The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1917-03-16

tory 1t is almost impossible to stop
them. 1t is really pity that so many
OF our game birds are being wasted
and animals disappearing every year
and 1t is little bit aggravating to
think that most of II. is caused by the
batting and windjamming of bunch
of would-be sportsmen who couldn't
go fifty yards off macadamized
road on sunshiny day without get
ting lost; that same bunch of wind
tanners that paint. such beautiful
word pictures about game preserves,
refuge playground of nation, ETC., that
same bunch that you will find in the
rank and file of eight or ten thousand
boys every year with every form of
high power rifle, after doing their
worst to make every kind of fool
law that will hasten the destruction
OF game within certain prescribed
area, stand around the outside ready
to pop anything that pokes its nose
over the line and call themselves
Sportsmen.
OF the many hunters and trappers
of my acquaintance, both red and
white, l have yet to see or know of
the first one that ever killed even
rabbit for sport. Personally l have
no time for the man, like the wolf or
coyote, that will kill big game for
sport only, walk up and tap it with
the toe of his boot, tell his guide to
skin out and pack the scalp into town,
leaving the rest to rot.
There was a time in this country
not long ago when there was an
abundance of game-wolves did not
infest then as they do now-the state
and county wolf bounty appropria-
lions were not overdrawn every year,
but there were men here then that
protected big and small game, pro-
tected it with the rifle, steel trap and
poison bottle, the only way, taking
into consideration the position of this
preserve. that game birds and animals
can be protected.
If business men interested in the
idea of protection would only dig
down for the actual facts concerning
wild life in the same manner they
would do on any ordinary business
proposition, and make laws accord
ingly, not on the mere say-so Of some
human parrot that makes noise just
because it sounds good to him. l feel
positive that every hunter, trapper
| and fisherman throughout this part
of the state, the only class Of men
who are vitality interested, would
stand solidly behind such laws and
would voluntarily see that they were
| enforced and with far better results
than the present make-shift, tin SOL
der idea that tends only to make en-.
emies of the motive behind game and
fish protection,
| 1t is true that the state begrudg.
| ingly allows few men under certain
restrictions to trap on this preserve;
while this is a step in the right di.
rection the idea under which it is
operated in many cases tends to de-
feat it's own ends. It does not make
| much difference how good a trapper
and hunter man may be-, it seems
that if he does not have stand in
with the local game warden, on whose
word depends whether he gets per-
NIT or not. I know of several &C.
casions in this locality where good
men made applications to trap on the
preserve, men that know every nook
and corner, and having trapped for
many years, the only way to learn the
business, but were turned down on
the recomm endation of the local
game warden to satisfy a personal
grievance; on the other hand there
are men on the preserves with the
sanction of the authorities, strangers
in this locality, who following their
proper vocations would have never
seen steel trap. While there are
good men in many parts of the state
that could and would do good work
towards real protection, the limiting
of their operations to certain town
ships often works hardship and dis
courages good men, while 1t would
make no difference to the average