Our Vanishing Wild Life Part 58

During the period when Mr. C.J. Jones ("Buffalo" Jones) was superintendent of the wild animals of the Park, the indignities inflicted upon tourist campers by certain grizzly bears quite abraded his nerves. He obtained from Major Pitcher authority to punish and reform a certain grizzly, and went about the matter in a thoroughly Buffalo-Jonesian manner. He procured a strong lariat and a bean-pole seven feet long and repaired to the camp that was troubled by too much grizzly.

The particular offender was a full-grown male grizzly who had become a notorious raider. At the psychological moment Jones la.s.soed him in short order, getting a firm hold on the bear's left hind leg. Quickly the end of the rope was thrown over a limb of the nearest tree, and in a trice Ephraim found himself swinging head downward between the heavens and the earth. And then his punishment began.

Buffalo Jones thrashed him soundly with the bean-pole! The outraged bear swung to and fro, whirled round and round, clawing and snapping at the empty air, roaring and bawling with rage, scourged in flesh and insulted in spirit. As he swung, the bean-pole searched out the different parts of his anatomy with a wonderful degree of neatness and precision.

Between rage and indignation the grizzly nearly exploded. A moving-picture camera was there, and since that day that truly moving scene has amazed and thrilled countless thousands of people.

When it was over, Mr. Jones boldly turned the bear loose! Although its rage was as boundless as the glories of the Yellowstone Park, it paused not to rend any of those present, but headed for the tall timber, and with many an indignant "Woof! Woof!" it plunged in and disappeared. It was two or three years before that locality was again troubled by impudent grizzly bears.

And what is the mental att.i.tude of _every_ Rocky Mountain black or grizzly bear _outside_ of the Yellowstone Park? It is colossal suspicion of man, perpetual fear, and a clean pair of heels the moment man-scent or man-sight proclaims the proximity of the Arch Enemy of Wild Creatures. And yet there are one or two men who tell the American public that wild animals do not think, that they do not reason, and are governed only by "instinct"!

"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing!"

TAMING WILD BIRDS.--As incontestable proof of the receptive faculties of birds, I will cite the taming of wild birds in the open, by friendly advances. There are hundreds, aye, thousands, of men, women, boys and girls who could give interesting and valuable personal testimony on this point.

My friend J. Alden Loring (one of the naturalists of the Roosevelt African Expedition), is an ardent lover of wild birds and mammals. The taming of wild creatures in the open is one of his pastimes, and his results serve well to ill.u.s.trate the marvelous readiness of our wild neighbors to become close friends with man _when protected_. I will quote from one of Mr. Loring's letters on this subject:

"Taming wild birds is a new field in nature study, and one never can tell what success he will have until he has experimented with different species. Some birds tame much more easily than others. On three or four occasions I have enticed a chickadee _to my hand_ at the first attempt, while in other cases it has taken from fifteen minutes to a whole day.

"Chipping sparrows that frequent my doorway I have tamed in two days. A nuthatch required three hours before it would fly to my hand, although it took food from my stick the first time it was offered. When you find a bird on her nest, it is of course much easier to tame that individual than if you had to follow it about in the open, and wait for it to come within reach of a stick. By exercising extreme caution, and approaching inch by inch, I have climbed a tree to the nest of a yellow-throated vireo, and at the first attempt handed the bird a meal-worm with my fingers. At one time I had two house wrens, a yellow-throated vireo, a chipping sparrow and a flock of chickadees that would come to my hand."

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIX WILD CHIPMUNKS DINE WITH MR. LORING]

It would be possible--and also delightful--to fill a volume with citations of evidence to ill.u.s.trate the quick acceptance of man's protection by wild birds and mammals. Let me draw a few ill.u.s.trations from my own wild neighbors.

