CHAPTER XXIVGAME AND AGRICULTURE; AND DEER AS A FOOD SUPPLY
CHAPTER XXIV
GAME AND AGRICULTURE; AND DEER AS A FOOD SUPPLY
As a state and county asset, the white-tailed deer contains possibilities that as yet seem to be ignored by the American people as a whole. It is quite time to consider that persistent, prolific and toothsome animal.
The proposition that large herds of horned game can not becomingly roam at will over farms and vineyards worth one hundred dollars per acre, affords little room for argument. Generally speaking, there is but one country in the world that breaks this well-nigh universal rule; and that country is India. On the plains between and adjacent to the Ganges and the Jumna, for two thousand years herds of black-buck, or sasin antelope, have roamed over cultivated fields so thickly garnished with human beings that to-day the rifle-shooting sportsman stands in hourly peril of bagging a five-hundred-rupee native every time he fires at an antelope.
Wherever rich agricultural lands exist, the big game must give way,—from those lands. To-day the bison could not survive in Iowa, eastern Nebraska or eastern Kansas, any longer than a Shawnee Indian would last on the Bowery. It was foredoomed that the elk, deer, bear and wild turkey should vanish from the rich farming regions of the East and the middle West.
To-day in British East Africa lions are being hunted with dogs and shot wholesale, because they are a pest to the settlers and to the surviving herds of big game. At the same time, the settlers who are striving to wrest the fertile plains of B.E.A, from the domain of savagery declare that the African buffalo, the zebra, the kongoni and the elephant are public nuisances that must be suppressed by the rifle.
Even the most ardent friend of wild life must admit that when a settler has laboriously fenced his fields, and plowed and sowed, only to have his whole crop ruined in one night by a herd of fence-breaking zebras, the event is sufficient to abrade the nerves of the party most in interest. While I take no stock in stories of dozens of "rogue" elephants that require treatment with the rifle, and of grown men being imperiled by savage gazelles, we admit that there are times when wild animals can make nuisances of themselves. Let us consider that subject now.
Wild Animal Nuisances.—Complaints have come to me, at various times, of great destruction of lambs by eagles; of trout by blue herons; of crops (on Long Island) by deer; of pears destroyed by birds, and of valuable park trees by beavers that chop down trees not wisely but too well. I do not, however, include in this category any cherries eaten by robins, or orioles, or jays; for they are of too small importance to consider in this court.
A FOOD SUPPLY OF WHITE-TAILED DEER
The Killing of the Does was Wrong
To meet the legitimate demands for the abatement of unbearable wild-animal nuisances, I recommend the enactment of a law similar to Section 158 of the Game laws of New York, which provides for the safe and legitimate abatement of unbearable wild creatures as follows:
Section 158.Power to Take Birds and Quadrupeds. In the event that any species of birds protected by the provisions of section two hundred and nineteen of this article, or quadrupeds protected by law, shall at any time, in any locality, become destructive of private or public property, the commission shall have power in its discretion to direct any game protector, or issue a permit to any citizen of the state, to take such species of birds or quadrupeds and dispose of the same in such manner as the commission may provide. Such permit shall expire within four months after the date of issuance.
This measure should be adopted by every state that is troubled by too many, or too aggressive, wild mammals or birds.
But to return to the subject of big game and farming. We do not complain of the disappearance of the bison, elk, deer and bear from the farms of the United States and Canada. The passing of the big game from all such regions follows the advance of real civilization, just so surely and certainly as night follows day.
But this vast land of ours is not wholly composed of rich agricultural lands; not by any means. There are millions of acres of forest lands, good, bad and indifferent, worth from nothing per acre up to one hundreddollars or more. There are millions of acres of rocky, brush-covered mountains and hills, wholly unsuited to agriculture, or even horticulture. There are other millions of acres of arid plains and arboreal deserts, on which nothing but thirst-proof animals can live and thrive. The South contains vast pine forests and cypress swamps, millions of acres of them, of which the average northerner knows less than nothing.
We can not stop long enough to look it up, but from the green color on our national map that betokens the forest reserves, and from our own personal knowledge of the deserts, swamps, barrens and rocks that we have seen, we make the estimate thatfully one-thirdof the total area of the United States is incapable of supporting the husbandman who depends for his existence upon tillage of the soil. People may talk and write about "dry farming" all they please, but I wish to observe that from Dry-Farming to Success is a long shot, with many limbs in the way. When it rains sufficiently, dry farming is a success; but otherwise it is not; and we heartily wish it were otherwise.
