
A pair of emperor geese and their young which are still 
in their first plumage and show the gray heads. On the 
estate of Mr. F. E. Blaauw at Gooilust, Holland. Mr. 
Blaauw is the first to raise these beautiful, rare birds. 

% 
Indian bar-headed geese. The two birds at the left are 
adults. The other three are their young in their first 
590 
plumage; they “have dark hind necks and no bars.” 
Helping Nature 
Keep a Balance 
By GEORGE HEBDEN CORSAN 
OUR or five years ago, a young man’s uncle died and left him 
some four hundred acres through which ran two streams. As 
an ordinary and usual farm, the place was rather played out, 
as are so many farms of other days in the Eastern States. On 
this particular farm some of the cultivated fields had run to a 
thick coppice growth. The young man considered the place, espe- 
cially the condition of the soil, the coppice growth, the two - 
streams. Quick thought. Quick action. He turned to a new 
phase of farming—the breeding of game birds. He advertised 
for a game breeder and chose a Scotsman (or names don’t mean 
anything). They went to work. They bought birds. They adver- 
tised. 
Now, you can’t start a game farm all at once. Birds will not 
nest and breed the minute they are put down in a strange place. 
However, inquiries poured in on this young man in such volume, 
that he sold all the birds he had bought. Although not able to 
breed these birds as he had planned, he made a good profit on his 
turnover. He bought more birds from the game breeders of En- 
gland, Holland and other European countries. These birds went 
as quickly as the first lot, and before he had a chance to breed 
them. Thus he became a game bird importer, as well as a game 
bird breeder. He is so well established to-day that he has many 
acres of all kinds of upland game and waterfowl which he has 
bred about the old farm, besides the many birds he imports from 
time to time. 
But everything did not run smoothly with this young man’s new 
work. One thing that bothered him was the fact that the greatest 
game breeder in the world seemed determined to ignore his let- 
ters of inquiry with regard to possible purchases of some of his 
stock. Being a typical American from the ground up and back 
for quite a number of generations, he finally went to Europe and 
called upon this particular game bird breeder. Evidence of his 
success has reached me in the form of a new list of game birds 
which he has brought back with him: trumpeter swans at $750.00 
a. pair; emperor geese at $500.00 a pair; Ross geese at $150.00 
a pair, etc., etc.—all home bred, Dutch birds. This shows good 
American spirit, and follows the slogan in my previous article: 
that nothing is ‘too good for North Amefica. It shows another 
fact also: that a Holland gentleman has been uniformly success- 
ful in breeding game birds that are native to North America. 
Mr. F. E. Blaauw, of Holland, has done wonderful work with the 
game birds of the world for many years and I am glad to see 
Mr. Oliver W. Holton, of New Jersey, bringing some of the results 
to America. 
pia up two Humane magazines the other day, I read of 
their terrible indignation at a Los Angeles company which is 
just now in the formative period. This company proposes to send 
a number of men to Africa to secure a great number of large 
game animals with the idea of establishing them on a huge fenced 
preserve in Central California and thus, some day, produce a great 
hunting club of unusual animals. Of course, the Human maga- 
zines are worrying because the company eventually plans to shoot 
these animals. See what one’s enemies or objectors can often 
do—a lot of real good! I would never have heard of this com- 
pany or its proposed plans, including their quest for money, but 
for these two magazines. But the Humane editors will not need 
to worry—all the shooting that will be done on the proposed pre- 
serve will not amount to the natural deaths that would result 
normally. Besides, in my opinion, the stockholders will do a mil- 
lion times more eye and camera shooting and charging us ordi- 
