252 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Aug. 13, 1910. 
place precisely as if the position of the horn 
was normal. 
I11 the head first figured the points of the 
horns are directed inward and meet and cross 
as shown in the photograph. They pass each 
other for about three inches. The horns are un¬ 
usual in their narrowness from side to side. 
There is little or no spread. The points, more¬ 
over, are somewhat twisted in corkscrew fashion, 
pass close to each other in the over-lapping and 
on each one, after the turn inward has been 
made, is a slight projection suggesting another 
"prong.” The normal prong is rather blunt and 
small, and indeed the horns are small for an 
adult antelope, which this appears to be. The 
head is mounted and no very clear idea of its 
age can be had. 
This head is the property of Joseph Kipp, of 
Browning, Montana, whom some of the older 
readers of Forest and Stream may recall as 
the donor to Forest and Stream many years 
ago of a pair of grizzly bears. These bears 
were sent on by express without warning, and 
one winter morning were dumped on the side¬ 
walk in front of Forest and Stream’s office in 
Park Row, New York, where they promptly 
drew a crowd of business men and newsboys 
which the police were finally obliged to disperse, 
but not before the - little bears had gathered in 
a harvest of fragments of clothing from the 
people who surrounded them. Finally the Cen¬ 
tral Park authorities sent down a wagon and 
carried the bears away to the Central Park 
Menagerie, where they lived for a long time and 
at last died full of years. 
This antelope was killed many years ago by 
a Piegan Indian named Cutbank John, who was 
a great hunter, and who many years ago captured 
a young mountain sheep which was subsequently 
brought east and lived for some years in the 
grounds of the Smithsonian Institution in Wash¬ 
ington. 
Antelope were formerly very common on the 
B'ackfeet Indian reservation, but have long been 
extinct there. G. B. G. 
California Birds and Fruit. 
The Department of Agriculture has finished 
its investigations as to harmful or beneficial ef¬ 
fect of California birds upon the fruit industry 
of that State and has issued the second and final 
part of its report in Bulletin No. 34 of the Bio¬ 
logical Survey. Seventy species of birds were 
systematically investigated. Many of these have 
not been charged with the injury of fruit or 
other farm products, but as almost all destroy 
harmful insects, or devour seeds of noxious 
weeds, they are important as a factor in farm 
economics. The aim has been to collect all data 
possible on the food of the several species, so 
that a just verdict might be rendered" as to the 
birds’ economic relations. 
Few birds are so destructive that their exter¬ 
mination can be urged on sound economic prin¬ 
ciples. Some, like the swallows, swifts, wrens 
and chickadees are so strictly insectivorous that 
they are exceedingly beneficial, wffiile others may 
injure crops at certain times of the year, but the 
loss is exceedingly small, and if by its insec¬ 
tivorous habits the bird prevents greater destruc¬ 
tion than it inflicts, the farmer should be will¬ 
ing to bear the lesser loss. 
A reasonable way of viewing the relation of 
birds to the farmer is to consider them as ser¬ 
vants, employed to destroy weeds and insects, 
for whom food and protection are provided. In 
the long run no part of the capital invested in 
the farm or orchard is more certain to pay big 
interest than the small sum collected as toll by 
the birds that harbor near the premises. The 
extensive investigations undertaken in response 
to complaints concerning depredations by birds 
on the Pacific coast show that of the seventy 
species, whose stomach contents were under ex¬ 
amination, but four species common in Califor¬ 
nia can be regarded as of doubtful utility. These 
are the linnet, California jay, steller jay and red¬ 
breasted sapsucker. 
The more the food habits of birds are studied 
the more evident it becomes that with a normal 
distribution of species and a fair supply of 
natural food the damage to agricultural products 
by birds is small as compared with the benefit. 
Wild Ducks on the Farm.—IV. 
Where the ducks themselves make nests and 
hatch out their young broods, the method of 
handling is not essentially different from that 
followed when the hen is the mother. The man 
who has charge of the birds is of course well 
known to them, and by constantly moving about 
them and continually visiting the nests in a quiet 
manner, the old birds have become so tame that 
they will let him approach them closely, or per¬ 
haps even touch them. The man in charge will 
have noticed when the bird began to sit, and so 
will know about when she ought to come off, and 
besides this her actions on the nest will show 
him whether the eggs are hatched. 
