Our Vanishing Wild Life Part 48

Men of Connecticut, save the last remnants of your native game birds before they are all utterly exterminated within your borders! Don't ask the killers of game what _they_ will agree to, but make the laws what _you know_ they should be! If you want a gameless state, let the destruction go on as it now is going, with _16,000 licensed gunners_ in the field each year, and you will surely have it, right soon.

DELAWARE:

Stop all spring shooting, at once; stop killing sh.o.r.e birds for ten years, and protect swans indefinitely.

Enact bag-limit laws, in very small figures.

Stop the sale of all native wild game, regardless of its use, by enacting a Bayne law.

Enact a resident license law, and provide for a force of paid game wardens.

Stop the use of machine shot-guns in killing your birds.

The state of Delaware is nearly twenty years behind the times. Can it be possible that her Governor and her people are really satisfied with that position? We think not. I dare say they are afflicted with apathy, and game-hogs. The latter can easily back up General Apathy to an extent that spells "no game laws." In one act, and at one bold stroke, Delaware can step out of her position at the rear of the procession of states, and take a place in the front rank. Will she do it? We hope so, for her present status is unworthy of any right-minded, red-blooded state this side of the Philippines.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA:

The sale of all native wild game, regardless of its source, should be stopped immediately, by the enactment of a complete Bayne law.

If game-shooting within the District is continued, on the marshes of the Eastern Branch and on the Potomac River, common decency demands the enactment of bag-limit laws and long close-season laws of the most modern pattern.

Just why it is that gross abuses against wild life have so long been tolerated in the territorial center of the American nation, remains to be ascertained. But, whatever the reason the situation is absurd and intolerable, and Congress should terminate it immediately. As late as 1897, and I think for two or three years thereafter, thousands of _robins_ were sold every year in the public markets of Was.h.i.+ngton as food! As a spectacle for G.o.ds and men, behold to-day the sale of quail, ruffed grouse, wild turkeys and other American game, half way between the Capitol and the White House! Look at Center Market as a national "fence" for the sale of game stolen by market gunners from Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas and Pennsylvania.

It is time for Congress to bring the District of Columbia sharply into line; for Was.h.i.+ngton must be made to toe the mark beside New York. The reputation of the national capital demands it, whether the G.o.ds of the cafes will consent or not.

FLORIDA:

Shooting sh.o.r.e birds and waterfowl in late winter and spring should be stopped.

The sale of all native wild game should be prohibited.

A State Game Commissioner whose term of office should be not less than four years, and a force of salaried game wardens, should be appointed.

A general resident license should be required for hunting.

The killing of does and fawns should be stopped, and no deer should be killed save bucks with horns at least three inches long.

The bag limit of five deer per year should be two deer; of twenty quail, and two turkeys per day should be ten quail and one turkey.

The open season on all game birds should end on February 1, for domestic reasons.

Protection should be accorded doves, and robins should be removed from the game list.

In the destruction of wild life, I think the backwoods population of Florida is the most lawless and defiant that can be found anywhere in the United States. The "plume-hunters" have practically exterminated the plume-bearing egrets, wholly annihilated the roseate spoonbill, the flamingo, and also the Carolina parrakeet. On July 8, 1905, one of them killed an Audubon a.s.sociation Warden, Guy M. Bradley, whose business it was to enforce the state laws protecting the egret rookeries. The people really to blame for the shooting of Guy Bradley, and the extermination of the egrets by lawless and dangerous men, are the vain and merciless women who wear the "white badges of cruelty" as long as they can be purchased! They have much to answer for!

Originally, Florida was alive with bird life. For number of species, abundance of individuals, and general dispersal throughout the whole state, I think no other state in America except possibly California ever possessed a bird fauna quite comparable with it. Once its bird life was one of the wonders of America. But the gunners began early to shoot, and shoot, and shoot. During the fifteen years preceding 1898, the general bird life of Florida decreased in volume 77 per cent. In 1900 it was at a very low point, and it has steadily continued to decrease. The rapidly-growing settlement and cultivation of the state has of course had much to do with the disappearance of wild life generally, and the draining and exploitation of the Everglades will about finish the birds of southern Florida.

