24 THE AU DUB ON BUM Eee 
and worthwhile to tile and ditch the poorly drained prairie soil. In this 
era hunting was a way of life—wild game was necessarily a steady diet for 
most pioneer families. Some of the early hired workers specified in thei 
contract that Prairie Chicken was not to be served more than three days 
per week. Not because Prairie Chicken is not delicious meat but because 
a steady diet of any meat grows monotonous. 
Merritt as a young man in the east read and heard glowing accounts 
of the abundance of game in Illinois. He bought a bird dog and set out, 
landing in Peoria in June 1855. Here he market-hunted in Adams, Bureau, 
Henry, Knox and Stark Counties along the Green, Rock and Vermillion 
Rivers and the prairies in between. Prairie Chicken were the pride of 
the prairie, greatly admired, of noble presence, a delicacy for any table. 
free for the taking. There were no game laws, closed seasons and hag 
limits were unheard of. No one ever dreamed of killing all that game. Dozens 
of flocks of Prairie Chicken were found in one stubble field. It was no 
trouble at all to kill 100 birds a week, all they could eat and give away. 
In the spring the melody on the booming grounds was the common 
music of the prairies. The glowing bright yellow, blazing bar over the 
eye of the male was his badge of royalty. His love token, which inflames 
him with his harem of 10 or 12 females, within his precious 10 by 12 foot 
circle. Master of his ring, ear feathers standing out like spears, head down 
he rushes forth, the picture of a raging bull. The boo and cackle poured 
forth in rapturous ecstasy and exhileration of his very soul, an esthetic 
holiday. The purpose is to charm his mate. 
There was no market when hunting started the first of August. Young 
Prairie Chicken were then half-grown and easily killed. Later in October 
and November they grew wary and gun-shy, flushing far ahead of the 
hunter and dog, they often flew a mile or more. When cold weather came 
and later with ice and cold storage plants, game could be held and shipped 
to Eastern markets. Ducks, Snipe, Golden Plover, Woodcock, and Prairie 
Chicken were dressed, packed in ice barrels or boxes and shipped to a 
ready market in New York. Prairie Chicken brought $1.50 per dozen, Quail 
$.75 per dozen, and Mallards $1.50 per dozen. In one of his best years, 
Merritt shipped twelve thousand Golden Plover, and eight thousand Snipe 
to New York at $2.00 per dozen. In the Chenoweeth Prairie in Bureau 
County the prairie was a wilderness of waste-land literally covered witk 
Prairie Chicken, Snipe, plovers, and ducks in fall and spring migration. It 
was not uncommon for a hunting party to bring in 600 to 1,000 chickens 
per day. In 1885-1886 Merritt shipped $20,000 worth of game to New York 
and Chicago. Prairie Chicken sold for $1.75 per pair. 
In 1854 the first railroad, the C.B.&O., opened the wilderness to needed 
travel and transportation for game, corn, and wheat. Roads were improved. 
settlers moved in, and land prices boomed. The prairie sod was broken, 
crops were cultivated, farms were fenced and tiled. Malaria was common— 
“the ague”’—mosquitoes were thick. As cultivation increased so did the 
Quail and Prairie Chicken up to a certain point. Enough grassland was 
left as waste-land, hay and pasture to provide the essential nesting and 
brood rearing cover. Cultivated crops provided abundant food. During the 
Civil War farmers requested hunters to come in and shoot the Prairie 
Chicken that were ruining their cornfields. Prairie Chicken gathered in 
flocks of 100 to 1,000. They lit on rail fences covering it for a mile long. 
One farmer in 1861 trapped 500 Prairie Chicken in his garden in one week. 
In Henry County 500 Prairie Chicken were killed in one week’s hunt. At 