It is recommended that the ducks be not al¬ 
lowed their freedom or permitted to take their 
broods to the water until the young are quite 
well grown. Fishes, water turtles and rats are 
great enenves and readily destroy the young, and 
indeed sometimes the older birds, if the oppor¬ 
tunity occurs. On the other hand it must be 
said that there should be no fishes, turtles or 
rats in the water to which the young ducks have 
access. 
For the first week or ten days of their life, 
nothing is more important than to give the birds 
plenty of food, except the quality of this food. 
They should be fed very frequently all that they 
will eat, and then the food should be removed, 
to be replaced at the next feeding by fresh food, 
the surplus of this to be removed in its turn. 
Ducks are voracious feeders and may properly 
be allowed to stuff themselves, but when that 
stuffing process is over, the food should be re¬ 
moved. Sour and stale food left about the 
coops, or in the little yards which they occupy, 
is almost sure to result in sickness. While the 
first few meals may be simply corn meal, on the 
second or third day they should be given some 
finely shaved soft green food, such as chick- 
weed, lettuce or some other tender plant, to¬ 
gether with some fine gravel. The water should 
be in shallow dishes at the bottom of which fine 
sand may be scattered. It is not desirable that 
the ducklings should be able to get into the 
dishes and so get themselves wet, yet shallow 
dishes with a little water in them are better than 
the ordinary self-feeding poultry water dishes. 
As the time passes, and the ducklings grow 
stronger and larger, they need more room. Now 
half a dozen coops with the hens and broods 
may be placed in a much larger inclosure — per¬ 
haps thirty feet each way.- This gives the young 
birds opportunity to run about to hunt insects, 
and to take exercise in a variety of ways. 
A danger here is that sometimes the ducklings 
may get into the wrong coop and may be injured 
by hens that do not recognize them, but by this 
time they are getting large and strong and are 
not so susceptible to injuries by violence as dur¬ 
ing the first few days of their life. By this time 
a certain amount of ground scraps — dried meat 
■—should be mixed with their meal, the supply of 
fine gravel should be constant and abundant and 
the green food given twice a day and always 
fresh. It is absolutely essential that the water 
should be always fresh and that the uneaten 
food should be constantly removed. 
Over a-portion of such a yard as has been 
suggested, it will be well to have a roof under 
which the little birds can take shelter in case 
of a storm. Heat does not seem to hurt them, 
and even on very warm days they may be seen 
sitting and resting on the ground, apparently en¬ 
joying the warmth of the sun. 
By this time, say at two weeks or over, the 
birds are strong enough and large enough to be 
fed some grain. For this purpose cracked corn 
may be' used, or wheat, or the “screenings” that 
may be purchased at any feed store. These 
screenings consist of imperfect grains of vffieat 
and many other seeds and grains of one kind 
and another, which are too heavy to be removed 
by the customary fanning of the thresher. 
It is recommended by Captain Oates that at 
first this small grain be soaked, on the ground 
that it thus becomes more digestible. Certainly 
there is no harm in doing this, but if the duck¬ 
lings have plenty of gravel, they can manage the 
grain well enough, even in its hard state. It is 
well now to change frequently the diet, giving 
them so far as possible a variety of foods which 
they will greatly enjoy. Orange. 
Mary Dutcher Memorial Fund. 
Contributors to the Mary Dutcher Fund wall 
be interested in knowing that that fund is in¬ 
creasing. Since the luncheon given to William 
Dutcher, president of the National Association 
of Audubon Societies on July 14 last, when the 
committee handed him a certificate of deposit 
for $6,550, the amount has grown until it is now 
$7,136.79- 
The committee has decided to leave the fund 
open, hoping that other contributors will come 
forward, and that the sum may come to reach 
$10,000, which would yield a net income to the 
association of about $500 a year. 
Persons who wish to contribute to this good 
object may address W. W. Grant, Chairman, 140 
Nassau street, New York. 
Our New Orleans correspondent advises us 
that the bronze'statue of John James" Audubon, 
the naturalist, has arrived there and will be 
placed in Audubon Park in that city within the 
next two or three weeks. The monument is a 
little more than life size! It was designed by 
Edward V. Valentine, the sculptor of Richmond, 
Va. It was purchased by funds raised through 
the instrumentality of the Louisiana Audubon 
Society. The city also contributed to the funds. 
The shaft cost about $16,000. 
