NEW LAWS NEEDED IN THE STATES
(Continued)
CONNECTICUT:
The sale of all native wild game, regardless of its source, should
be prohibited at all times. Enact at once a five-year close season
law on the remnant of ruffed grouse, quail, woodcock, snipe, and all
shore birds.
Even in the home of the newest and deadliest "autoloading" shotgun,
those guns and pump guns should be prohibited in hunting.
The enormous bag limits of 35 rail and 50 each per day of plover,
snipe and shore birds is a crime! They should be replaced by a
ten-year close season law for all of those species.
The terms of the game commissioners should be not less than four
years.
Like so many other states, Connecticut has recklessly wasted her
wild-life inheritance. During the fifteen years preceding the year 1898,
the bird life of that state had decreased 75 per cent. On March 6, 1912,
Senator Geo. P. McLean, of Connecticut stated at the hearing held by his
Committee on Forest Reservations and the Protection of Game this fact:
"We have more cover than there was thirty or forty years ago, more brush
probably, but there is not one partridge [ruffed grouse] today where
there were twenty ten years ago!"
First of all, Connecticut needs a ten-year close season law to save her
remnant of shore birds before it is completely annihilated. Then she
needs a Bayne law, and needs it badly. Under such a law, and the tagging
system that it provides, the state game wardens would have so strong a
grip on the situation that the present unlawful sale of game would be
completely stopped. Half-way measures in preventing the sale of game
will not answer. Already Connecticut has wasted thousands of dollars in
fruitless efforts to restock her desolated woodlands and farms with
quail, and to introduce the Hungarian partridge; but even yet she _will
not_ protect her own native species!
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 shore 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 Washington as
food! As a spectacle for gods 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 Washington must be made to toe the mark beside New York. The
reputation of the national capital demands it, whether the gods of the
cafes will consent or not.
FLORIDA:
Shooting shore 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 Association 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 entitled "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 gratitude 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.
If the people of Idaho wish to save their wild fauna, they must be up
and doing. The time to temporize, theorize, be conservative and
easy-going has gone by. It is that fatal policy that causes men to
slumber until it is too late to act; and we will watch with keen
interest to see whether the real men of Idaho are big enough to do their
whole duty in time to benefit their state.
In 1910, Dr. T.S. Palmer credited Idaho with the possession of about
five hundred moose and two hundred antelope.
There is one feature of the Idaho game law that may well stand
unchanged. The open season on "ibex," of which one per year may be
killed, may as well be continued. One myth per year is not an
extravagant bag for any intelligent hunter; and it seems that the "ibex"
will not down. Being officially recognized by Idaho, its place in our
fauna now seems assured.
ILLINOIS:
Enact a Bayne law, and stop the sale of all native wild game,
regardless of source, and regardless of the gay revelers of Chicago.
In Illinois the bag limits on birds are nearly all at least 50 per
cent too high. They should be as follows: No squirrels, doves or
shore birds; six quail, five woodcock, ten coots, ten rail, ten
ducks, three geese and three brant, with a total limit of ten
waterfowl per day.
Doves should be removed from the game list.
All tree squirrels and chipmunks should be perpetually protected, as
companions to man, unfit for food.
The sale of aigrettes should be stopped, and Chicago placed in the
same class as Boston, New York, New Orleans and San Francisco.
The use of all machine shotguns in hunting should be prohibited.
The chief plague-spots for the grinding up of American game are Chicago,
Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans and San Francisco. St. Louis
cleared her record in 1909. New York thoroughly cleaned her Augean
stable in 1911, and Massachusetts won her Bayne law by a desperate
battle in 1912. In 1913, Pennsylvania probably will enact a Bayne law.
Fancy a city in the center of the United States sending to Norway for
1,500 ptarmigan, to eat, as Chicago did in 1911; and that was only one
order.
For forty years the marshes, prairies, farms and streams of the whole
upper Mississippi Valley have been combed year after year by the guns of
the market shooters. Often the migratory game was located by telegraphic
reports. Game birds were slain by the wagon-load, boat-load, barrel, and
car-load, "for the Chicago market." And the fool farmers of the Middle
West stolidly plowed their fields and fed their hogs, and permitted the
slaughter to go on. To-day the sons of those farmers go to the museums
and zoological parks of the cities to see specimens of pinnated grouse,
crane, woodcock, ducks and other species that the market shooters have
"wiped out"; and their fathers wax eloquent in telling of the flocks of
pigeons that "darkened the sky," and the big droves of prairie chickens
that used to rise out of the corn-fields "with a roar like a coming
storm."
To-day, Chicago stands half-way reformed. Her markets are open to only
one-half the game killable in Illinois, but they are wide open to all
"_legally_ killed game imported from other states, from Oct. 1 to Feb.
1." Through that hole in her game laws any game-dealer can drive a
moving-van! Of course, any game offered in Chicago has been "legally
killed in some other state!" Who can prove otherwise?
In addition to the imported game illegally killed in other states, the
starving population of Chicago may also buy for cash, and consume with
their champagne in November and December, all the Illinois doves that
can be combed out by the market-gunners.
After the awful Iroquois Theatre fire in Chicago, in 1903, the game
dealers reported a heavy falling off in the consumption of game! The
tragedy caused the temporary closing of the theaters, and the falling
off in after-theater suppers may be said to have taken away the
appetites of thousands of erstwhile consumers of game. Incidentally it
showed who consumes purchased game.
The people of Illinois should now enact a full-fledged Bayne law,
without changing a single word, and bring Chicago up to the level of New
York, St. Louis and Boston.
