The age-herald., 1901-10-28
To Many Deers in Vermont.

The open season III Malne labJB IrOin
 October 1 to December 15, and the
 woods of that wooded State are full
 of alleged sportsmen from Boston and
 other cities, and nearly as many farm.
 CTS, mistaken for deer or bear or hip
 potami, have been shot as deer. The
 record includes 1s victims in the open
 season thus far.
 In Vermont the open season covers
 but 10 days, and in that time per
 son can kill or possess but one deer,
 and no hornless deer, moose or carl bon shall be harmed, and the penal ties for disobedience are very heavy. In Maine a person may kill two deer, and in September he may kill one deer to be consumed in the locality of the shooting.
 The severer restrictions of Vermont have filled that State with deer. "The State" says the Springfield Republi- can, "Is overrun with deer. They ob- tained a numerous hold upon life dur ing close season maintained contin- uously for several years, and the res trictions thrown about the brief year ly open season established in 1896 pre- vent the making of any headway In re- ducing their numbers. The deer hold their own at least, while the hunters sometimes reduce their own numbers in the shooting.
 "To the traveller or summer. visitor 1t is delightful sight afforded by the glimpses of deer browsing by the mountain roads or dashing through the woods or drinking at the brook by the plank bridge. There is an ap- proach to primeval and untamed con ditions which pleases and fefreshes the townsman, and the fact Is no doubt helpful to the summer boarder busi- hOoo. out lO luc ldTmcT anu ITulL raiser the prevalence of the deer has become serious nuisance. The ani- mals are so numerous and tame that they run over cultivated farms lands and gardens, and poke their noses into the windows of farm houses. They seem to understand that no one dares kill them, and that the hands of everybody are tied except for 10 days in each year, and then as against them all except one deer per hunter They trample down and browse upon the growing grain and vegetables, and they go through orchards like an in- sect plague, sharpening their horns on the trunks of the trees. scraping off the bark, browsing on the leaves. and eating and knocking of the fruit and trampling 1t under foot. No ordinary fence or wall stands in their way, and the situation for the agriculturist comes down to just this: Either the State Legislature must extend the open hunting season and increase the number of deer which one person may take, or he must go to the expense of putting wire fencing eight feet high or higher about all of his cultivated and orchard lands. And this is an ex- pense that few Vermont farmers can afford"
 Vermont's farmers are now demand ing longer open season in order that the deer supply may be reduced, and it Is believed that next Legislature will be compelled to change in some respects the States game laws.
 Whenever Alabama desires to make deer again plentiful 1t has but.to copy Vermont's game law and enforce it. It would probably i'll the penitentiary very full, but if rigidly enforced 1t would in a few years fill the forests of the State with the fleet and beauti. full animals that was once so numer. ous in Alabama.