The logical conclusion of our land that is utterly unfit for agriculture is a great area of land available for occupancy by valuable wild animals. Every year the people of the United States are wasting uncountable millions of pounds of venison, because we are neglecting our opportunities for producing it practically without cost. Imagine for a moment bestowing upon land owners the ability to stock with white-tailed and Indian sambar deer all the wild lands of the United States that are suitable for those species, and permitting only bucks over one year of age to be shot. With the does even reasonably protected, the numerical results in annual pounds of good edible flesh fairly challenges the imagination.
About six years ago, Mr. C.C. Worthington's deer, in his fenced park, at Shawnee-on-Delaware, Pennsylvania, became so numerous and so burdensome that he opened his fences and permitted about one thousand head to go free.
We are losing each year a very large and valuable asset in the intangible form of a million hardy deer that we might have raised but did not! Our vast domains of wooded mountains, hills and valleys lie practically untenanted by big game, save in a few exceptional spots. We lose because we are lawless. We lose because we are too improvident to conserve large forms of wild life unless we are compelled to do so by the stern edict of the law! The law-breakers, the game-hogs, the conscienceless doe-and-fawn slayers are everywhere! Ten per cent of all the grown men now in the United States are to-day poachers, thieves and law-breakers, or else they are liable to become so to-morrow. If you doubt it, try risking your new umbrella unprotected in the next mixed company of one hundred men that you encounter, in such a situation that it will be easy to "get away" with it.
We could raise two million deer each year on our empty wild lands; but without fences it would take half a million real game-wardens, on dutyfrom dawn until dark, to protect them from destructive slaughter. At present our land of liberty contains only 9,354 game wardens.[J]The states that contain the greatest areas of wild lands naturally lack in population and in tax funds, and not one such state can afford to put into the field even half enough salaried game wardens to really protect her game from surreptitious slaughter. The surplus of "personal liberty" in this liberty-cursed land is a curse to the big game. The average frontiersman never will admit the divine right of kings, but he does ardently believe in the divine right of settlers,—to reach out and take any of the products of Nature that they happen to fancy.
Wild Meat As A Food Supply.—We hear much these days about the high cost of living, but thus far we have made no move to mend the situation. With coal going straight up to ten dollars per ton, beef going up to fifteen dollars per hundred on the hoof and wheat and hay going-up—heaven alone knows where, it is time for all Americans who are not rich to arouse and take thought for the morrow.What are we going to do about it? The tariff on the coarser necessities of life is now booked to come down; but what about the fresh meat supply?
I desire to point out that between Bangor and San Diego and from Key West to Bellingham, our country contains millions of acres of wild, practically uninhabited forests, rough foot-hills, bad-lands and mountains that could produce two million deer each year, without deducting $50,000 a year from the wealth of the country. I grant that in the total number of deer that would be necessary to produce two million deer per annum, the farms situated on the edges of forests, and actually within the forests, would suffer somewhat from the depredations of those deer. As I will presently show by documentary records, every one of those individual damages that exceeds two dollars in value could be compensated in cash, and afterward leave on the credit side of the deer account an enormous annual balance.
Stop for a moment, you enterprising and restless men and women who travel all over the United States, and think of the illimitable miles of unbroken forest that you have looked upon from your Pullman windows in the East, in the South, in the West and in southern Canada. Recall the wooded mountains of the Appalachian system, the White Mountain region, the pine forests of the Atlantic Coast and the Gulf States, the forests of Tennessee, Arkansas and southern Missouri; of northern Minnesota, and every state of the Rocky Mountain region. Then, think of the silent and untouched forests of the Pacific Coast and tell me whether you think five million deer scattered through all those forests would make any visible impression upon them. That would be only about twenty-five times as many as are there now! I think the forests would not be over populated; and they would producetwo million killable deer each year!
Last year, 11,000 deer were forced down out of their hiding places inthe Rocky Mountains, and were killed in Montana. Even the natives had not dreamed there were so many available; and they were slaughtered not wisely but too ill. It is not right that six members of one family should "hog" twelve deer in one season. At present no deer supply can stand such slaughter.
