' Forest and Stream 
A Weekly Journal. Copyright, 1907, by Forest and Stream Publishing Co. 
GgorGe Birp GRINNELL, President, 
York. 
346 Broadway, New 
Cuarves B. REYNOLDS, Secretary. 
346 Broadway, New York. 
Louis DEAN Sprir, Treasurer. 
346 Broadway, New York. 




Terms, $3 a Year, 10 Cts. a Copy. t 
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THE OBJECT OF THIS JOURNAL 
will be to studiously promote a healthful interest 
‘in outdoor recreation, and to cultivate a refined 
( taste for natural objects. 
. 
—— oe 
| all the time we can spare to their pursuit. 
—Forest AND Stream, Aug. 14, 1873. 

GAME BIRD DANGERS. 
Tue non-migratory game birds of our Northern 
coverts have a difficult struggle for existence. 
In some places it almost seems that they have 
yielded in the struggle. and been swept away. 
We are all much given to discussing the im- 
portance of preserving them, but when the shoot- 
ing season comes again, the most of us devote 
We 
wish these birds preserved for a selfish motive— 
for our own pleasure. We feel that they should 
be taken only by ourselves, only in our way—that 
they should be protected from all other dangers. 
Since we insist on killing all of these birds 
_that we can, it is manifestly to our interest to 
_ do everything possible to make life easy for them 
it 
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during the close time. Winter is their season 
of greatest danger, the time when famine and 
cold threaten, the time when the birds are most 
easily discovered and preyed upon by their 
enemies. 
It is often suggested that it would be worth 
while also for the sportsman who lives in a 
region where there are game birds to do sys- 
tematic trapping during the winter in order to 
reduce, if possible, the number of predaceous 
mammals found in his neighborhood. Here, how- 
ever, we are confronted with a problem, about 
which we know very little. It is no doubt true 
that the foxes, skunks, coons and weasels destroy 
some game birds, but it is very certain also that 
they destroy vast numbers of injurious rodents. 
No one can tell as yet just where the balance 
lies, but it is altogether probable that by their 
destruction of small rodents these mammals ac- 
complish more good than harm. 
In the case of such birds of prey as the great 
horned owl, the goshawk and Cooper’s hawk, 
the evil wrought no doubt far exceeds the good. 
The testimony recently given by a correspondent 
for a small district of Connecticut is particularly 
interesting as the experience of one man who 
spends much time in the winter woods. Mr. 
Ashman tells us that of thirty-three partridges 
whose remains he found during the winter of 
1906-07, only three had been killed by predaceous 
animals, while thirty had fallen a prey to hawks 
and owls. On the other hand, in spring many 
nests must be broken up by four-footed car- 
nivors, but as in a majority of cases this prob- 
ably happens without the destruction of the old 
birds, other nests are often built and the second 
brood of young is hatched. 
On the other hand we know that in England, 
where game keeping is brought to its highest 
pitch of perfection, the keeper destroys all pre- 
daceous birds and mammals except the fox, and 
the fox is obliged to keep himself away from the 
covers where the birds are found. 
Among the chief causes for the lessened num- 
bers of our upland birds are the destruction of 
forests and the draining of the swamps, and the 
consequent increase of cultivated and decrease 
of wild land. All these conditions tend to re- 
duce the area over which birds are to be looked 
for. Besides, there is the great increase in gun- 
ners and guns all over the land, and too fre- 
quently a lax enforcement of the game laws. 
To make up for these causes of game bird scar- 
city we must do all that we can to protect our 
species by care in winter, by protecting them 
from their natural enemies, by seeing to it that 
game laws are enforced, and by shortening the 
shooting seasons. If we do not take these meas- 
ures or some of them, we shall face a situation 
where we shall have no wing shooting at all, 
and the game bird of America will be the clay 
pigeon. 