On Lake Aga.s.siz, in the N.Y. Zoological Park, within 500 feet of my office in the Administration Building, a pair of wild wood-ducks made their nest last spring, and have just finished rearing nine fine, healthy young birds. Whenever you see a wood-duck rise and fly in our Park, you may know that it is a wild bird. During the summer of 1912 a small flock of wild wood-ducks came every night to our Wild-Fowl Pond, and spent the night there.

A year ago, a covey of eleven quail appeared in the Park, and have persistently remained ever since. Last fall and winter they came at least twenty times to a spot within forty feet of the rear window of my office, in order to feed upon the wheat screenings that we placed there for them.

When we first occupied the Zoological Park grounds, in 1899, there was not one wild rabbit in the whole 264 acres. Presently the species appeared, and rabbits began to hop about confidently, all over the place. In 1906, we estimated that there were about eighty individuals.

Then the marauding cats began to come in, and they killed off the rabbits until not one was to be seen. Thereupon, we addressed ourselves to those cats, in more serious earnest than ever before. Now the cats have disappeared; and one day last spring, as I left my office at six o'clock, everyone else having previously gone, I almost stepped upon two half-grown bunnies that had been visiting on the front door-mat.

When we were macadamizing the yards around the Elephant House, with a throng of workmen all about every day, a robin made its nest on the heavy channel-iron frame of one of the large elephant gates that swung to and fro nearly every day.

In 1900 we planted a young pine tree in front of our temporary office building, within six feet of a main walk; and at once a pair of robins nested in it and reared young there.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WILD CREATURES QUICKLY RESPOND TO FRIENDLY ADVANCES Chickadee and Chipmunk Tamed by Mr. Loring]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE COLORADO OBJECT LESSON IN BRINGING BACK THE DUCKS]

Up in Putnam County, where for five years deer have been protected, the exhibitions that are given each year of the supreme confidence of protected deer literally astonish the natives. They are almost unafraid of man and his vehicles, his cattle and his horses, but of course they are unwilling to be handled. Strangers are astonished; but people who know something about the mental att.i.tude of wild animals under protection know that it is the natural and inevitable result of _real protection_.

At Mr. Frank Seaman's summer home in the Catskills, the phoebe birds nest on the beams under the roof of the porch. At my summer home in the Berks.h.i.+res, no sooner was our garage completed than a phoebe built her nest on the edge of the lintel over the side door; and another built on a drain-pipe over the kitchen door.

Near Port Jervis, last year a wild ruffed grouse nested and reared a large brood in the garden of Mr. W.I. Mitch.e.l.l, within _two feet_ of the foundation of the house.

On the Bull River in the wilds of British Columbia two trappers of my acquaintance, Mack Norboe and Charlie Smith, once formed a friends.h.i.+p with a wild weasel. In a very few visits, the weasel found that it was among friends, and the trappers' log cabin became its home. I have a photograph of it, taken while it posed on the door-sill. The trappers said that often when returning at nightfall from their trap-lines, the weasel would meet them a hundred yards away on the trail, and follow them back to the cabin.

"Old Ben," the big sea-lion who often landed on the wharf at Avalon, Santa Catalina, to be fed on fish, was personally known to thousands of people.

AN OBJECT LESSON IN PROTECTION.--A remarkable object lesson in the recognition of protection by wild ducks came under my notice in the pages of "Recreation Magazine" in June, 1903, when that publication was edited by G.O. s.h.i.+elds. The article was ent.i.tled,--" A Haven of Refuge,"

and the place described well deserved the name. It is impossible for me to impress upon the readers of this volume with sufficient force and clearness the splendid success that is easily attainable in encouraging the return of the birds. The story of the Mosca "Haven of Refuge" was so well told by Mr. Charles C. Townsend in the publication referred to above, that I take pleasure in reproducing it entire.

One mile north of the little village of Mosca, Colorado, in San Luis valley, lives the family of J.C. Gray. On the Gray ranch there is an artesian well which empties into a small pond about 100 feet square.

