Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-03-20

| ton Algonquin Park is splendid object lesson
| Only eighteen years ago it was set apart as
| breeding place and refuge for wild animals.
Moose were then almost extinct, there were
comparatively few deer, and the fur bearing
animals had been trapped persstently that
the trail of a solitary beaver or otter marten
or fisher a sight to remember. No animals
were introduced for stocking purposes; the
few that remained were simply protected and
allowed to increase naturally.
The superintendent, G. w. Bartlett, is big,
kindly conscientious man who loves his work
and does it magnihcently. He has only
dozen rangers to cover two thousand square
miles; but he has dotted the big woods with
shelter huts at strategic points and planned the
work SO carefully that he has now absolute con-
troll of this immense territory, and 1t is pract1-
cally impossible for trap to be set or deer to
be killed without the offender being discovered
and tralled and brought to justice Even the
| vagabond Indian trappers soon discovered this.
and dubbed the superintendent the Long
Dew" because he seemed to have eyes in the
back of his head and more than five senses. and
it was impossible for them to lift beaver or
otter skin without presently being tapped on
the shoulder by one of his rangers.
Bewildering Increase of Game
THE results of these eighteen years of protec
ton almost bewildering. In some sec
tions moose now abundant and increasing
rapidly. Deer are more numerous than have
ever seen them elsewhere, even IN the most
famous sections of Maine. In severe winters
every sheltered ridge and valley is populous
deer yard, and in open winters they range over
every ridge and along the shores of every lake,
throwing network Of tracks over the big woods.
One morning in crossing little trail had
blazed from kearney to Pog Lake. distance
of less than mile, counted fourteen different
deer, and spent large part of the morning
watching them at their feelings. The sun was
bright; but the barometer falling, and
with some strange foreknowledge of the big
storm that was coming they were filling up for
a two days fast. Not only is the game, big and
little. abundant in this protected region. but
as natural result deer and other animals
spread out as they increase, furnishing excel
lent hunting in all the surrounding territory.
As for fur bearing animals, the number IS al
most incredible. An old Indian chief. Big
Canoe who used to trap this ground sixty
years ago, before game had been killed and
driven off by white hunters, recently visited the
park with the idea of looking over his old hunt
ing grounds, and he said that never in his best
DAYS had he dreamed of such rich trappings.
Every stream you follow brings you pres
emily to a new beaver colony, and, as they gen.
orally have bit of open swift running water
near their houses, they come out freely in win
ter. Beside almost every lake and stream one
can follow their winter hauling roads, over
which they bring wood they have cut for the
bark, and at twilight one can watch them at
work and at play by almost every open bit OF
water.
Everywhere you 60 you come across the
beautiful trail of the otter,-jump. jump slide:
jump, jump, slide. blowing long grooves
through the snow and over the ice they slide
along their way. On a little pond just north of
Boundary Lake counted the trail of eleven
different offers which had been playing together
on the ice Then pack of wolves swept down
on the lake. and the way the offers found their
refuge holes, some in hidden brooks, some in
the thin ice at the inlet, astonishing.
Every otter darted and slid in straight line
for certain spot and escaped-all but one. A
wolf got him as he was digging frantically at the
thin ice near a projecting stub. 1t was his own
particular refuge hole, no doubt; but he had
not taken the precaution to open it recently.
and two nights of frost had sealed it up too
tight for him to break through in hurry The
wolves ate him on the spot. not with hghtlngs
and desperate wranglings for the best morsels,
as we SUPPOSE but quietly as one could wish,
standing head to head around the game A
few bits of rich fur and one hind foot were all
found to tell me the last chapter of his story.
Suggestions for the Beginner
TT is impossible to do justice to the joy of the
winter woods in a short article / make only
a few suggestions which may interest and help
the beginner, or the sportsman who turns from
the enervating South to the vigorous tonic of
the Northland At the outset let me state that,
while the trip calls for vigor, there is no hard