Two Months' Ducking

Last week President Hoover had good news for duck hunters. The season for hunting duck and other migratory waterfowl, last year drastically cut to one month (TIME, Sept. 7), will be extended this year to two months.

Last year's law caught sportsmen napping. Many insisted there was no shortage. Others, admitting a shortage in the West and a general scarcity of canvasbacks, redheads and other divers, insisted that in the East most wildfowl were as plentiful as ever, black ducks more so. Editor Raymond Prunty ("Ray") Holland of Field & Stream argued that if a duck cannot find food in one place it will go somewhere else. To raise money for conservation the American Game Association introduced a bill in Congress providing for a $1 Federal hunting license, met a counter proposal from the More Game Birds in America Foundation for a 1-c- shell tax (TIME, March 28). Before the groups could agree on any measure Congress had adjourned. Meanwhile the American Game Association had sent observers to the breeding grounds, had received reports that conditions were good for a large flight this year. The Migratory Bird Advisory Board (game commissioners, sportsmen, naturalists, conservationists) met last fortnight in Washington, recommended a 60-day season. Secretary of Agriculture Hyde approved the recommendation, passed it on to the President.

The New Law lightens several restrictions imposed last year, sets the following dates for hunting duck, geese, brant and coot:

Oct. 16 to Dec. 15--Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York (except Long Island), West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Arizona, Idaho, Oregon and Washington.

Oct. 1 to Nov. 30--Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota. Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and Nevada.

Nov. 1 to Dec. 31--Long Island, N. Y., New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Kentucky, California and western and northern Texas.

Nov. 16 to Jan. 15--Southern and eastern Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and Maryland.

Nov. 20 to Jan. 15--Florida.

Sept. 1 to Oct. 31--Alaska.

The bag limit of 15 is continued. The possession limit is double the bag limit. There is a limit of ten to a bag on canvasback, redhead, scaup, ringneck, all teals, gadwalls and shovellers. The bag limit on eider ducks is five. Ruddy ducks and buffle-heads are added to the protected list. The bag limit on mourning doves is reduced from 25 to 18. The limit on live decoys (last year, ten) is 25, except in California, where they are protected.

Depression. Last year's kill was estimated at one-third of normal. Naturalist Van Campen Heilner figured the cost of the shortened season at $60,000,000. Wildfowl shooting normally is a $100,000,000-a-year industry, the money going for guides, guns, shells, food, clothing, transportation, grain, etc., etc.--about $50 from each of two million shooters. Furthermore, millions of dollars are spent on preserves: near Sandusky, Ohio $3,000,000 was spent for dikes alone; at Currituck Sound, N. C., Tycoons William Ellis Corey (steel) and Joseph Palmer Knapp (American Lithographic Co.) put up $500,000 for canal locks. Such investments provided a potent argument for the sportsmen in their campaign for more ducking days.

Cat Woman

One night her Spokane neighbors noticed that Widow Alice Dornsife, 73, had found a companion for her tomcat. A few nights later the cat disappeared. Widow Dornsife's tomcat found a new companion. That one, too, disappeared. Widow Dornsife got a third, fourth, fifth companion for her tomcat. All disappeared. Then one night up from the widow's basement came the tomcat's first companion. With her were five kittens. The neighbors complained.

To join the seven cats on the widow's back fence came the tomcat's second mate. She brought four kittens. The neighbors complained more vociferously, threw shoes, clocks, crockery. Six more cats came forth. The neighbors went to Spokane's Humane Society. The Humane Society went to Widow Dornsife. The widow produced cats Nos. 19, 20, 21, 22. The Health Department appealed to Widow Dornsife. Widow Dornsife shrugged her aged shoulders, seven more cats appeared. Officers went to the widow's house, were beaten back by 29 snarling, spitting cats.

Widow Dornsife's electricity was shut off. Neighbors reported 34 cats. Her water supply was discontinued. She went to a nearby pump. When she returned she had 39 cats. The city condemned her house. One of the widow's cats went strolling, returned with a friend. Widow Dornsife chuckled gleefully, polished her oil lamps.

Meanwhile distemper broke out among the widow's cats. Four died, leaving 36 tomcats to snarl, spit, scream and wail from the Dornsife's domicile at night.

Early one morning last week a platoon of health & humane officers appeared at the widow's house. They were armed with water pipes, through which were passed looped wires. The men fought back the cats with the pipes, forced them, into corners, slipped the looped wires around their necks, dragged them out to a net in the yard. As each fighting cat was tossed into a wagon, neighbors leaning from windows cheered. Twenty-eight cats were captured this way. Only eight remained. The sun went down, another tomcat lost its freedom. Dusk fell, and with it two more tomcats. As darkness crept into the Dornsife house the officers called for lights. The lights had been turned off days before. Smiling sardonically, the Widow Dornsife refused to produce a lamp.

The officers made one more sortie. In the darkness they saw five pairs of gleaming eyes. Occasionally their pipes came in contact with bodies soft and active, but not another cat could they catch. So into their wagon they piled, carefully avoiding their 31 captive cats, putted off to the pound. Widow Dornsife spoke soothingly to her five remaining pets, struck a match, lit a lamp.

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