ODDS & ENDS by Ralph Bice October 31, 1973  

At least once a year, sometimes oftener, I receive copies of the pamphlets that are sent out by the Jack Miner Foundation. I imagine the main reason is to raise funds though from what I hear they are doing very well as financing goes. They are still carrying on a war against wolves and are quoting many facts to back up their arguments. The last one had a story of what happened in Quebec. Seems like the top men in the Wild Life made a study and found out that the wolves were taking far too many deer. Apparently these men do not subscribe to the theory that wolves are noble creatures and must be preserved as they kill only the sick and week deer. And they proceeded to do something about it with the result that the wolf population was greatly reduced.

I do not subscribe to their thinking on deer hunting, about having a buck law and eliminating the use of dogs. But I do go along with them in their idea that the deer belong to the people and we will soon have a different set up for hunting.

Speaking of wolves, I caught my first one for this season. Hurts just a little to realize that I will not be collecting a bounty but the hides are bringing in a good price. What does give me a bit of joy is that since this was taken near where we hunt it likely will be saving a dozen deer for future hunts. Since it was a female it also means no small wolves for next fall. The studies made in the Park fifteen years ago tell us that wolves need ten pounds of meat each day. That comes close to two tons of meat each year made up of moose, deer and beaver. Another thing that hurts is that its last meal had been beaver, my beaver.

Bunch of men from Natural Resources are working on the road in our section of the woods and one of them, a chap named Orville, thought he was giving me a bad time when I came by with the animal. But I felt he was just looking for me to get riled. There are still a few around, wolves I mean and I hope I can get a few more.

Have said it before but the deer signs are very scarce. Moose much in evidence, but no season. Bear signs a few weeks ago but none lately.

Made the usual trip to Rain Lake to close the cottage. Always makes me a bit sad to know another summer has ended. Too, after there being so many people around this summer it was a bit strange not to see even one other boat.

One thing I did see was a great many flocks of geese on their way to a warmer spot for the winter. Different falls I have seen numerous flocks in one day but I never saw so many in a few hours as there were on Saturday. So it looks like a bit of cold weather settled in where they came from. I also saw a large flock of Brant. These are a type of goose and they too nest in the far north. These are easily distinguished from Canada Geese for they do not fly in formation and they have a different call than the geese we are used to. It looked like there were several hundred in this flock. I have only seen three or four flocks of Brant, one going north, the rest south. But every flock I saw was at Rain Lake so it must be a flyway.

I also saw a strange bird near the campsite at the west end of the lake. I did not know it but after hunting through the bird books, it must be a Dowitcher. I was not aware there was this type of bird. It resembled a snipe, even to tottering a bit, only it was much larger, in fact several times larger. The book says they nest only in the northern part of the Yukon so they must have a long flight both ways.

There is a pair of loons left on Rain Lake, and old one and a juvenile. The young one looked like it couldn’t fly any distance. There is a young loon still in the lakes here in Kearney though the old ones are now gone. After the way the loons protect their young it is hard to understand why they, the older ones, start south and leave the young loons behind. It is many years since I heard of a young loon being frozen in when the ice comes but it does seem that they know what flying ability they have and wait as long as it is safe.

Years ago when I was spending most of the time in the woods with fishing parties it was not unusual to see young loons practicing their flying. One we watched several days and its first flights were short but after a while it was making a circle of the lake. After the scare we were given a few years ago about loons gradually disappearing from the scene it is nice to see so many young loons as there were this summer.

Well, in another week everything must stop while the hunters take off. I do hope they will have more luck than the signs in the woods indicate.