Page 357 - Our Vanishing Wild Life

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CHAPTER XXXVI
NATIONAL AND STATE GAME PRESERVES, AND BIRD REFUGES
Out West, there is said to be a "feeling" that game and forest con- servation has "gone far enough." In Montana, particularly, the Na- tional Wool-Growers' Association has for some time been firmly con- vinced that "the time has come to call a halt." Oh, yes! A halt on the conservation of game and forests; but not on the free grazing of sheep onthepublicdomain. No,notevenwhilethosesamesheeparebusily growing wool that is so fearfully and wonderfully conserved by a sky- high tariff that the truly poor Americans are forced to wear garments made of shoddy because they cannot afford to buy clothing made of wool
(This is the testimony of a responsible clothing merchant, in 1912.)
We can readily understand the new hue and cry against conservation that the sheep men now are raising. Of course they are against all new game and forest reserves,—unless the woolly hordes are given the right to graze in them
Many men of the Great West,—the West beyond the Great Plains, are afflicted with a desire to do as they please with the natural resources ofthatregion. Thatisthegreatcursethatto-dayrestsuponourgame. When the nearest game warden is 50 miles away, and big game is only 5 miles away, it is time for that game to take to the tall timber.
But in the West, and East and South, there are many men and women who believe in reasonable conservation, and deplore destruction. We have not by any means reached the point where we can think of stopping inthemakingofgamepreserves,orforestpreserves. Oftheformer,we have scarcely begun to make. The majority of the states of our Union knowofstategamepreservesonlybyhearsay. Butthetimeiscoming when the states will come forward, and perfonn the serious duty that they neglect to-day.
Let the statesmen of America be not afraid of making too many game preserves! For the next year, one per day would be none too many! Remember, that on one hand we have the Army of Destruction, and on theothertheexpectantmDlionsofPosterity. Noexecutorortrusteeever erred in safeguarding an estate too carefully. Fifty years hence, if your successors and mine find that too much land has been set aside for the good of the people, they can mighty easily restore any surplus to the public domain, and at a vastly increased valuation. Give Posterity at least one chance to debate the question : "Were our forefathers too liberal in the making of game and forest reserves?"