Assuming that the people of the United Statescouldbe educated into the idea of so conserving deer that they could draw two million head per year from the general stock, what would it be worth?
It is not very difficult to estimate the value of a deer, when the whole animal can be utilized. In various portions of the United States, deer vary in size, but I shall take all this into account, and try to strike a fair average. In some sections, where deer are large and heavy, a full-grown buck is easily worth twenty-five dollars. Let him who doubts it, try to replace those generous pounds of flesh with purchased beef and mutton and veal, and see how far twenty-five dollars will go toward it. Every man who is a householder knows full well how little meat one dollar will buy at this time.
I think that throughout the United States as a whole every full-grown deer, male or female contains on an average ten dollars worth of good meat. I know of one large preserve which annually sells its surplus of deer at that price, wholesale, to dealers; and in New York City (doubtless in many other cities, also) venison often has sold in the market at one dollar per pound!
Two million deer at $10 each mean $20,000,000. The licenses for the killing of two million deer should cost one million men one dollar each; and that would pay 1,666 new game wardens each fifty dollars per month, all the year round. The damages that would need to be paid to farmers, on account of crops injured by deer, would be so small that each county could take care of its own cases, from its own treasury, as is done in the State of Vermont.
There are certain essentials to the realization of a dream of two million deer per year that are absolutely required. They are neither obscure nor impossible.
Each state and each county proposing to stock its vacant woods with deer must resolutely educate its own people in the necessity of playing fair about the killing of deer, and giving every man and every deer a square deal. This isnotimpossible! Not as a general thing, even though it may be so in some specially lawless communities. If theleading menof the state and the county will take this matter seriously in hand, it can be done in two years' time. The American people are not insensible to appeals to reason, when those appeals are made by their own "home folks." The governors, senators, assemblymen, judges, mayors and justices of the peace could,if they would, make a campaign of education and appeal that would result in the creation of an immense volume of free wild food in every state that possesses wild lands.
When the shoe of Necessity pinches the People hard enough, remember the possibilities in deer.
From the "American Natural History"
WHITE-TAILED DEER
If Honestly and Intelligently Conserved, this Species could be made to Produce on our Wild Lands Two Million Deer per annum, as a new Food Supply
The best wild animal to furnish a serious food supply is the white-tailed deer. This is because of its persistence and fertility. The elk is too large for general use. An elk carcass can not be carried on a horse; it is impossible to get a sled or a wagon to where it lies; and so, fully half of it usually is wasted! The mule deer is good for the Rocky Mountains, and can live where the white-tail can not; but it istoo easy to shoot! The Columbian black-tail is the natural species for the forests of the Pacific states; but it is a trifle small in size.
The Example Of Vermont.—In order to show that all the above is not based on empty theory,—regarding the stocking of forests with deer, their wonderful powers of increase, and the practical handling of the damage question,—let us take the experience and the fine example of Vermont.
In April, 1875, a few sportsmen of Rutland, of whom the late Henry W. Cheney was one, procured in the Adirondacks thirteen white-tailed deer, six bucks and seven does. These were liberated in a forest six miles from Rutland, and beyond being protected from slaughter, they were left to shift for themselves. They increased, slowly at first, then rapidly, and by 1897, they had become so numerous that it seemed right to have a short annual open season, and kill a few. From first to last, many of those deer have been killed contrary to law. In 1904-5, it was known that 294 head were destroyed in that way; and undoubtedly there were others that were not reported.
Damages To Crops By Deer.—For several years past, the various countiesof Vermont have been paying farmers for damages inflicted upon their crops by deer. Clearly, it is more just that counties should settle these damages than that they should be paid from the state treasury, because the counties paying damages have large compensation in the value of the deer killed each year. The hunting appears to be open to all persons who hold licenses from the state.
In order that the public at large may know the cost of the Vermont system, I offer the following digest compiled from the last biennial report of the State Fish and Game Commissioner:
Value Of White-Tailed Deer.—Having noted the fact that in two years (1908-9), the people of Vermont paid out $4,865 in compensation for damages inflicted by deer, it is of interest to determine whether that money was wisely expended. In other words, did it pay?
We have seen that in the years 1908 and 9, the people of Vermont killed, legally and illegally, and converted to use, 7,186 deer. This does not include the deer killed by dogs and by accidents.
