as Middendorf most justly says. The silence which reigns within them
is a positive torture. When the pairing of the black-cock is past one
may hear the song of the fieldfare and the black-throated thrush,
the warbling of the white-throat, the linnet, and the pine grosbeak,
the melody of the wood-wren, and the call of the cuckoo, but hardly
ever all these voices at once. The trilling call of the greenshank
and redshank becomes a song, the chattering of the magpie gains a
new charm, even the cawing of the hooded crow and the raven seem
cheerful, and the call of a woodpecker or a titmouse most refreshing.
The silence expresses the desolateness of the woods. He who hopes to
be able to lead in them a joyous sportsman’s life will be bitterly
disappointed. Doubtless all the immense woods of this region have more
tenants, especially birds and mammals, than we are at first inclined
to believe, but these animals are so unequally distributed over the
immeasurable area, and probably also wander so widely, that we can
arrive at no standard for estimating their numbers. Miles and miles
are, or appear to be for a time at least, so lifeless and desolate that
naturalist and sportsman alike are almost driven to despair, their
expectations are so continually disappointed. All the reports of even
experienced observers who have sojourned there leave one still in the
dark. Districts which seem to combine all the conditions necessary
for the vigorous and comfortable life of certain species of animals,
shelter, to all appearance, not a single pair, not even a male,
naturally fond of roving. In such woods, far from human settlements,
and to some extent beyond the limits of human traffic, one cannot
but hope at length to fall in with the species which should frequent
such places, but the hope is as fallacious as the supposition that
one is more likely to meet with them in the heart of the forest than
on its outskirts. The fact is that the regions under man’s influence,
which he has modified, and to some extent cultivated, seem often to
exhibit a more abundant and diverse life than the interior of the
forest-wilderness. Wherever man has founded stable settlements, rooted
out trees, and laid out fields and pasture-lands, there gradually
arises a greater diversity of animal life than is to be seen in the
vast untouched regions which remain in their original monotony. It
seems as if many animals find suitable localities for settlement only
after the ground is brought under cultivation. Of course the fact that
certain animals are more abundant in the neighbourhood of man, where
they are ruthlessly hunted, than they are in the inaccessible forest,
where danger scarce threatens them, implies a gradual reinforcement
from without. At certain seasons at least there must be migrations
of more or less considerable extent, and in these most of the West
Siberian animals take part. All the observations hitherto made
corroborate this view.
[Illustration: Fig. 19.--Reindeer Flocking to Drink.]
The only stationary animals, in the usual sense of the word, seem to
be certain mountain species and those which hibernate in caves and
holes; all the rest migrate more or less regularly. At the pairing and
nesting time all the West Siberian animals segregate themselves, except
those which are gregarious during the breeding season. Later on, the
parents and their young combine with their fellows in herds or flocks,
which, impelled by the need for more readily obtainable food, and
perhaps also driven off by the plague of mosquitoes, set out on their
wanderings together. Localities rich in fodder attract the herbivorous
creatures, which are the first to arrive, but on their heels come
others, and finally their enemies. Thus certain parts of the woodland
are depopulated and others are peopled, and there occur actual blocks
in the migratory stream, which must be the more striking in contrast
to the usual desolateness and emptiness of the forest. The scenes of
old conflagrations are favourite rendezvous, for, on the fertilized
soil, berry-bearing bushes of various sorts have sprung up and attained
luxuriant growth. Here, in autumn, the Siberian herbivores find a
rich harvest, and not only they, but wolves and foxes, martens and
gluttons, sables and bears, primarily attracted by the collected herds,
may be seen banqueting, devouring the berries with evident pleasure.
The different animals thus brought together seem to remain for a time
in a certain correlation. The herbivores, as observant sportsmen have
noticed, keep with unmistakable constancy to the berries; and the
carnivores follow closely in their tracks.
These migrations explain how it is that during certain years some of
the woods are filled with all kinds of beasts of the chase, while
during other years they are entirely forsaken. The traveller from the
west, who journeys in late winter or early spring in Western Siberia,
beholds with astonishment a flock of three to five hundred black-game
rise in crowded flight from the highway through the forest, and learns
with not less astonishment a little later that the same or even more
favourable woods are but sparsely stocked with these birds. In summer
he searches in the most suitable localities for the hazel-grouse, and
is discouraged because his search is continually futile; in autumn he
is pleasantly surprised to see, in the same places, abundance of the
same game.
