the idea that the wild game around them
is all theirs. Very few of them recognize the fact that every other man,
woman and child in a given state or province has vested rights in its
wild game. It is natural for a frontiersman to feel that because he is
in the wilds he has a God-given right to live off the country; but
to-day _that idea is totally wrong_! If some way can not be found to
curb that all-pervading propensity among our frontiersmen, then we may
as well bid all our open-field big game a long farewell; for the deadly
"residents" surely will exterminate it, outside the game preserves. The
"residents" are, in my opinion, about ten times more destructive than
the sportsmen. A sportsman in quest of large game is in the field only
from ten to thirty days; all his movements are known, and all his
trophies are seen and counted. His killing is limited by law, and upon
him the law is actually enforced. Often a resident hunts the whole
twelve months of the year,--for food, for amusement, and for trophies to
sell. Rarely does a game warden reach his cabin; because the wardens are
few, the distances great and the frontier cabins are widely scattered.

Mr. Carl Pickhardt told me of a guide in Newfoundland who had a shed in
the woods hanging full of bodies of caribou, and who admitted to him
that while the law allowed him five caribou each year, he killed each
year about twenty-five.

Mr. J.M. Phillips knows of a mountain in British Columbia, once well
stocked with goats, on which the goats have been completely exterminated
by one man who lives within easy striking distance of them, and who
finds goat meat to his liking.

I have been reliably informed that in 1911, at Haha Lake, near Grande
Bay, Saguenay District, P.Q., one family of six persons killed
thirty-four woodland caribou and six moose. This meant the waste of
about 14,000 pounds of good meat, and the death of several female
animals.

In 1886 I knew a man named Owens who lived on the head of Sunday Creek,
Montana, who told me that in 1884-5 he killed thirty-five mule deer for
himself and family. The family ate as much as possible, the dogs ate all
they could, and in the spring the remainder spoiled. Now there is not a
deer, an antelope, or a sage grouse within fifty miles of that lifeless
waste.

Here is a Montana object lesson on the frame of mind of the "resident"
hunter, copied from _Outdoor Life_ Magazine (Denver) for February, 1912.
It is from a letter