The Ely miner., 1916-02-11
GAME WARDEN WOOD

Our comments on the DlWaDlk
Times article concerning Game
Warden Wood have been taken
seriously in several parts of the
country outside of Biwabik. The
concensus of opinion seems to be
that there is considerable to the
game laws that need fixing. We
go farther than that. The whole
blooming mess should be scrapped
and something built that can be
understood and also something
that would prove of benefit to both
the people of the game and fish
sections and also to the game and
fish.
We have fish enough in St. Louis
County to feed four or five states,
yet it is impossible right here in
the fish country to get one to eat
at this season of the year while
St. Paul, Minneapolis, and other
cities can have our species of fish
at any time.
We are in favor of a law that
will allow netting of fish in all
waters under proper jurisdiction
and at a profit to the state. We
want a net with a mesh that will
take the very large sizes and are
honestly of the opinion that by
doing this more conservation of the
fish supply would be had than at
present.
1t is claimed on good authority
that full grown pike eats over
twelve times his own weight in
smaller fish year. By this
method of computing it will take
almost an uncountable number of
cans of fry, just to feed one big
fellow. By taking the big fellow
out, the little ones would have
a chance to get big, and so on
indefinitely.
We are not in favor of the poacher
and the game hog. Mr.. Wood
has done noble work in distilling
the fear of the law into the poacher
and the game hog. We do feel
however that the line of demarka-
tion is not closely enough drawn
between the poacher and game hog
and the settler in the woods.
The Daily Virginian of Virginia
raps little harder and claims that
the fee system has a tendency to
place everyone caught in the woods
and on the lakes in the tolls of the
law. The Virginian says:
And all this game protection
business is being done mostly to
benefit the sports, the men who
can afford to buy hunting clothes,
fifty dollar guns and ten dollar
fishing rods, spend fifty dollars or
more on a camping outfit and HE
themselves each year to the forests
and lakes and kill a deer or
moose and perhaps catch a few
dollars worth of fish and give it all
away to their rich and we'll to do
friends. Game Warden Wood is
out for the money there is in it.
The law is all wrong. If the state
wants to protect its game why does
it not pay Game Warden Wood a
salary so that he will be able to go
out and land the game hogs and
not prosecute those who hunt or
fish in order that their families
may have something to eat.
Woods has had many a poor home
steader brought before the bar of
justice Cd and had them fined
heavily for very slight offense
against the game laws of the state.
Wood is alright about the game
hogs and the pot hunters, but he
should be made to let alone those
who seek game to feed their half
starved families. Gods knows the
poor homesteader has hard
enough time of it to exist without
having to pay heavy fine every
time he goes out after something
to eat for himself and family. Let
the state increase the hunting
licenses fee and pays its game
wardens descent salaries and then
they would not be obliged to stoop
to this petit business of taking
away the bread and meat from the
mouths of the babes in order to
collect sufficient fees for they them
selves to live upon
CHARLIE CHAPLIN the wobblv-
legged comedian of the pictures
has been having hard time trying