So peculiar are the conditions due to the monotonous uniformity of wide
stretches, that the huntsman who will make sure of his booty must be
very familiar with them; indeed, even the most skilful and experienced
sportsman is always and everywhere in the measureless forests at
the mercy of chance. Whatever be the game he pursues, he never can
predict where he will find it. Yesterday the goddess of the chase was
kind to extravagance; to-day she refuses him every aid. There is no
lack of game, but the huntsman who had to live on what he shot would
starve. A sportsman’s life, such as is possible in other latitudes,
is inconceivable in Western Siberia; the profit to be derived from
the forest chase is inconsiderable. Some animals, for example the
beaver,[31] seem already to have been exterminated; and others,
especially the much-prized sable, have withdrawn from the inhabited
districts into the interior of the forest. Everywhere in Siberia one
hears the common complaint, that game becomes scarcer every year; and
it is certain that from one decennium to another the diminution is
perceptible. For this man is not wholly responsible; the forest-fires
and the devastating epidemics which now and then break out are probably
as much, if not more, to blame. At the same time, no Siberian ever
realizes that a temporary sparing of the game is the first condition of
its preservation. Sportsman-like hunting is unknown; the most varied
means are used to kill as many animals as possible. Gun and rifle are
mere accessories; pitfalls and nets, spring-guns and poison are the
most important agents employed by natives and immigrants alike.
“Game” to the Siberian means every animal which he can in any way use
after its death, the elk and the flying squirrel, the tiger and the
weasel, the capercaillie and the magpie. What the superstition of one
race spares falls as a booty to the other; animals whose flesh the
Russians despise are delicacies to the Mongolian palate. Ostiaks and
Samoyedes take young foxes, martens, bears, owls, swans, geese, and
other creatures, treat them tenderly as long as they are young, care
for them sedulously until the fur or plumage is fully developed, and
then kill them, eating the flesh and selling the skin. The number
of skins brought from Siberia to the markets there and in Europe is
computed in millions: the number used in the country itself is much
smaller, but still very considerable. The quantity of furred, and
especially of feathered game, which is transported to a distance in
a frozen state, also mounts up to many hundreds of thousands. Along
with the furs of mammals the skins of certain birds are at present
much exported, especially those of swans, geese, gulls, grebes, and
magpies, which, like the furs, are used in making muffs, collars, and
hat trimmings. A single merchant in the unimportant town of Tjukalinsk
passes through his hands every year thirty thousand plover-skins, ten
thousand swan-skins, and about a hundred thousand magpies; and some
years ago his sale was much larger.[32] That the total traffic in
skins must involve a yearly diminution of the animals is certain; and
that only the inaccessibility of the wildernesses of forest and water
preserves the affected species from utter destruction will be plain to
everyone who knows the unsparing hand of the Siberian huntsman.
Although it is plain from what we have said that the Siberian’s
conception of game is a very wide one, the animals looked upon as
worthy of hunting are really those which we ourselves regard as furred
and feathered game, or would so regard if they occurred in Germany.
In our sense of the term, the game of the forest girdle includes the
Maral stag and the roe-deer, the elk and the reindeer, the wolf, the
fox, the Arctic fox, the lynx and the bear, the Arctic hare, the
squirrel, the striped and flying squirrel, but above all, the martens,
viz., sable, pine-marten and stone-marten, pole-cat, kolonok, ermine,
weasel, glutton, and otter; besides the capercaillie, black-grouse, and
hazel-grouse. In the south must be added the tiger, which now and then
prowls within this region, the ounce, the musk-deer, and the wild boar
of the mountain forest; while the north also yields the willow grouse,
occasionally found at least on the outskirts of the forest. These
animals everyone hunts, and the more civilized do so in a regular,
if not always sportsmanlike, fashion; for most of them ingenious and
effective snares are also laid.
Of the latter the much-used “fall-trap” is most worthy of notice.