Regarding the value of a full-grown deer, it must be remembered that much depends upon the locality of the carcass. In New York or Pittsburg or Chicago, a whole deer is worth, at wholesale, at least twenty-five dollars. In Vermont, where deer are plentiful, they are worth a less sum. I think that fifteen dollars would be a fair figure,—at least low enough!
Even when computed at fifteen dollars per carcass, those deer were worth to the people of Vermont $107,790. It would seem, therefore, that the soundness of Vermont's policy leaves no room for argument; and we hope that other states, and also private individuals, will profit by Vermont's very successful experiment in bringing back the deer to her forests, and in increasing the food supply of her people.
Killing Female Deer.—To say one word on this subject which might by any possibility be construed as favoring it, is like juggling with a lighted torch over a barrel of gunpowder. Already, in Pennsylvania at least one gentleman has appeared anxious to represent me as favoring the killing of does, which in nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of every thousand I distinctly and emphatically do not. The slaughter of female hoofed game animals is necessarily destructive and reprehensible, and not one man out of every ten thousand in this country ever will see the place and time wherein the opposite is true.
At present there are just two places in America, and I think only two, wherein there exists the slightest exception on this point. The state of Vermont is becoming overstocked with deer, and the females have insomecounties (not in all), become so tame and destructive in orchards, gardens and farm crops as to constitute a great annoyance. For this reason, the experiment is being made of permitting does to be killed under license, until their number is somewhat reduced.
The first returns from this trial have now come in, from the county game wardens of Vermont to the state game warden. Mr. John W. Titcomb. I will quote the gist of the opinion of each.
The State Commissioner says: "This law should remain in force at least until there is some indication of a decrease in the number of deer." Warden W.H. Taft (Addison County) says: "The killing of does I believe did away with a good many of these tame deer that cause most of the damage to farmers' crops." Harry Chase (Bennington County) says the doe-killing law is "a good law, and I sincerely trust it will not be repealed." Warden Hayward of Rutland County says: "The majority of the farmers in this county are in favor of repealing the doe law.... A great many does and young deer (almost fawns) were killed in this county during the hunting season of 1909." R.W. Wheeler, of Rutland County says: "Have the doe law repealed! We don't need it!" H.J. Parcher of Washington County finds that the does did more damage to the crops than the bucks, and he thinks the doe law is "a just one." R.L. Frost, of Windham County, judicially concludes that "the law allowing does to be killed should remain in force one or two seasons more." C.S Parker, of Orleans County, says his county is not overstocked with deer, and he favors a special act for his county, to protect females.
A summary of the testimony of the wardens is easily made. When deer are too plentiful, and the over-tame does become a public nuisance too great to be endured, the number should be reduced by regular shooting in the open season; but,
As soon as the proper balance of deer life has been restored, protect the does once more.
The pursuit of this policy is safe and sane, provided it can be wrought out without the influence of selfishness, and reckless disregard for the rights of the next generation. On the whole, its handling is like playing with fire, and I think there are very, very few states on this earth wherein it would be wise or safe to try it. As a wise friend once remarked to me, "Give some men a hinch, and they'll always try to take a hell." In Vermont, however, the situation is kept so well in hand we may be sure that at the right moment the law providing for the decrease of the number of does will be repealed.
Hippopotami And Antelopes.—Last year a bill was introduced in the lower House of Congress proposing to provide funds for the introduction into certain southern states of various animals from Africa, especially hippopotami and African antelopes. The former were proposed partly forthe purpose of ridding navigation of the water hyacinths that now are choking many of the streams of Louisiana and Mississippi. The antelopes were to be acclimatized as a food supply for the people at large.
This measure well illustrates the prevailing disposition of the American people to-day,—to ignore and destroy their own valuable natural stock of wild birds and mammals, and when they have completed their war of extermination, reach out to foreign countries for foreign species. Instead of preserving the deer of the South, the South reaches out for the utterly impossible antelopes of Africa, and the preposterous hippopotamus. The North joyously exterminates her quail and ruffed grouse, and goes to Europe for the Hungarian partridge. That partridge is a failure here, and I amheartily glad of it, on the ground that the exterminators of our native species do not deserve success in their efforts to displace our finest native species with others from abroad.
The hippo-antelope proposition is a climax of absurdity, in proposing the replacing of valuable native game with impossible foreign species.