THE NEW FOREST AS A SANCTUARY.
ACORRESPONDENCE in the Field, begun by a com- plaint from a holder of a license to kill game that there was not enough game to shoot, leaves the impression that there is a general and serious decrease in most animal life in the Forest. Pheasants are increasing, mainly because the private owners in and around the Forest preserve and the Crown authorities look after them in the enclosures. But there is a. general agreement of sportsmen, botanists, and naturalists, writing independently that the Forest is unable to stand the drain of animal life made on it from many sources, and by larger numbers yearly. One collector is said to have taken one thousand eggs from the Forest. Woodcock and snipe are decreasing; ground birds, and especially black-game, disappearing. The Forest is hunted by packs of hounds five days in a week ; squirrel- hunters organise noisy parties in some parts; in others not a bird or animal is seen or heard.
Such are the complaints of the correspondents of the Field. From personal observation, we can Bay that they only apply to parts of the Forest. But experience shows that the position cannot remain as it is, and that any changes will be for the worse, and not for the better. At present the timber of the Forest is preserved, and the area is to remain fca ever open and wild, for the enjoyment of the nation. A few birds are under the protection of the County Council. But speaking broadly, the rest of the creatures, from deer to insects, are all either hunted, shot, caught, oi collected by an increasing number of persons, and with few or no special limitations to the indulgence of these amusements. Many of the pursuits which entail this inter- ference with the wild life of the Forest are popular and pic- turesque; others are neither the one nor the other. But as they all contribute to thin down the wild animals, some form of regulation will soon become necessary if they
are to be kept at all. The votaries of some of these activities will be indignant at being classed with those engaged in others. But no view of the agencies now at work to diminish the Forest creatures would be complete which does not include them all.
The wild-deer of the Forest, a few of which, both red-deer and fallow-deer, have always survived, even after a decree was passed to destroy them, are regularly hunted by the New Forest staghounds. The meets are most picturesque, the woodland hunting makes a unique spectacle of its kind, and as the Forest was originally created for the chase of the deer, the revival has a certain historic interest. Meantime, the deer suffer. Sixty days' sport, six years ago, averaged almost as many deer killed during the season. The Forest is disturbed, and instead of the deer being a feature in the landscape, they retire into the densest covers during the whole day. The staghounds are supplemented by the fox- hounds. Thus two packs are regularly hunting in the Forest, and the staghounds meet as late as April. Foxhounds mean fox-preservation, and of all enemies to general wild life in such a country foxes are the very worst. From the black-game and nesting woodcock and snipe, to the smallest ground- building birds, such as willow-wrens, or mammals like doormice and squirrels, nothing is too large or too small for them. Moreover, by custom, and by the diffi- culty of drawing a line between preservation and extirpa- tion, foxes tend always to be over-preserved, where they are preserved at all. In the New Forest, with its great woods and bad country, there is no limit to the possible number of foxes. Shooting goes on throughout the season, under certain limits. Licenses to shoot are purchased by paying a fee. Bags made recently are given in the Field. They range from over a hundred pheasants in a season to twenty, with woodcock, duck, snipe, teal, and rabbits. No one but a good sportsman would be likely to take out a Forest license, but this makes matters so much the worse for the birds. Hares seem very scarce all through the Forest, and rabbits are very locally distributed. The only mammal at all in evidence is the squirrel, and according to one corre- spondent of the Field, he is regularly hnnt.ed by mobs of lads armed with sticks. Now that excursion trains run into Lyndhurst Road from Southampton and other large towns, the "occasional population" of the Forest is often re- inforced by hundreds of very thoughtless visitors ; but these disturb at most a minute area of forest com- pared with that accessible to the public by means of bicycles. Formerly, the distances in the Forest and the absence of railroads made it an expensive and difficult place to explore. Now that the steel wheels have annihilated distances within the Forest area it is everywhere opened up. The cyclist visitor has two pet hobbies, or rather the followers of these two hobbies find the cycle most convenient. Entomology and botany can be studied in the one "national park" better than anywhere else in the South of England. There is no place to compare with it for butterflies, moths, plants, and flowers. All these objects are "collected," not studied and let alone. So there is an ever-increasing stream of cyclists on the look out for "white admirals," fritillaries of all kinds, "wood whites," or perhaps purple emperors. Last summer ten persons were seen at one time on a Forest road catching or seeking specimens of the narrow-banded bee hawk- moth, a species for which the Forest has a reputation among collectors. Other visitors are busy digging up wild gladiolus or orchids, or seeking ferns or flower-roots. The efforts of these amateurs are said to have made a sensible reduction in the number of rare plants, for these are, as a rule, only known to the educated; while the butterfly hunters have done much the same by rare species of insects. The latter feat seems almost incredible; but those familiar with the true in- wardness of the collecting mania, and the enthusiasm with which the entomologist of any age from twelve to three score and ten will seek not only the insects, but their eggs, caterpillars, and larvre, turning over leaf by leaf, or digging round the trunks of trees, will credit them with extensive powers of reducing rare species. Amateur egg-collectors do less mischief, the time-honoured story of the New Forest buzzard's eggs not- withstanding. But there are numbers of egg-robbers of a diffet ent class. These are men employed on the spot, or sent down to the Forest by London egg-sellers, or "naturalists," to gather birds' eggs for sale. All eggs are welcome, from those of the snipe, black-game, or hawks, to the migratory
warblers, finches, water-birds, robins, and hedgesparrows.