Its arrangement is as follows:--Across clear spaces in the forest,
especially those which afford a clear view, a low and very
inconspicuous fence is stretched, and in the middle of this an opening
is left, or there may be two or three if the fence be long. Each
opening is laterally bounded by two firm stakes which bear a cross-beam
above, and are meant to guide the falling beam, which consists of
two long, moderately thick tree-stems, bound side by side. A long
lever rests on the cross-beam, on its short arm the falling beam is
suspended, while a cord from the long arm forms the connection with a
peg-arrangement. The latter is contrived as follows. A short stick,
forked at one end and pointed at the other, is fixed with the fork
against a notch in one of the stakes, and with its pointed end fastened
against another longer peg whose forked end rests lightly on the other
stake. The two pegs keep one another in position, but on the slightest
pressure they fall asunder. When the trap is set, the peg arrangement
which corresponds to the trigger is covered with numerous light, dry
twigs, not so much to conceal it, as to form a larger surface of
possible contact. When an animal, even a small bird, steps upon the
twigs, the two pegs fall asunder, and the beam drops, killing the
animal under it. If it be set for a beast of prey, bait is laid beside
the triggers; all other kinds of game are simply guided to the trap by
the direction of the fence. In many woods all the haunts, paths, and
clear spaces are beset with these traps in hundreds and thousands, so
that the huntsman is often compensated by abundant booty for the slight
trouble which it takes to arrange his effective apparatus. Grouse,
hares, squirrels, and ermine are the commonest victims; polecat,
pine-marten, and sable, the rarest. Gluttons also and wolves often lose
their lives, but the survivors learn like dogs, and anxiously avoid the
set traps, though neither is at all afraid to steal or gnaw at and thus
destroy the booty caught in one which has sprung.
[Illustration: Fig. 20.--Elk and Black-cock in a Siberian Forest.]
Besides the “fall-trap”, the Ostiaks and Samoyedes are fond of using
a spring-gun arrangement, fitted with bow and arrow or automatic
cross-bow. As the bow is very strong and the arrow well made, the
murderous contrivance is very effective, and exceedingly dangerous
to the inattentive explorer. Ingenious arrangements hold the bow
stretched, and keep it and the arrow in position; a wooden clasp
relaxes the bow whenever a line stretched across the animal’s run is
touched. In order to direct the arrow so that it may pierce the heart
of the victim, the ingenious people use a pillar-like perforated
target the size of the desired booty. When this is placed on the run
it has the perforation at the precise level of the beast’s heart, and
according to the distance between the heart and the collar-bone, the
hunters determine the distance between the mark and the trigger. As all
the natives are well acquainted with the tracks of various kinds of
game, the spring-gun only fails when a creature comes along entirely
different in size from that for which the arrow was destined. Usually
they are set for foxes, and with hardly less success for wolves, or
even for elk and reindeer, while the automatic cross-bow is arranged
for smaller game, especially ermine and squirrels. For both of these,
bait is spread which can only be got at when the animal creeps through
a narrow hole in front of the lower part of the set cross-bow. In so
doing the creature touches a trigger, and is forthwith crushed by a
broad, chisel-like arrow which the cross-bow shoots forcibly down on
its appointed course.
As an important addition to these old-fashioned contrivances, fire-arms
have recently come more and more into vogue among the natives of
Western Siberia, but they do not displace the bow and arrow. Powder
and bullets are dear, and the people prefer small-bored matchlocks and
flint-locks, which are exceedingly bad; but they use these defective
weapons with remarkable skill. A fork fastened in front to the
barrel, and used as a rest, is to be seen on every gun, and even the
educated sportsmen use it as indispensable to the effective use of the
matchlock. Fowling-pieces are used by the officials and well-to-do
townsfolk, but not by the natives, who have to make a profit by the
chase, and to measure their powder, as it were, by the grain. They
fill a small horn with the expensive material, wind a leaden wire of
the diameter of their bore twice or thrice round their waists, and
thus equipped set out on the chase. The leaden wire serves for making
bullets, which are not cast but simply cut, or, even more simply,
bitten off the wire; the resulting peg-like shot is laid without any
wad directly on the powder, and thus the gun is loaded. Of course the
native huntsmen do not shoot from a distance except when forced to, but
to the height of medium-sized trees their aim is so sure that they take
the eye of the sable or squirrel for their mark and seldom miss it.
