, 1925-06-10
As SEEN FROMThEW WATERMELON
9 "a @mme@ okha1t 5TSa#4

on the plains or in the mountains and this entire western country is is $ d l@
ttue of life a S a city park-as tame and commonplace as a picnic grove in
Pennsylvania?
1t would zen 20. 1t would appear that every animal that cannot be
penalty with its life Without sentiment or imagination, devoid of the sense
of fair play which distinguishes the true sportsmen, these murderers of wild
nina are bet on a org Of bood-etting that apparently will know no
surcease until there is nothing left to shoot at. trap or poison.
We quite realize that W lay ourselves open to the ridhule of such per-
can overwhelm us with facts. figures and in5isnutabe evidence Of Of t ths d dn
relations of these animals which leave us not a leg to stand o +.
We know that W re are fighting a losing fight and that W ire outnumber-
in life in dollars and cents. Nevertheless, at the risk of being considered
Impractical and overly sentimental We are going to say Jul say Besides,
now that We think of it, W don't give a whoop anyhow.
1t seems to us that these predatory animal folk with their poison
aone matters. w nav always a a notion that Nature understood Ter
business and that she could get along without so much assistance from
1t all has been figured out to the last penny just what som of these
animals cost the farmer and stockmen, and. viewed from that standpoint, the
official killers with their tons of poison and high power rifles are doing a
splendid work and re great benefaetors But, o n the other hand, when
lied too late that they also had their value? that they lent a charm
an n attract nc to the state state which Nv, went t with their passing Who
Yet they do com in droves for the thrill they experience from catching a
crashing through the down-timber, a coyote sinking rel the ridge, the
prairie dogs chattering in their villages, the ground squirrels and chip hunks
Here m a few of the headlines W have cor across among our ex-
changes recently which give a very good idea of what is happening to the
Massacre of Grizzly Bears in Wyoming will soon be Started" Get the
Blackbrds-Now," "strychnine and Salt for Rabbits" poison the Prairie
Dogs" Kill the Crows" "war on Magpes" "can Kill Wild Horses Under
New Law" says a Montana paper, while in Colorado tn. scare head of a cir
GUAR issued b n forestry department creame the information -"Kabab
of a Lifetime"
and the public by the payment of $500 a head could kill three deer each.
The excuse for the slaughter was that the deer had not enough graz
ing in the forest although a contract had been given Il have from five to
eight thousand head driven over into the Grand Canyon in Arizona.
One of our Wyoming exchanges in an indignant editorial said of the
ITO our mind it is in-beffttng the forest department. to permit this
slaughter in view of the popular educational movement to preserve wild life,
and after disseminating tons Of educational matter and the force of every
government agency brought into action to preserve wild animals to now
come out with such a circular stirring up the lust for blood"
With approximately only 5000 head of antelope left in the entire
as being willing to permit the killing of 300 head of these vanishing ami
mails, and so moose. Assuming that n % more than this number are killed
outright, it may be taken as a fact that there will be a big percentage of
wounded to crawl off in the brush and die. since anybody, regardless of his
Skill who has the price and can barrow a rifle will be entitled to shoot at
them if the proposed permits are issued in July.
giving a prize for the person killing the greatest number of crow No
body for a moment believes that the crows pnfering from the farmer give
the powder company any great concern. but the shoot stimulated the sale
crows, and it is too much to expect that a kid with a gun is going 20 stop at
Time was, when the farmer took it a a matter of purse that he as to
share with the crow when he planted his corn. hence the old nursery rhyme:
"one for the eutworm one for the crow,
One for the farmer and ne to grow"
But the old-fashioned farmer who liked to see the crows flying home at
night against a crimson sunset, watch the iridescent light shining upon Il
baekbrds wings and listen &c its notes of liquid gold "a gone to his re-
ward, and the modern, scientific tiner of the soil lays for his companions in
The mania for killing something, anything, everything, harmless or
otherwise, which seems to possess the average person with a gun, is quite
beyond our comprehension. This indiscriminate killing by cruel and stupid
people who have just courage and brains enough to pull a trigger, makes us
Jingle with indignation and W e cannot seem to school ourselves to indif-
ference though W e realize that our anger is quite futile.
Some three years ago re had a beautiful golden eagle that wa IS tame a IS
a chicken and with a intelligence that a uncanny. "Uncle Sam" Is we
called him, took a trip into the clarks Fork country and, when he had fin
lished soaring, came down a bench not far from the main road. About
this time a lout with a gun came along, the kind that habituany carries one
in hope of seeing something to shoot at. and Uncle Sam having lot the
least fear of humans waddled tustingly toward him.
This lout, we cannot refrain from applying the epithet to this low
brow S % TYPICAL Of his kind, as not in the slightest danger, and the eagle,
wanted to kill something, so he shot it, at close range. and gathered up
Uncle Sans mansied body in high ge and carried it home to prove
The ranchers Q n upper Sage creek protect the grouse and sage chickens
in their fields because they like to zee them there and because the birds eat
grasshoppers During the summer passing tourists pick them off
with the % rifles many of them carry, and shOtsuns. Until by Fall but a few
go after the dead o r wounded birds; they find their sport in seeing them
During the very dry summer of a few years ago a taxieab driver in
Thermopous, with a friend n two. went out in IN automobile TO she water