Will caribou vanish like the buffalo?
Saturday, 28 August 2010 00:00
August 27, 1884. Will wanton slaughter cause moose deer, caribou and other wildlife of the northwest to vanish like the buffalo? The sighting near Medicine Hat of a tiny remnant of the millions of buffalo that once covered the North American plains prompts the Winnipeg Times to sound a warning. Edited excerpts.
It was only in 1870 that a writer laughed at the fears of the Indians that the buffalo would soon be exterminated and declared such fears to be groundless. Today, less than 15 years from that date, the buffalo has practically disappeared from this continent.
During these years every man’s hand has been raised against them, and none has been lifted in their defence. Not many years ago in the United States, titled foreigners were furnished with cavalry escorts to scour the western plains with the avowed and sole purpose of becoming buffalo butchers. The carcasses were left where they fell to feed the wolves or to rot. With the arrival of the railways the slaughter increased tenfold, and trains rolled heavily laden eastward with tons of buffalo tongues and ham. A single hunter could destroy 75 to 100 buffalo a day and furnish steady employment for the dozen skinners who followed his bloody trail. For a few years, thousands of men were thus employed.
Is there no lesson in this? A few days ago there were stories of valiant sportsmen shooting by the dozen ducks too young to fly away. Hundreds of ducks were brought into Winnipeg during the firs t days of the open season and thrown into cellars to rot.
In Manitoba and the northwest, moose, wapiti, caribou, black-tailed deer, bear, wolf, beaver, and lynx may be found in abundanc e. In the northern country the barren ground caribou are thicker than the buffalo ever were. In a few years at most a railway will penetrate that country, and armies of hunters will rush in and slaughter indiscriminately. Is there no way to protect this game, or is it not worth protecting?
At one Hudson’s Bay Company fort, for one winter’s provisions, 20,000 caribou tongues have been taken and dried. The 20,000 carcasses were doubtless left for the wolves to feed on. Soon the caribou will be as effectively exterminated as the buffalo, if such horrible butchering as this is permitted.