The various species of grouse are more generally hunted than any other
creatures, and are caught and killed in hundreds of thousands. During
the pairing season capercaillie and black-grouse are almost everywhere
left unmolested. The sportsman’s joy as we know it when the pairing
grouse take wing can scarcely be experienced in Siberia, owing to the
inaccessibility of the woodland; not even for the pairing black-grouse
does one rise betimes in May; the hazel-grouse alone is sought after by
mimicking his love-call. But who would put himself to so much trouble
and discomfort for so uncertain a prize? Only in autumn and winter does
the chase reward the Siberian as he desires and expects; when the young
birds change their plumage, when the coveys unite in large flocks, and
when these wander through the forest in search of berries, then is the
huntsman’s opportunity. Whoever is not afraid of discomforts of all
kinds pursues the migrating flocks with his dogs--usually pitiable
helpers--and generally returns with rich booty; those who know how to
use snow-shoes hunt capercaillie and black-game even in winter. After
the first heavy snowfall the migrations are stopped, and each flock
seeks out a resting-place which promises abundant food for a few days
at least. In the beginning of winter the still ungathered cranberries
afford sufficient food, and afterwards the juniper berries; when both
these supplies are exhausted the easily satisfied birds take to the
leaves of larch, and finally of pine and fir, and to the young cones of
all these conifers. As long as possible they continue their wanderings
on foot, and often cover seven or eight miles in a day; occasionally
they come within a few hundred paces of a settlement, and leave such
distinct footprints on the fresh snow that the huntsman is bound to
discover them. When they are forced to take to a diet of pine-needles,
the sportsman is able to track them, at first by their droppings, and
eventually by their sleeping-places. For the Siberian capercaillie
and black-game differ in habit from their relatives in Germany, and
make more or less deep burrows, usually reaching from the surface of
the snow down to the ground. They leave these in the morning, or when
danger threatens, breaking with beating wings through the coverlet of
snow. These shelters are, therefore, readily recognizable, and as they
also afford sure indication of the night on which they were used, they
are most valuable guides to the experienced sportsman. Amid continuous
snowfall the birds sometimes remain beneath the snow till towards
mid-day, and then, after they have taken to the trees and are eating,
they will allow the huntsman to come within range, for they are not
scared by the barking of his dogs, and, while watching the cur at the
foot of the tree, often overlook the marksman. The first condition of
success in such hunting is, that the snow have not only smoothed off
most of the roughness of the ground, and thus removed the greatest
obstacles to progress, but that it be sufficiently firm to afford the
necessary resistance to the huntsman’s snow-shoes.
With incomparably greater comfort, and usually with more success, the
black-grouse may be hunted by means of the decoy or _bulban_. When
using this the huntsman sets out before dawn in autumn, hides in the
forest in a previously-prepared or rapidly-constructed hut, and there
fixes up the _bulban_. This is a stuffed decoy-bird or one fashioned
of wood and tow, with black, white, and red cloth at appropriate
places, a deceptive imitation of the living bird. It is perched by
means of a pole on the highest of the surrounding trees, with its head
to the wind, and while the sportsman hides in the hut, men and dogs
drive the adjacent forest. All the young black-game, or all which have
not learned wisdom from previous experience, fly, when disturbed, to
the bulban, which, to all appearance, is a fellow-bird sitting in
reassuring security. They crowd on to the same tree, and the sportsman
beneath, equipped with a small-bored and but slightly noisy rifle, or
sometimes also with a fowling-piece, often has the pick of dozens of
silly birds. In woods which are undisturbed throughout the summer,
the black-grouse are so heedless of the slight report of the rifle,
that after a bird has fallen dead from the tree the others do not fly
away, but stretching their necks gaze at their fallen comrade, and wait
quietly until the marksman has reloaded and claimed a second or a third
victim. So abundant are these birds that the assertion that a single
sportsman may, in the course of the morning, bring down twenty or more
without leaving his hut is perfectly credible.