There are few eggs which cannot be sold in the shops for twopence. Others range from two shillings for a hobby's, to sixpence for a nightingale's, or kestrel's, or owl's. The
New Forest is the favourite haunt of these men, and their ravages increase yearly. Add to them the professional
flower-diggers, moss-gatherers, and the like, who bring up carts loaded with spoils of this kind to London, and the list of predatory species of man in the Forest is fairly coin.
plete. The egg-robber and flower-stealer for gain are justly denounced by every one. The deer-hunter, fox-hunter, and bon&-fide c.olleetor of insects, flowers, and ferns, and the holder of a license to shoot are all following pursuits which command a large share of interest, as being forms of sport and natural history. But if this limited area is to be hunted, shot, "egged," collected, and made a fox preserve, what will become of the birds when the number of persons so engaged are doubled, as they soon will be, while the area of forest re- mains the same P It is unfortunately almost certain that the greater number of interesting birds, plants, and insects will disappear.
It will be almost impossible to make exceptions in favour of one class against another, and we can only conclude that the whole Forest must, and shortly will, be made a national park like that in Yellowstone Valley, where all wild life, except destructive creatures when they become too numerous, enjoy almost complete protection, and the original fauna of the country is preserved or reintroduced. At the present moment no less than sixty-six square miles are being added to the American sanctuary, and the course of that great experiment is absolntely•favourable to its repro- duction elsewhere. To prohibit hunting in the Forest would no doubt raise strong opposition from persons of wealth and position locally. But they can find plenty of stag-hunting on Exmoor, and better fox-hunting in almost any part of England. On the other hand, the greater public who seek the Forest as a place of rest, and for the quiet enjoyment of wild scenery and ani m al life, would gain immensely. The Forest would need" policing "to keep down egg-robbing birds, foxes, and the bloodthirsty stoats and weasels, just as the wolves and foxes are kept down in Yellowstone. The experiment might be tried by reserving a central portion of the total area first, and subsequently adding to it. The deer would, in an incredibly short time, increase and grow tame, and the experience of the United States shows that in fonr or five years all other animals would do the same. Roe-deer should be introduced, and the blacker)** and capercailzie established. The former bird has never died out on the Forest heaths; but much might be done to increase its numbers. The Duke of Bedford's experiments at Woburn will before long show what foreign deer are suited for our woods. If it proves that the axis—the brightly coloured and handsome forest stag of India—can thrive in the open, these should be turned out in the Forest. As the woods and dense copses by the streams and bogs belong to the nation, there is no reason why two or three beaver colonies might not be established on the upper and narrow waters of the Forest streams. There are many perfect places for such an experi- ment, and as the small wood is constantly reproducing itself inside the plantations, any damage the beavers might do is compensated by growth elsewhere. The main practical diffi- culty in the way of such a scheme arises from the inter- mixture of private properties embedded in the Forest, and the pecuniary interests of the owners of rights of grazing on the Forest. But if the people here are in real earnest to secure and make the best of a great national wild playground they will find means to clear this public estate of encum- brances, even if it involves some small sacrifice of public funds.
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