Colorado, Feb. 22, 1912:

"After the most severe winter weather experienced for twenty years we
are able to compute approximately our loss of feathered life. It is
seventy-five per cent of the quail throughout the irrigated district,
and about twenty per cent of meadow-larks. In the rough cedar-covered
sections south of the Arkansas River, the loss among the quail was much
lighter. The ground sparrows suffered severely, while the English
sparrow seems to have come through in good shape. Many cotton-tail
rabbits starved to death, while the deep, light snow of January made
them easy prey for hawks and coyotes." (F.T. Webber).

It would be possible to record many instances similar to the above, but
why multiply them? And now behold the cruel corollary:

At least twenty-five times during the past two years I have heard and
read arguments by sportsmen against my proposal for a 5-year close
season for quail, taking the ground that "The sportsmen are not wholly
to blame for the scarcity of quail. It is the cold winters that kill
them off!"

So then, _because the fierce winters murder the bob white, wholesale,
they should not have a chance to recover themselves_! Could human beings
possibly assume a more absurd attitude?

Yes, it is coldly and incontestably true, that even after such winter
slaughter as Mr. Webber has reported above, the very next season will
find the quail hunter joyously taking the field, his face beaming with
health and good living, to hunt down and shoot to death as many as
possible of the pitiful 25 per cent remnant that managed to survive the