The vanishing moose, and their extermination in the Adirondacks
Year: 1894
Type: book
Abstract: 5° much has been written of late, especially inthis Columbian year, of the great achievements and rapid development of the United States that sometimes we lose sight of the fact that we are still in a period of transition.The old order of things has largely passed away, but we are yet within sight of the primeval state of a savage and beautiful wilderness, and can obtain some idea of what this country once was by the untouched or only partly mutilated corners that remain.Theend, however, is near, and before many years we shall have to cultivate trees as is done in Europe, and the only hunting will be in private parks.Of the great forests that absolutely covered the Eastern and Northwestern States, and served as the home of vast numbers of animals, scarcely anything is left.That little will be destroyed by fire and ax within two decades, and with the trees will vanish the last of the game.It is really appalling to compare the enormous amount of game on this continent at the beginning of the century with the wretched remnant of to-day.At that time the American buffalo roamed the prairies in countless thousands, and was probably the most numerous large animal in the world, and now -but all Americans know the shameful story of its extermination.Little more than a hundred years ago great herds of elk swarmed in the Kentucky and Illinois hunting-grounds, and even as late as 1820 a few could be found in the district north of the Ohio River.To-day their fast-diminishing bands are confined to the mountains of the Northwest.The same sad story of fast-approaching extinction is true of the other game VoL.XLVII.-45.
Author: Madison Grant
Language: English
Subfield: Ecology
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
SDG: Life on land
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2482063140