Our Vanishing Wild Life: Its Extermination and Preservation

Chapter I. FORMER ABUNDANCE OF WILD LIFE II. EXTINCT SPECIES OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS III. THE NEXT CANDIDATES FOR OBLIVION IV. EXTINCT AND NEARLY EXTINCT SPECIES OF MAMMALS V. T...

XXII. OUR ANNUAL LOSSES BY INSECTS XXIII. THE ECONOMIC VALUE OF BIRDS XXIV. GAME AND AGRICULTURE: DEER AS A FOOD SUPPLY XXV. LAW AND SENTIMENT AS FACTORS IN PRESERVATION XXVI. T...

In order that the American people may correctly understand and judge the question of the extinction or preservation of our wild life, it is necessary to recall the near past. It...

No man has a right, either moral or legal, to destroy or squander an inheritance of his children that he holds for them in trust. And man, the wasteful and greedy spendthrift th...

In the world of human beings, murder is the most serious of all crimes. To take from a man that which no one ever can restore to him, his life, is murder; and its penalty is the...

birds are fast vanishing. Many of them have been so reduced that _extermination seems imminent_. So averse to shore birds are present conditions [of slaughter] that the wonder i...

When we pause and consider the years, the generations and the ages that Nature spends in the production of a high vertebrate species, the preservation of such species from exter...

These queries were addressed to persons whose tastes and observations rendered them especially qualified to furnish the information desired. The interest shown in the inquiry wa...

In order to cure any disease, the surgeon must make of it a correct diagnosis. It is useless to try to prescribe remedies without a thorough understanding of the trouble.

In warfare, a _guerrilla, or bushwhacker_, is an armed man who recognizes none of the rules of civilized warfare, and very often has no commander. In France he is called a "fran...

Quite unintentionally on his part, Man, the arch destroyer and the most predatory and merciless of all animal species except the wolves, has rendered a great service to all the...

Every cause that has the effect of reducing the total of wild-life population is now a matter of importance to mankind. The violent and universal disturbance of the balance of N...

It is a fixed condition of Nature that whenever and wherever a wild species exists in a state of nature, free from the trammels and limitations that contact with man always impo...

In these days of wild-life slaughter, we hear much of death and destruction. Before our eyes there continually arise photographs of hanging masses of waterfowl, grouse, pheasant...

Whenever the people of a particular race make a specialty of some particular type of wrong-doing, anyone who pointedly rebukes the faulty members of that race is immediately acc...

[Footnote D: In the preparation of this chapter and its illustrations, I have had much valuable assistance from Mr. C. William Beebe, who recently has probed the London feather...

This chapter is a curtain-dropper to the preceding chapter. As a clearly-cut, concrete case, the reader will find it unique and unsurpassed. It should be of lively interest to e...

For considerably more than a century, the States of the American Union have enacted game-protective laws based on the principle that the wild game belongs to the People, and the...

The subject of this chapter opens up a vast field of facts and conclusions, quite broad enough to fill a whole volume. In the space at our disposal here it is possible to offer...

THE WHITE-TAILED DEER.--Five hundred years hence, when the greed and rapacity of "civilized" man has completed the loot and ruin of the continent of North America, the white-tai...

Thanks to the diligence with which sportsmen and field naturalists have recorded their observations in the haunts of big game, it is not at all difficult to forecast the immedia...

After a successful survival of man's influence through two thousand years, at last the big game of India has made a good start on the road to vanishment. Up to 1870 it had held...

[Footnote G: The observations which furnished this valuable chapter were made by Mr. Beebe in 1911 while conducting an expedition in southern Asia, Borneo and Java for the purpo...

The mental attitude of the men who shoot constitutes a deadly factor in the destruction of wild life and the extermination of species. Fully ninety-five per cent of the sportsme...

"In no country in the world," says Mr. C.L. Marlatt, of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, "do insects impose a heavier tax on farm products than in the United States." These a...

To-day, from Halifax to Los Angeles, and from Key West to Victoria, a deadly contest is being waged. The fruit-growers, farmers, forest owners and "park people" are engaged in a...

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 per...

There is grave danger that through ignorance of the true character of about 80 per cent of the men and boys who shoot wild creatures, a great wrong will be done the latter. Let...

It now seems that the friends of wild life who themselves are not on the firing-line should be afforded some definite information regarding the Army of the Defense, and its stre...

THE LINE OF ACTION.--In the face of a calamity, the saving of life and property and the check of fire and flood depends upon good judgment and quick action at the critical momen...

The principles of wild-life protection and encouragement are now so firmly established as to leave little room for argument regarding their value. When they are set forth before...

The sale of all native wild game, regardless of its source, should be prohibited at all times. Enact at once a five-year close season law on the remnant of ruffed grouse, quail,...

There are reasons for the belief that Maine is conserving her large game better than any other state or province in North America. One glance over her laws is sufficient to conv...

The game laws of North Carolina form a droll crazy-quilt of local and state measures, effective and ineffective. In 1909, a total of 77 local game laws were enacted, and only tw...

We are assuming that the American people sincerely desire the adequate protection and increase of bird life, for reasons that are both sentimental and commercial. Surely every g...

The most charming trait of wild-life character is the alacrity and confidence with which wild birds and mammals respond to the friendly advances of human friends. Those who are...

Man has made numerous experiments in the transplantation of wild species of mammals and birds from one country, or continent, to another. About one-half these efforts have been...

The man who successfully transplants or "introduces" into a new habitat any persistent species of living thing, assumes a very grave responsibility. Every introduced species is...

Out West, there is said to be a "feeling" that game and forest conservation has "gone far enough." In Montana, particularly, the National Wool-Growers' Association has for some...

As now set forth on the map of North America, Canada is a vast country. We must no longer think of Ontario and Quebec as "Canada West" and "Canada East," because the new assista...

Primarily, in the early days of the Man-on-Horseback, the self-elected and predatory lords of creation evolved the private game preserve as a scheme for preventing other fellows...

In the early days of America, the founders of our states and territories gave little heed, or none at all, to the preservation of wild life. Even if they thought of that duty, u...

GAME BREEDING.--The breeding of game in captivity for sale in the markets of the world is just as legitimate as the breeding of domestic species. This applies equally to mammals...

Thousands of busy and burdened men and women are to-day striving hard, early and late, to promote measures that will preserve the valuable wild life of the world. They desire to...

I count it as rather strange that American and English sportsmen have hunted and shot for a century, and until 1908 formulated practically nothing to establish and define the et...

The publication of this chapter will hardly be regarded as a bid for fame, or even popularity, on the part of the author. However, the subject can not be ignored simply because...

The fate of wild life in North America hangs to-day by three very slender threads, the names of which you will hardly guess unaided. They are Labor, Money and Publicity! The thr...