This pond is never entirely frozen over and the water emptying therein is warm even during the coldest winter.

Some five years ago, Mr. Gray secured a few wild-duck eggs, and hatched them under a hen. The little ducks were reared and fed on the little pond. The following spring they left the place, to return in the fall, bringing with them broods of young; also bringing other ducks to the home where protection was afforded them, and plenty of good feed was provided. Each year since, the ducks have scattered in the spring to mate and rear their families, returning again with greatly increased numbers in the fall, and again bringing strangers to the haven of refuge.

I drove out to the ranch November 24, 1902, and found the little pond almost black with the birds, and was fortunate enough to secure a picture of a part of the pond while the ducks were thickly gathered thereon. Ice had formed around the edges, and this ice was covered with ducks. The water was also alive with others, which paid not the least attention to the party of strangers on the sh.o.r.e.

From Mr. Gray I learned that there were some 600 ducks of various kinds on the pond at that time, though it was then early for them to seek winter quarters. Later in the year, he a.s.sured me, there would be between 2,000 and 3,000 teal, mallards, canvas-backs, redheads and other varieties, all perfectly at home and fearless of danger.

The family have habitually approached the pond from the house, which stands on the south side, and should any person appear on the north side of the pond the ducks immediately take fright and flight. Wheat was strewn on the ground and in the water, and the ducks waddled around us within a few inches of our feet to feed, paying not the least attention to us, or to the old house-dog which walked near.

Six miles east of the ranch is San Luis lake, to which these ducks travel almost daily while the lake is open. When they are at the lake it is impossible to approach within gunshot of the then timid birds. Some unsympathetic boys and men have learned the habit of the birds, and place themselves in hiding along the course of flight to and from the lake. Many ducks are shot in this way, but woe to the person caught firing a gun on or near the home-pond. When away from home, the birds are as other wild-ducks and fail to recognize any members of the Gray family. While at home they follow the boys around the barn-yard, squawking for feed like so many tame ducks.

This is the greatest sight I have ever witnessed, and one that I could not believe existed until I had seen it. Certainly it is worth travelling many miles to see, and no one, after seeing it, would care to shoot birds that, when kindly treated, make such charming pets.

Since the above was published, the protected flocks of tame wild ducks have become one of the most interesting sights of Florida. At Palm Beach the tameness of the wild ducks when within their protected area, and their wildness outside of it, has been witnessed by thousands of visitors.

THE SAVING OF THE SNOWY EGRET IN THE UNITED STATES.--The time was when very many persons believed that the devastations of the plume-hunters of Florida and the Gulf Coast would be so long continued and so persistently followed up to the logical conclusion that both species of plume-furnis.h.i.+ng egrets would disappear from the avifauna of the United States. This expectation gave rise to feelings of resentment, indignation and despair.

It happened, however, that almost at the last moment a solitary individual set on foot an enterprise calculated to preserve the snowy egret (which is the smaller of the two species involved), from final extermination. The splendid success that has attended the efforts of Mr.

Edward A. McIlhenny, of Avery Island, Louisiana, is ent.i.tled not only to admiration and praise, but also to the higher tribute of practical imitation. Mr. McIlhenny is, first of all, a lover of birds, and a humanitarian. He has traveled widely throughout the continent of North America and elsewhere, and has seen much of wild life and man's influence upon it. To-day his highest ambition is to create for the benefit of the Present, and as a heritage to Posterity, a mid-continental chain of great bird refuges, in which migrating wild fowl and birds of all other species may find resting-places and refuges during their migrations, and protected feeding-grounds in winter. In this grand enterprise, the consummation of which is now in progress, Mr.

McIlhenny is a.s.sociated with Mr. Charles Willis Ward, joint donor of the splendid Ward-McIlhenny Bird Preserve of 13,000 acres, which recently was presented to the State of Louisiana by its former owners.