The brown pelicans' breeding-place on Pelican Island, in Indian River, has been taken in hand by the national government as a bird refuge, and its marvelous spectacle of pelican life is now protected. Nine other islands on the coast of Florida have been taken as national bird refuges, and will render posterity good service.

The great private game and bird preserve of Dr. Ray V. Pierce, at Apalachicola, known as St. Vincent Island, containing twenty square miles of wonderful woods and waters, is performing an important function for the state and the nation.

The Florida bag limit on quail is entirely too liberal. I know one man who never once exceeded the limit of twenty birds per day, but in the season of 1908-9 he killed _865 quail_! Can the quail of any state long endure such drains as that?

From a zoological point of view, Florida is in bad shape. A great many of her people who shoot are desperately lawless and uncontrollable, and the state is not financially able to support a force of wardens sufficiently strong to enforce the laws, even as they are. It looks as if the slaughter would go on until nothing of bird life remains. At present I can see no hope whatever for saving even a good remnant of the wild life of the state.

The present status of wild-life protective laws in Florida was made the subject of an article in _Forest and Stream_ of August 10, 1912, by John H. Wallace, Jr., Game Commissioner of the State of Alabama, in an article ent.i.tled "The Florida Situation." In view of his record, no one will question either the value or the honest sincerity of Mr. Wallace's opinions. The following paragraphs are from that article:

The enactment of a model and modern game law for the State of Florida is absolutely imperative in order to save many of the most valuable species of birds and game of that State from certain depletion and threatened extinction. The question of the protection of the birds and game in Florida is not a local one, but is national in its scope. Birds know no state lines, and while practically all the States lying to the north of Florida protect migratory birds and waterfowl, yet these are recklessly slaughtered in that state to such an extent as to be appalling to all sportsmen and bird lovers.

So alarming has become the decrease of the birds and game of Florida that unless a halt is called on the campaign of reckless annihilation that has been ceaselessly waged in that state, the sport and recreation enjoyed by primeval nimrods will linger only in history and tradition.

It is the sincerest hope of all lovers of wild life of the American continent that a strong and invincible sentiment, relative to the imperative necessity of real conservation legislation, be crystallized in the minds of the members elect of the Florida Legislature, to the end that the next Legislature will spread upon the statute books of the State of Florida a model and modern law for the preservation and protection of the birds and game of that State, which when put into practical operation will elicit the thanks of all good citizens, and likewise the grat.i.tude of future generations.

GEORGIA:

Prohibit late winter and spring shooting, and provide rational seasons for wild fowl.

Reduce the limit on deer to two bucks a season, with horns not less than three inches long.

Protect the meadow lark and stop forever the killing of doves and wood-ducks.

Prohibit the use of automatic and pump shot-guns in hunting.

Extend the term of the game commissioner to four years.

We are glad to report that Georgia has already begun to take up the white man's burden. The protection of wild life is now a gentleman's proposition, and in it every real man with red blood in his veins has a duty to perform. The state of Georgia has recently awakened, and under the comprehensive law of 1911 has resolutely undertaken to do her whole duty in this matter.

IDAHO:

The imperative duties of Idaho are as follows:

Stop all hunting of mountain sheep, mountain goat and elk.

Give the sage grouse and sharp-tail ten-year close seasons, at once, to forestall their extermination.

Stop the killing of doves as "game."

Stop the killing of female deer, and of bucks with horns less than three inches long.

Enact the model law to protect non-game birds.

Prohibit the use of machine shot-guns in hunting.

Extend the State Warden's term to four years.

Like Montana, Wyoming and Colorado, the state of Idaho has wasted her stock of game, and it is to be feared that several species are now about to disappear from that state. I am told that the sage grouse is almost "gone"; and I think that the antelope, caribou, and mountain sheep are in the same condition of scarcity.