Part 32

ELIMINATION BY THE GLACIAL PERIOD.

The Glacial Period eliminated half of this fauna, whereas the equatorial latitude of the fauna in Africa saved that fauna from the attack of the Glacial Period, which was so fatally destructive to the animals in the more northerly latitudes of America. The glaciers or at least the very low temperature of the period eliminated especially all the African aspects of our fauna. This destructive agency was almost as baneful and effective as the mythical Noah's flood. When it passed off, there survived comparatively few indigenous North American animals, but the country was repopulated from the entire northern hemisphere, so that the magnificent wild animals which our ancestors found here were partly North American and partly Eurasiatic in origin.

ELIMINATION BY MAN.

Our animal fortune seemed to us so enormous that it never could be spent. Like a young rake coming into a very large inheritance, we attacked this noble fauna with characteristic American improvidence, and with a rapidity compared with which the Glacial advance was eternally slow; the East went first, and in fifty years we have brought about an elimination in the West which promises to be even more radical than that effected by the ice. We are now beginning to see the end of the North American fauna; and if we do not move promptly, it will become a matter of history and of museums. The bison is on the danger line; if it survives the fatal effects of its natural sluggishness when abundantly fed, it still runs the more insidious but equally great danger of inbreeding, like the wild ox of Europe. The chances for the wapiti and elk and the western mule and black-tail deer are brighter, provided that we move promptly for their protection. The pronghorn is a wonderfully clever and adaptive animal, crawling under barb-wire fences, and thus avoiding one of the greatest enemies of Western life. Last summer I was surprised beyond measure to see the large herds of twenty to forty pronghorn antelopes still surviving on the Laramie plains, fenced in on all sides by the wires of the great Four-Bar Ranch, part of which I believe are stretched illegally.

RECENT DISAPPEARANCE.

I need not dwell on the astonishingly rapid diminution of our larger animals in the last few years; it would be like "carrying coals to Newcastle" to detail personal observations before this Club, which is full of men of far greater experience and knowledge than myself. On the White River Plateau Forest Reserve, which is destined to be the Adirondacks of Colorado, with which many of you are familiar, the deer disappeared in a period of four years. Comparatively few are left.

The most thoroughly devastated country I know of is the Uintah Mountain Forest Reserve, which borders between southwestern Wyoming and northern Utah. I first went through this country in 1877. It was then a wild natural region; even a comparatively few years ago it was bright with game, and a perfect flower garden. It has felt the full force of the sheep curse. I think any one of you who may visit this country now will agree that this is not too strong a term, and I want to speak of the sheep question from three standpoints: First, as of a great and legitimate industry in itself; second, from the economic standpoint; third, from the standpoint of wild animals.

GENERAL RESULTS OF GRAZING.

The formerly beautiful Uintah Mountain range presents a terrible example of the effects of prolonged sheep herding. The under foliage is entirely gone. The sheep annually eat off the grass tops and prevent seeding down; they trample out of life what they do not eat; along the principal valley routes even the sage brush is destroyed. Reforesting by the upgrowth of young trees is still going on to a limited extent, but is in danger. The water supply of the entire Bridger farming country, which is dependent upon the Uintah Mountains as a natural reservoir, is rapidly diminishing; the water comes in tremendous floods in the spring, and begins to run short in the summer, when it is most needed. The consequent effects upon both fish and wild animals are well known to you. No other animal will feed after the sheep. It is no exaggeration to say, therefore, that the sheep in this region are the enemies of every living thing.

BALANCE OF NATURE.

Even the owner cannot much longer enjoy his range, because he is operating against the balance of nature. The last stage of destruction which these innocent animals bring about has not yet been reached, but it is approaching; it is the stage in which there is no food left for the sheep themselves. I do not know how many pounds of food a sheep consumes in course of a year--it cannot be much less than a ton--but say it is only half a ton, how many acres of dry western mountain land are capable of producing half a ton a year when not seeding down? As long as the consumption exceeds the production of the soil, it is only a question of time when even the sheep will no longer find subsistence.

THE LAST STAGE TO BE SEEN IN THE ORIENT.

While going through these mountains last summer and reflecting upon the prodigious changes which the sheep have brought about in a few years, it occurred to me that we must look to Oriental countries in order to see the final results of sheep and goat grazing in semi-arid climates. I have proposed as an historical thesis a subject which at first appears somewhat humorous, namely, "The Influence of Sheep and Goats in History." I am convinced that the country lying between Arabia and Mesopotamia, which was formerly densely populated, full of beautiful cities, and heavily wooded, has been transformed less by the action of political causes than by the unrestricted browsing of sheep and goats. This browsing destroyed first the undergrowth, then the forests, the natural reservoirs of the country, then the grasses which held together the soil, and finally resulted in the removal of the soil itself. The country is now denuded of soil, the rocks are practically bare; it supports only a few lions, hyaes, gazelles, and Bedouins. Even if the trade routes and mines, on which Brooks Adams in his "New Empire" dwells so strongly as factors of all civilization, were completely restored, the population could not be restored nor the civilization, because there is nothing in this country for people to live upon. The same is true of North Africa, which, according to Gibbon, was once the granary of the Roman Empire. In Greece to-day the goats are now destroying the last vestiges of the forests.

I venture the prediction that the sheep industry on naturally semi-arid lands is doomed; that the future feeding of both sheep and cattle will be on irrigated lands, and that the forests will be carefully guarded by State and Nature as natural reservoirs.

COMMERCIALISM AND IDEALISM.