The present bag limits on Illinois game birds are fatally high. As they
stand, with 190,000 licensed gunners in the field each year, what else
do they mean than extermination? The men of Illinois have just two
alternatives between which to choose: drastic and immediate
preservation, or a gameless state. Which shall it be?
INDIANA:
Indiana should hasten to stop spring shooting.
She should enact a law, prohibiting the sale for millinery purposes
of the plumage of all wild birds save ducks killed in their open
season.
A Bayne law, absolutely prohibiting the sale of all native wild
game, should be enacted at once.
The killing of squirrels should be prohibited; because they are not
white men's game.
Ruffed grouse and quail should have five year close seasons.
The use of pump and autoloading guns in hunting should be
prohibited.
In Indiana the white-tailed deer is extinct. This means very close
hunting, and a bad outlook for all other game larger than the sparrow.
On October 2, 1912, eleven heads of greater bird of paradise, with
plumes attached, were offered for sale within one hundred feet of the
headquarters of the Fourth National Conservation Congress. The prices
ranged from $35 to $47.50; and while we looked, two ladies came up, one
of whom pointed to a bird-of-paradise corpse and said: "There! I want
one o' them, an' I'm a-goin' to _have_ it, too!"
IOWA:
Spring shooting should be stopped, at once and forever.
The killing of all tree squirrels and chipmunks should cease.
All shore birds that visit Iowa deserve a five-year close season.
Especially is the shooting of plover, sandpiper, marsh and beach
birds, rail, duck, geese and brant from September 1, to April 15, an
outrage.
Iowa should prohibit the use of the machine guns, and it is to be
hoped that she will awaken sufficiently to do so.
It is said that the Indian word "Iowa" means "the drowsy, or sleepy
ones." Politically, and educationally, Iowa is all right, but in the
protection of wild life she is ten years behind the times, in almost
everything save the prohibition of the sale of game. _Iowa knows better
than to pursue the course that she does_! She boasts about her corn and
hogs, but she is deaf to the appeals of the states surrounding her on
the subject of spring shooting. For years Minnesota has set her a good
example; but nothing moves her to step up where she belongs in the
phalanx of intelligent game-protecting states.
The foregoing may sound harsh, but in view of what other states have
endured from Iowa's stubbornness regarding migratory game, the time for
silent treatment of her case has gone by. She is to-day in the same
class as North Carolina, South Carolina and Maryland,--at the tail end
of the procession of states. She cares everything for corn and hogs, but
little for wild life.
KANSAS:
Spring shooting should be stopped, at once: with apologies for not
having done so long ago.
The continued shooting of prairie chickens when the species is near
extermination is outrageous, and should be prohibited for ten years.
Doves should be removed permanently from the game list, partly as a
measure of self respect.
Kansas should treat herself to a force of salaried game wardens
rendering real service.
She should bar out the machine guns as unfit for use in a
well-regulated State.
Kansas has calmly witnessed the extermination of her bison, elk, deer,
antelope, wild turkeys, sage grouse, whooping cranes, and the beginning
of the end of her pinnated grouse, without a pang. What is wild game in
comparison with fat hogs, and seventy-bushels-to-the-acre!
Draw a line around the hog-and-corn area of the United States, and
within it you will find more spring shooting, more sale of game and more
extermination of species than in any other area in the United States. I
refer to Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio,
Kentucky and Tennessee. In not one of these states except Missouri is
there any big game hunting, and in the majority of them spring shooting
is lawful!
In the Island of Mauritius, it was swine that exterminated the dodo. In
the United States, hogs and game extermination still go hand in hand.
Since the days of the dodo, however, a new species of swine has been
developed. It is now widely known as the "game-hog," and it has been
officially recognized by both bench and bar.
KENTUCKY:
Nearly everything that a state should maintain in the line of wild life
protection _Kentucky lacks_! It is easier to tell what she has than to
recite what she should have. Kentucky _permits spring shooting_; she has
_no bag limits_, and she has _long open seasons_ on everything save
introduced pheasants; She protects from sale only quail, grouse and wild
turkey _killed within her own borders_. This means that her markets are
practically wide open.
Until recently the people of Kentucky have been very indifferent to the
value of her wild-life; but with the new law enacted this year providing
for a game commission and a game protection fund, surely every member of
the Army of the Defense will wish God-speed to her efforts in game
conservation, and stand ready to lend a helping hand whenever help can
be utilized.
Kentucky should at one grand coup _stop spring shooting and all sale of
wild game, accord long close seasons to all species that are verging on
extinction, protect doves, establish moderate bag limits and stop the
use of machine guns_. If she takes up these measures at the rate of only
one at each legislative session, by the time her laws are perfect _all
her game will be gone_!
LOUISIANA:
On more counts than one, Louisiana is in the list of Great Delinquents;
for behold the things that she needs to do:
Protect deer for five years.
Instantly take the robin, red-winged black-bird, dove, grosbeak,
wood-duck and gull off the list of birds that may be killed as
"game."
Stop all late winter and spring shooting.
Stop the sale of all native game, and the possession and
transportation of game sold or intended for sale. In short,
Enact a Bayne law.
Re-establish a game warden system.
In legally permitting the slaughter of the robin, red-winged blackbird,
dove, grosbeak, wood-duck and gull the state of Louisiana is very
culpable.
For good reasons, forty states of the American Union strictly prohibit
the killing of song and insectivorous birds. The duty of every state to
protect those birds is not a debatable proposition. I put this question
to the people of Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee and
other states where the robin is treated as a game bird: Is it fair of
you to kill and eat robins when that species is carefully protected by
forty other states of our country for grave economic reasons? What would
you say of the people of the North if they slaughtered your mockingbird
_to eat_!
Remember this proportion:
The Robin : The North :: The Mockingbird : The South.
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