HUNTING GROUNDS ELIMINATED. 
AnoTHer chapter on the gradual elimination 
of shooting and fishing resorts near the city of 
New York will soon be written. 
The last Legislature provided for a commis- 
sion of five to select a site for a State prison 
to take the place of Sing Sing, which is situated 
on low made ground between the railway tracks 
and the Hudson River at Ossining, N. Y. Gov- 
ernor Hughes appointed Dr. Charles F. Howard, 
C. V. Collins, E. M. Johnson, S, J. Barrows and 
Thomas W. Hines. 
The commission has reported to the Governor 
that a site has been selected and negotiations 
for its purchase have been closed. The site com- 
prises about 500 acres of land on the west shore 
of the Hudson River between Stony Point and 
old Fort Montgomery, and fronts-on Doodletown 
Bight, its northern line being Popolopen Creek. 
It extends back into the hills and includes High- 
land Lake and the forest roundabout. 
The rugged hills on the west shore of the Hud- 
son at this point, which is about forty miles 
from New York city, have long been the favorite 
hunting ground of many small game shooters 
who seldom if ever go further afield in autumn, 
but who know the woods of that region as the 
resort of grouse and squirrels. They detrained 
at old Fort Montgomery and a half hour’s walk 
found them in a semi-mountainous region of 
great attractiveness. They stopped over night at 
one of the houses in the village, and found rest 
and recreation near at hand. 
Hard by is Iona Island, once the favorite pic- 
nic ground of countless numbers of New York- 
ers, and a camp-site for all of the canoeists who 
cruised the The Government purchased 
it and it is now a naval arsenal. This drove the 
canoeists to Popolopen Creek, nearby, and of 
late years, the islands of the Croton River being 
river. 
VOL. LXIX.—No. 24. 
| No. 346 Broadway, New York. 
barred to them, they have gone to this creek and 
not a few of them cart their outfits to Highland 
Lake and Popolopen Pond, for the fishing and 
the quiet restfulness of the hills and woods. 
Work will soon be started on the site. Trees 
will be felled, piers constructed andthe hills 
blasted into shape to receive the ugly buildings 
of the prison. Roads will open the forest to 
foreigners and the old names will be known no 
more. 

LO DESOROYW SHEEP) KILLERS: 
For some years now a common plan of getting 
rid of noxious animals has been to offer bounties 
for their scalps, but it has many times been shown 
that this method, instead of exterminating such 
noxious animals, rather keep up the 
supply. In other words, bounties have been found 
to fail of their purpose. 
In the Western country, live stock, from horses 
and cattle down to pigs and poultry, have taken 
the place of game as food for predatory animals of 
various sorts and and the the 
property of the stock grower throughout the cat- 
tle country of the West from this cause, has been 
very heavy. Through the efforts of the United 
States Forest Service, working with the Bureau 
of Biological Survey, it has been demonstrated 
tends to 
sizes, drain on 
that the larger predatory animals can be effec- 
tively destroyed by trained hunters, whose success 
is tending very rapidly to rid some of the ranges 
of these expensive wild creatures. The 
are tracked to their dens and:dug out, the young 
being killed and the old ones shot whenever it is 
possible. This is a most effective way of pre- 
venting the increase of these animals and limiting 
wolves 
their ravages. 
The method is one that appeals to the common 
sense of the average man, and it is not surprising 
that the Wool Growers’ Association of Oregon 
has recently gone on record as favoring the aban- 
donment of the bounty system and substituting 
the practice of killing the animals by private ef- 
fort by means of professional hunters. 
In the discussion of this subject at a recent 
meeting it was stated that during the past year 
Oregon sheep owners lost $250,000 by the ravages 
of predatory animals, and that the loss of other 
farm stock, including poultry, would increase the 
amount to half a million dollars. The Wool 
Association purposes to take up the 
work, and will ask assistance from the National 
Growers’ 
Association. 

AFTER a stormy session at Syracuse last Thurs- 
day the New York State Fish, Game and Forest 
The 
factional fight that led to this action was pecul- 
League adjourned without electing officers. 
iarly unfortunate, coming at a time when the 
number of affiliated clubs had been doubled, and 
the power of the league for good correspondingly 
increased. 

