Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-09-01
FEATHERS AND FURS.
The Seasons and Places for Hunting
Game in the United States.
SHOTS AT BIRDS AND BEASTS.
Rufied Grouse Shooting in Pennsylvanis
and Also Some Deer.
WATER FOWL ON THE ATLANTIC COAST

WRITTEN FOR THE DIsPATCH.l
1t is said that the modern Briton regards
it as the whole duty of man to 60 somewhere
and kill something. The modern American
seems to be built on much the same plan.
Though he does not take his sport quite SO
sadly as his cousin over the sea, he spends
no end of time and money going to and fro,
and roaming up and down seeking what he
may devour after killing it in the most ap-
proved modern fashion. In May he whips
the mountain brook for trout; in June hies
him to salmon river, and if he can land q
3O-pounder lives happy ever after. In July
and August he goes a-gunning for wood
cock, snipe and such small deer. In Sep
rember there are doves and wild turkeys to
be done to death, with much fine angling in
salt water and fresh. October opens up the
whole hunters heaven. Then he may choose
betwixt wood, field, shore, marsh or mount
ain. Newfoundland, Maine, Canada, allure
with moose and caribou; the prairie States
are a-swarm with "chicken;" the Appala-
chian highlands of the Middle States offer
grouse, partridges, deer and bear; Maryland
all manner of wild fowl; Virginia and the
Carolinas quail-called there partridge
squirrels, rabbits, coons and possum.
Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas,
pretty well everything wearing fur and
feathers, and the far Western Territories
big game in quantity.
Truly, it is an embarrassment of riches.
The keenest sportsman may get anywhere
his fill. If he is very English in mis- feel
ings he will likely choose Newfoundland,
where, alone upon this continent, the
blackjack or moor fowl of Scotland can be
shot, He may see caribou or moose, but
fha abo Rio q
plenty, but the streams are full of trout and
other fine fish. The region is wild and
desola te, much of it still unexplored. 1t is
known, though that away from the coast it
is mainly a lichen-covered "barren,"
where nothing but the heathcQck thrives.
The bird has
A CURIOUS HABIT
of turning from brown and yellow to pure
white upon the approach of winter, which
must rank with the African leaf lizards and
stick insects, among natures efforts at imi-
tative protection. Newfoundland in winter
is a land of snow. A white bird will pass
unnoticed in where dark one would fall q
prey to predatory beasts.
All the world knows of the salmon waters
OF Maine and Canada. The most of them
are leased by rich men, or clubs of rich men,
and religiously preserved. It is estimated
salmon rod throughout the season. A new
trout region has Just been discovered
among the "waste-lands of the Crown"
lying 30 miles north of Quebec, and rum
ming pretty we'll up to Hudson Bay. Its
waters fairly TEEN with fine fish and are
being rapidly mapped and leased by fishing
clubs made up largely of Americans. From
the Adirondack region on to Nova Scotia,
the big forest hold reasonable number of
moose, deer, caribou and feathered game.
The close of the season varies somewhat ac-
cording to locality, but in general way it
may be said to run from the 1st of January
to the 1st of October. Hunting with dogs
is forbidden, but goes on all the same, and
no hunter may kill in one season more than
l moose, Q caribou and 5 deer, if he pays
heed to the law of the land. Market hunt
ing is forbidden, so is fire hunting, "yard-
ing" and "crusting." The game must be
tracked over the light first SHOWS, and be
killed by combination of pluck, luck and
skilltuI woodcraft. Back. in the golden
ages, when game laws were not fire hunting
was high in favor with sportsmen who ven
tured up the Rangely chain of lakes after
fin and fur. Summer was the season, for it
and two persons were needed-one either to
"carry the jack" big lamp with a faring
reflector behind it, or else to paddle the boat
upon whose PROV it was fixed. The hunter
walked or sat behind, and as the outfit stole
noiselessly through the lily pads or the
marshes where deer were feeding, the ami
mails flung up their heads, caught the rays in
their eyeballs and flashed them back In
steady phosphorescence. The next minute
the creatures life paid the forfeit for its
curiosity. Like death, the gunner
LOVED A SHINING MARK,
,,I fba oh Of
winter the game-especially moose-herd
together in some spot where their favorite
food is plentiful and make themselves yard.
by tramping paths and runways through
the snow. After each fall they tread them
down anew, and by mid-winter have made
of them a labyrinth of hard channels, from
which they feed upon the buds and twigs
either side, without foundering in the deep
untrodden drifts. Trappers and Indians
sought out all such spots and for consider
alton took the hunters to them. Then be-
gan carnival of slaughter. The yard was
surrounded-the woodsmen ran along the
ways, or sent in big deer hounds to frighten
the game out upon the waiting guns. In
two days the most populous yard was
cleared, for flight was out of the question,
and though the big bulls fought gamely
and often gave their pursuers serious hurts,
in the end lead and steel were too much for
them.
"Crusting" was practiced in early spring,
when here and there bare sunny hillside
tempted the caribou to feed upon its succu-
lent lichen. All about are spread ten-foot
drifts, CLASSY hard at dawn, but softening
perilously when the sun got high. Here the
hunter crept or crawled upon him often with
no weapon but big knife, cautiously gave
him his wind, and when the beast was fast
in the drift upon which he had sprung for
flight, he was shot or hamstrung and butch
cred at leisure.
A summer method was to initiate upon
birch-back trumpet the call of the COW
moose, and when the male of her species
came crashing through the woods, to send
two-ounce bullet crashing through his chest.
The animal had a tough hide and so won
derful vitality that bullet0must strike
him full and fair or it will glance, and 60
through heart or brain to make an end of
him. He is the largest game quadruped of
North America, and to have hunted him
successfully is liberal education in wood
wisdom.
A WILDERNESS TREASURE.
The mountainous country running from
southwestern New York through Pennsyl-
vania to West Virginia and Kentucky is a
treasure of wild things. In 1t there are
townships, nay counties, almost untouched
of man. In places deer run riot, bears are
too thick for good neighborhood, pigeons
darken the air and partridges drum on every
hill top. Even where civilization has a
lusty foothold, the game hangs on. Wild
turkeys are beautifully plenty within Is