empty stomachs. It is even so 
with woods photography. If you have a camera 
and expose your last fresh plate, and afterward 
meet a deer on the trail, you will be sure to 
swear at the other fellow if he has your spare 
plates in the bottom of his pack basket and is 
resting far down the mountain trail. 
Perry D. Frazer. 
The Forest and Stream may he obtained from 
any newsdealer on order. Ask your dealer to 
supply you regularly. 
Spring Shooting. 
Philadelphia, Pa., June 8 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: In common no doubt with many other 
sportsmen among your readers, I was gratified 
to read in your issue of May 28 your references 
to the evil effects following from wildfowl shoot¬ 
ing in the spring and your statement of the prog¬ 
ress made in changing the laws of the various 
States so as to prohibit this practice. I do not 
pretend to have any special knowledge of the 
subject other than that derived from observa¬ 
tion and sharing in the wildfowl shooting on 
the eastern shore of Virginia. 
I am a member of a club within easy distance 
of the shooting grounds on Broadwater Bay, and 
during the last two years there has been evi¬ 
dently an increase of wildfowl frequenting those 
waters. It is fair to believe, as suggested in 
your editorial, that this increase is due to the 
measure of relief afforded by the checking of 
shooting in the States that have abolished spring 
shooting. If we are to preserve our American 
wildfowl, and this is obviously desirable, en¬ 
tirely aside from pleasure afforded to sports¬ 
men, they must be given some rest from the 
constant hunting extending from the furthest 
north to the furthest south. If no duck shoot¬ 
ing were permitted along the Atlantic coast later 
than the 15th of February, there would be no 
reasonable ground of complaint, and if the 
sportsmen of the States interested from Maine 
to Florida would unite in an appeal to their 
Legislatures, there is little doubt that spring 
shooting would be abolished. This, however, 
will not be effective in preserving the wildfowl 
unless some measures are devised to stop netting 
and night shooting. The wary ducks and geese 
can protect themselves fairly well during the 
day except against nets, but at night they are 
helpless against the murderous assaults of the 
market gunners. Of course there are laws on 
the statute boks which prohibit such practices, 
but they need an enlightened public opinion and 
a brave and determined force of well-paid war¬ 
dens to enforce them. 
If drafts of acts for the preservation of game 
prepared by experts were given publicity in the 
columns of your paper and criticism invited, it 
seems to me the cause of game protection would 
be materially aided. Walter George Smith. 
Editor Forest and Stream: 
Most emphatically I am in favor of the clos¬ 
ing of the spring shooting of ducks—at all 
events in the latitude of Southern Canada—but 
equally emphatically I do not regard January 
and February as spring months. 
Ducks are not mated then. Mallards and 
black ducks may appear to be, but no more than 
they are in November or December; i. e., the 
proportion of the sexes in these birds seems to 
be about equal at any time after Oct. 1. 
In nearly all other species the proportions of 
the sexes are most unequal until close to the 
breeding season. This is not guess work on 
my part, but the result of observations and rec¬ 
ords made during twenty-five years’ continuous 
duck shooting. 
As an example I may cite the conditions in 
the locality I am at present residing in, Okana¬ 
gan Lake, B. C. 
The autumn shooting does not amount to 
much as a rule, but toward the close of January 
huge flocks of redheads, scaups and canvasbacks 
with a good number of widgeon, gather wher¬ 
ever there is a growth of weeds on the bottom 
of the lake. Up to the cl<?se of February, 
three-fourths of these birds are males in splen¬ 
did condition, very different from the moulting 
birds one shoots in September. About the mid¬ 
dle of March the flocks are composed of a fairly 
equal proportion of males and females, though 
the males still preponderate. Further south the 
conditions will be just the reverse. 
Even as late as the middle of April I have 
seen flocks of widgeon, pintails, goldeneyes, buf- 
fleheads, scaups and canvasbacks in which the 
full plumage males were in the majority of at 
least two to one, and in the case of the deep 
water ducks sometimes the entire bunch would 
be males. 
Now I hold no brief for the market hunter, 
though there are many splendid sportsmen in 
their ranks, but I do want to see the winter wild- 
fowler get a square deal. 
Along both coasts the greater part of the 
shooting is after Dec. 1. Close the season on 
Jan. 1 and the shooting is limited to a few 
weeks. (On this coast few ducks take to the 
salt water before Dec. 15.) 
Now there are hundreds of keen shooters to 
whom the hardships of winter duck shooting 
are an added zest. No one knows better than 
they that no harm is done by shooting at that 
season, as they are as a rule far better ac¬ 
quainted with the ways and habits of ducks than 
most ornithologists. To see large beds of ducks 
which do not breed within a thousand miles of 
them, carefully protected at the only time they 
get a chance to shoot them is a rank injustice. 
The man who only gets a chance at salt water 
shooting might as well sell his gun if ducks are 
protected after Jan. 1. 
There are a number of men, however, who 
do not believe in killing at all, and others who 
only care for a month or so of shooting in the 
mellow autumn weather; with these I cannot 
argue. Wildfowl will never be exterminated 
except perhaps such species as nest in Southern 
latitudes like woodduck, cinnamon teal, Florida 
duck, treeducks and others. 
Take the British Isles as an instance. There, 
spring shooting has been allowed for centuries, 
also such deadly devices as the pipe decoy and 
the very much over-rated swivel gun, as well 
as night shooting and the use of launches. Yet 
countless swarms of wildfowl still resort to its 
crowded shores, and the breeding grounds that 
supply them are insignificant compared with the 
vast tundras of North America. Holland, 
France and Italy present similar illustrations. 
Wildfowl can be scared away, but never ex¬ 
terminated. The reports from all over America 
amply prove this. There are many places where 
there are more ducks now than ever before, 
owing to a change of conditions such as the 
Salton Sea. 
The following factors for the conservation of 
wildfowl are more important than the shorten¬ 
ing of the season: 
First — The absolute prohibition of sale of all 
species. - 1 *ff 
Second—The forming of refuges (not neces¬ 
sarily of large area) where no shooting is al¬ 
lowed wherever wildfowl congregate in large 
numbers. 
Third — The prohibition of all night shooting 