The egret and heron preserve, however, is Mr. McIlhenny's individual enterprise, and really furnished the motif of the larger movement. Of its inception and development, he has kindly furnished me the following account, accompanied by many beautiful photographs of egrets breeding in sanctuary, one of which appears on page 27.

In some recent publications I have seen statements to the effect that you believed the egrets were nearing extinction, owing to the persecution of plume hunters, so I know that you will be interested in the enclosed photographs, which were taken in my heron rookery, situated within 100 yards of my factory, where I am now sitting dictating this letter.

This rookery was started by me in 1896, because I saw at that time that the herons of Louisiana were being rapidly exterminated by plume hunters. My thought was that the way to preserve them would be to start an artificial rookery of them where they could be thoroughly protected. With this end in view I built a small pond, taking in a wet s.p.a.ce that contained a few willows and other shrubs which grow in wet places.

In a large cage in this pond, I raised some snowy herons. After keeping the birds in confinement for something over six months I turned them loose, hoping that they would come back the next season, as they were perfectly tame and were used to seeing people. I was rewarded the next season by four of the birds returning, and nesting in the willows in the pond. This was the start of a rookery that now covers 35 acres, and contains more than twenty thousand pairs of nesting birds, embracing not only the egrets but all the species of herons found in Louisiana, besides many other water birds.

With a view to carrying on the preservation of our birds on a larger scale, Mr. Chas. W. Ward and I have recently donated to the State of Louisiana 13,000 acres of what I consider to be the finest wild fowl feeding ground on the Louisiana coast, as it contains the only gravel beach for 50 miles, and all of the geese within that s.p.a.ce come daily to this beach for gravel. This territory also produces a great amount of natural food for geese and ducks.

SAVING THE GULLS AND TERNS.--But for the vigorous and long-continued efforts of the Audubon Societies, I think our coasts would by this time have been swept clean of the gulls and terns that now adorn it. Twenty years ago the milliners were determined to have them all. The fight for them was long, and hotly contested, but the Audubon Societies won. It was a great victory, and has yielded results of great value to the country at large. And yet, it was only a small number of persons who furnished the money and made the fight which inured to the benefit of the millions of American people. Hereafter, whenever you see an American gull or tern, remind yourself that it was saved to the nation by "the Audubon people."

In times of grave emergency, such as fire, war and scarcity of food, the wild creatures forget their fear of man, and many times actually surrender themselves to his mercy and protection. At such times, hard is the heart and low is the code of manly honor that does not respond in a manner becoming a superior species.

The most pathetic wild-animal situation ever seen in the United States on a large scale is that which for six winters in succession forced several thousand starving elk into the settlement of Jackson Hole, Wyoming, in quest of food at the hands of their natural enemies. The elk lost all fear, partly because they were not attacked, and they surrounded the log-enclosed haystacks, barns and houses, mutely begging for food. Previous to the winter of 1911, thousands of weak calves and cows perished around the haystacks. Mr. S.N. Leek's wonderful pictures tell a thrilling but very sad story.

To the everlasting honor of the people of Jackson Hole, be it recorded that they rose like Men to the occasion that confronted them. In 1909 they gave to the elk herds all the hay that their domestic stock could spare, not pausing to ascertain whether they ever would be reimbursed for it. They just handed it out! The famis.h.i.+ng animals literally mobbed the hay-wagons. To-day the national government has the situation in hand.

In times of peace and plenty, the people of Jackson Hole take their toll of the elk herds, but their example during starvation periods is to be commended to all men.

A SLAUGHTER OF RESTORED GAME.--The case of the chamois in Switzerland teaches the world a valuable lesson in how _not_ to slaughter game that has come back to its haunts through protected breeding.

A few years ago, one of the provinces of Switzerland took note of the fact that its once-abundant stock of chamois was almost extinct, and enacted a law by which the remnant was absolutely protected for a long period. During those years of protection, the animals bred and multiplied, until finally the original number was almost restored.