Not less effective than the decoying of black-game, fascinating
moreover, and satisfactory to every sportsman, is the hunting of the
hazel-grouse as practised in Siberia. No special equipment of any
kind is required, not even trained dogs--useful auxiliaries none the
less--are indispensable. The hazel-grouse is very abundant in all
suitable parts of the West Siberian forests, perhaps more abundant
than the capercaillie and black-grouse, but it is so noiseless that one
may often miss it although there are numerous coveys in the wood. It
never forms such large flocks as its relatives, nor does it undertake
such long migrations, but it is more uniformly distributed throughout
the wide forest-wilderness, and the sportsman who knows its ways gets
more readily within shot of it than in the case of any other bird of
the woods. During spring and summer it seems to the inexperienced to
have wholly disappeared; but in autumn it occurs everywhere, even in
those places where, a few months before, it might have been sought for
in vain. It is as fond of berries as are its relatives, and to secure
these it visits the larger clearings, which, in spring and summer, it
seems to avoid. But even there it knows how to escape observation. It
lies much more closely than capercaillie or black-cock, and, without
anxiously concealing itself on the approach of an intruder, remains
as long as possible motionless, only rising when the enemy is almost
touching it. Even then its flight is so noiseless and inconspicuous
that one may readily fail to hear or see it; even a partridge or a
wood-cock makes more noise than this charming bird, of whose flight
only a gentle whirring is perceptible. When startled, it usually,
though by no means always, flies to the nearest fir-tree and alights
on the first convenient branch, but there it sits so quietly that it
is once more as inconspicuous as it was on the ground. The sportsman
often tries for a long time in vain to discover the bird’s whereabouts,
and when he has finally decided that it has secretly flown off, he is
suddenly nonplussed by a start or movement which betrays its presence
on the very branch on which he had looked for it repeatedly. The
cleverness with which all birds of this sort hide themselves from
observation has reached a rare perfection in the hazel-grouse. For
its haunts it prefers the boggy and mossy parts of the forest, which
abound in bilberries and cranberries and are surrounded by old dead
trees and young growths. Here it knows so skilfully how to use the
cover, that one rarely perceives it until it has flown for security
to one of the lifeless giants. When it does not move, it appears most
deceptively like a knot on the tree, and it behaves as if it knew that
it could trust to the colour-resemblance between its plumage and its
surroundings. Nevertheless, whenever it shows itself freely it keeps
looking anxiously all round, and, if it suspects danger, leaves its
perch as silently as it gained it. Hazel-grouse shooting is a true
pleasure to the sportsman. He may expect the bird almost everywhere in
the forest, and can never tell how it will show itself; he must usually
dispense with all auxiliaries, but his success is not prejudiced
by awkward companions; and he is even more richly rewarded by the
continuous tension and pleasurable excitement than by the exquisite
dish afforded by this best-flavoured of game-birds.
Compared with the importance of game-birds to the sportsman, and
indeed to the community generally, the chase and exploitation of big
game in West Siberia must seem inconsiderable. The four species of
stag found in this region are for various, but equally unsatisfactory
reasons, much less appreciated than they deserve. They are treated in
a manner which, if not actually barbarous, seems to us disagreeable or
even repulsive. This is especially true in regard to the Maral stag.
This splendid creature, according to some naturalists a large-sized
red-deer, according to others a nearly related species with larger body
and stronger antlers, lives in all the southern forests, especially on
the mountains, and is probably by no means so rare as the untiring lust
for the chase on the part of both natives and strangers has made it
seem. For a strange reason the said lust for the chase endangers this
stag most seriously just at the time when he needs most to be spared.
For he is hunted by all the North Asiatic hunters not for his flesh
nor his skin, nor for his fully-branched head, but solely and wholly
for the growing, incompletely tined, and still velvety antlers.[33]
Out of this the Chinese physicians or quacks prepare a specific, which
is greatly sought after by rich debilitated Celestials, and is sold
for its weight in gold. It is esteemed as a stimulant of rare virtue,
and believed to be replaceable by no other. Most sought after are the
half-branched, six-tined antlers, still richly filled with blood; for
these the price is from £10 to £15, while completely formed antlers,
with twelve or fourteen tines, and bared of their velvet, may be bought
for six to twelve shillings. Not only the Mongols of North and Central
Asia, but also the Siberians of Russian origin, exert themselves to
procure these valuable antlers, which, when obtained in the proper
condition, are despatched as quickly as possible, especially by post,
to Kiachta, whence, through special merchants, thousands are sent
every year to China without satisfying the demand. Siberian peasants
also keep the Maral stag in captivity for the sole purpose of cutting
off the blood-charged antlers at the proper time and selling them.
Now, since all stags when growing their antlers avoid the dense
thickets, and are less wary than at other seasons, and as the one- and
two-year-old stags are as little spared as those with crown antlers,
it is obvious that the numerical strength of the race must be notably
impoverished, and that the breeding must also be appreciably affected.
The flesh and the skin obtained in the slaughter are but rarely taken
into consideration; if it would involve any trouble to remove the
carcase, it is usually left without reluctance to the wolves and foxes.
[Illustration: Fig. 21.--The Maral Stag.]