wasteland that would be good for game 
farming. If you already have some 
land, or a farm, select the site where 
you intend to raise your waterfowl. 
| AM not at all in sympathy with the 
little-cage-fancier who will spend 
enormous sums of money on rare birds 
and place them in small cages where 
they never breed, where, indeed, they 
quickly die. Such men, as well as the 
Zoological Gardens—never were places 
more misnamed—destroy over million 
dollars’ worth of rare game and orna- 
mental birds in this country every year. 
Such men are never scientific and they 
never understand the psychology of 
birds. For instance, consider the New 
York Zoological Gardens placing a half 
dozen rare muskox in a dirty little pen. 
Then consider the Canadian Govern- 
ment placing a dozen of these animals 
on Anticosti Island. The one action 
is destruction of a rare animal, while 
the other is conservation. Similar con- 
ditions prevail among the birds and 
animals in every zoological garden. 
Do not think I am knocking Dr. Horna- 
day of the New York Zoo, for I greatly 
appreciate the work he has done in the 
past and is doing now. Some of the 
animals at this Park are in very good 
pens. But conservation of birds and 
animals is my object and for this rea- 
son I want to draw attention to the 
miserable sums doled out to zoological 
gardens everywhere, sums that do not 
enable them to keep their birds and ani- 

An artificial tree on the Bendick farm. In 
the four holes of the stump a pair each 
of the wood, mandarin, buffle head and 
golden eye have bred this year, 
mals .in more natural and healthier 
conditions instead of in beastly, smelly, 
cramped prisons as is the case at pres- 
ent. It is no wonder that disease and 
death quickly overtake so many birds 
and animals. 
As it is impossible in this day and 
generation for game to survive, much 
less increase,, outside of game refuges, 
it is necessary for us to farm game by 
providing natural environment. Some 
game birds love sandy fields, some clay 
fields, some marsh lands; others seek 
the deep woods, some prefer the wood 
borders while others want shrubby 
places. They are like trees in this re- 
spect. We know that some trees thrive 
in stiff clay, others in light clay; some 
in sandy soil, others in wet sand; some 
in wet clay, others in deep humus, in 
gravel, in rocky soil. Then, too, some 
trees like a high altitude, some prefer 
the sea level, while other trees like 
country in between these two extremes. 
Some trees, such as arbor vitae, will 
grow in any soil. 
LL of this is true with the game 
birds. To many birds and ani- 
mals an altitudinal change means 
death, while others can stand such 
change and never notice it. Some birds 
and animals will stand a _ climatic 
change wonderfully well, just as will 
some of our vegetation. You may know 
that the cinnamon vine from the Phil- 
ippines will grow in northern Ontario, 
that Eulalia variegata from Japan will 
grow in that same section; that the 
Japanese walnut will grow at Ottawa, 
Ontario. But a man in Florida cannot 
breed Arctic geese, while 4 man in 
Manitoba can do so easily; a man in 
Manitoba cannot breed Mexican quail 
nor green peafowl, while the Florida 
man would find it not at all difficult. 
After selecting your game farm with 
a view to the birds or animals you in- 
tend to propagate, you must fence that 
part of it you will use for the game. 
By fencing, I mean a secure outer fence 
that will surround your breeding pens 
and free range sections. Such area 
should range from 4 to 50 acres, de- 
pending upon the quantity of birds you 
will have, the money you wish to use 
in such work. Your pens should be 
about six feet high, so you can stand 
upright in them, and should be about 
twelve by sixteen feet in size. 
Ae these pens are merely for breed- 
ing, they should be of the take- 
down variety. Fencing for quail should 
be 1” mesh for the sides and 14%” mesh 
for the top; for other game birds, 2” 
mesh for both sides and top in the case 
of stock birds, but, in the case of young 
birds, the lower two feet of the sides 
should be 1”, the upper section 1%”, 
and the top 2” mesh. With the excep- 

esse sett tem am 
Mrs. Vincent with baby tree ducks, bred 
on a game farm for the first time. 
tion of very pugnacious cock birds, all 
stock birds should be free in the open 
sections from June lst to February 
28th, as should all young birds when 
half or three quarters grown. This, 
of course, means that one wing of each 
bird must be clipped and feeding traps 
will have to be provided for trapping 
and reclipping. Waterfowl need not 
be clipped nearly so closely as pheas- 
ants. 
HEASANTS must have one big 
wing pretty well clipped in order 
to prevent their flying over an eight- 
foot fence which should be the height 
of the fence surrounding your pens 
and free range sections. This fence, 
which will entirely surround your 
pheasant, quail, partridge and grouse 
pens and free range sections, must also 
surround your ponds and marshlands 
if you have any. The best mesh for 
this outer fence is the diamond shaped 
close mesh. If anything, this is slightly 
closer than the ordinary 2” chicken 
close mesh. Do not use the graduated 
chicken fencing that starts at the bot- 
tom at 1” and finishes at the top at 5”, 
as this wire is very poorly galvanized. 
You could, if you wish, use fencing of 
1” mesh, 2 feet wide, along the bottom, 
then have fencing of 2” mesh, 6 feet 
wide above that. The posts should be 
fairly close together and the wire 
should be taut. A 4 strand barb wire 
run along the bottom will keep dogs 
from burrowing under the fence, while 
one or two along the top will deter men 
from climbing over. 
(Continued on page 693) 
653 