By contrast to the sheep question, which is a purely economic or utilitarian one, and will settle itself, if we do not settle it by legislation based on scientific observation, the preservation of the Sequoia and of our large wild animals is one of pure sentiment, of appreciation of the ideal side of life; we can live and make money without either. We cannot even use the argument which has been so forcibly used in the case of the birds, that the cutting down of these trees or killing of these animals will upset the balance of nature.

I believe in every part of the country--East, West, North, and South--we Americans have reached a stage of civilization where if the matter were at issue the majority vote would unquestionably be, let us preserve our wild animals.

We are generally considered a commercial people, and so we are; but we are more than this, we are a people of ideas, and we value them. As stated in the preamble of the Sequoia bill introduced on Dec. 8, 1903, we must legislate for the benefit and enjoyment of the people, and I may add for the greatest happiness of the largest number, not only of the present but of future generations.

So far as my observation goes, preservation can only be absolutely insured by national legislation.

GOVERNMENT LEGISLATION BY ENGLAND, BELGIUM, GERMANY.

The English, a naturally law-abiding people, seem to have a special faculty for enforcing laws. By co-operation with the Belgian Government they have taken effective and remarkably successful measures for the protection of African game. As for Germany, in 1896 Mr. Gosselin, of the British Embassy in Berlin, reported as follows for German East Africa:

That the question of preserving big game in German East Africa has been under the consideration of the local authorities for some time past, and a regulation has been notified at Dar-es-Salaam which it is hoped will do something toward checking the wanton destruction of elephants and other indigenous animals. Under this regulation every hunter must take out an animal license, for which the fee varies from 5 to 500 rupees, the former being the ordinary fee for natives, the latter for elephant and rhinoceros hunting, and for the members of sporting expeditions into the interior. Licenses are not needed for the purpose of obtaining food, nor for shooting game damaging cultivated land, nor for shooting apes, beasts of prey, wild boars, reptiles, and all birds except ostriches and cranes. Whatever the circumstances, the shooting is prohibited of all young game--calves, foals, young elephants, either tuskless or having tusks under three kilos, all female game if recognizable--except, of course, those in the above category of unprotected animals. Further, in the Moschi district of Kilima-Njaro, no one, whether possessing a license or not, is allowed without the special permission of the Governor to shoot antelopes, giraffes, buffaloes, ostriches, and cranes. Further, special permission must be obtained to hunt these with nets, by kindling fires, or by big drives. Those who are not natives have also to pay l00 rupees for the first elephant killed, and 250 for each additional one, and 50 rupees for the first rhinoceros and 150 for each succeeding one. Special game preserves are also to be established, and Major von Wissmann, in a circular to the local officers, explains that no shooting whatever will be allowed in these without special permission from the Government. The reserves will be of interest to science as a means of preserving from extirpation the rarer species, and the Governor calls for suggestions as to the best places for them. They are to extend in each direction at least ten hours' journey on foot. He further asks for suggestions as to hippopotamus reserves, where injury would not be done to plantations. Two districts are already notified as game sanctuaries. Major von Wissmann further suggests that the station authorities should endeavor to domesticate zebras (especially when crossed with muscat and other asses and horses), ostriches, and hyaena dogs crossed with European breeds. Mr. Gosselin remarks that the best means of preventing the extermination of elephants would be to fix by international agreement among all the Powers on the East African coast a close time for elephants, and to render illegal the exportation or sale of tusks under a certain age.

In December, 1900, Viscount Cranborne in the House of Commons reported as follows:

* * * That regulations for the preservation of wild animals have been in force for some time in the several African Protectorates administered by the Foreign Office as well as in the Sudan. The obligations imposed by the recent London Convention upon the signatory Powers will not become operative until after the exchange of ratifications, which has not yet taken place. In anticipation, however, steps have been taken to revise the existing regulations in the British Protectorates so as to bring them into strict harmony with the terms of the convention. The game reserves now existing in the several Protectorates are: In (a) British Central Africa, the elephant marsh reserve and the Shirwa reserve; in (b) the East Africa Protectorate, the Kenia District; in (c) Uganda, the Sugota game reserve in the northeast of the Protectorate; in (d) Somaliland, a large district defined by an elaborate boundary line described in the regulations. The regulations have the force of law in the Protectorates, and offenders are dealt with in the Protectorate Courts. It is in contemplation to charge special officers of the Administrations with the duty of watching over the proper observance of the regulations. Under the East African game regulations only the officers permanently stationed at or near the Kenia reserve may be specially authorized to kill game in the reserve.

Other effective measures have been taken in the Soudan district. Capt. Stanley Flower, Director of the Gizeh Zoological Gardens, made a very full report, which is quoted in Nature for July 25, 1901, p. 318.

STATE LAWS.

The preservation of even a few of our wild animals is a very large proposition; it is an undertaking the difficulty of which grows in magnitude as one comes to study it in detail and gets on the ground. The rapidly increasing legislation in the Western States is an indication of rapidly growing sentiment. A still more encouraging sign is the strong sympathy with the enforcement of the laws which we find around the National Park in Wyoming and Montana especially. State laws should be encouraged, but I am convinced that while effective in the East, they will not be effective in the West in time, because of the scattered population, the greater areas of country involved, the greater difficulty of watching and controlling the killing, and the actual need of game for food by settlers.

When we study the operation of our State laws on the ground we find that for various reasons they are not fully effective. A steady and in some cases rapid diminution of animals is going on so far as I have observed in Colorado and Wyoming; either the wardens strictly enforce the laws with strangers and wink at the breaking of them by residents, or they draw their salaries and do not enforce the laws at all.