Indegenous Wildlife ca. 19th century America

[Renvilleranger21]

Re: Indegenous Wildlife ca. 19th century America

In Minnesota during the 1820-50s there were Elk, Brown Bear, Black Bear, Wolves, and Buffalo all of which except the black bear which reside in the northern half of the state and a very limited population of elk (which were reintroduced in the 1930's) are no longer in the state. One thing that guided many of these animals to move west and out of the state was settlement. Until about the 1880's 2/3 of Minnesota was an oak savannah and much of the state was an outright prairie. When settlers came in because of treaties of 1838, 1851 and the homestead act of 1862, the landscape changed vastly to one with many more trees than there were just 150 years ago.

[Jeff Prechtel]

Re: Indegenous Wildlife ca. 19th century America

I don't know if these two were mentioned already....
but the Carolina parakeet, as well as the ivory billed wood pecker.
Condors once ranged here in Oregon also......the last one recorded
nesting or seen in flight was in the 1870s I believe.

I can remember reading that the soldiers had a hard time finding game
to shoot, because all the troop movements, cannon and musket fire drove
them pretty much out of any area they were in.

Anybody else note any mention of this in anything they've read....
either the taking of wild game to supplement their diet, or the general lack thereof?

[Hank Trent]

Re: Indegenous Wildlife ca. 19th century America

Here's an article from the Ironton Register, Aug. 3, 1854 at http://lawrencecountyohio.com/families/k_p/kelley.htm There's a small amount more on game in the area in the early 1800s, in addition to the article below:

THE LAST BUFFALO KILLED IN OHIO
In 1851, Professor Mather, in the Western Agriculturalist, said: "In 1843 an old hunter of Jackson county, Mr. George Willis, told us that he saw the last Buffalo killed within the limits of this State. He was shot by a hunter named Keenes, near the headwaters of Symmes creek, in the year 1802."

This, Mr. Kelley says, is a mistake as he himself shot the last buffalo killed in Ohio in 1803, the next year after Keenes killed his buffalo. Let Mr. Kelley tell his own story:

"I was out hunting and came upon the buffalo, on the waters of Storms creek, above where Vesuvius Furnace now is [in Lawrence Co. Ohio, in the southern part of the state, now part of Wayne National Forest, coincidentally the location of the 1857 camping trip event in 2006]. He was a monstrous large buffalo. The place for shooting a buffalo is just behind the shoulders, but I shot this one too far back, so that it didn't kill him right off, although I saw that he was so badly hurt that he would soon die; and he stood pawing and bellowing at the dogs. I loaded my gun again, and for curiosity aimed another shot square at his face, which only caused him to shake his head, but made him mad, and he broke right at me, but I dodged behind a tree, and he struck off, right ahead, in a bee line. I followed on as fast as I could, with the dogs. He ran about two miles before he fell; the last part of the distance he began to stagger like a drunken man; he would lean up against a tree or sapling, and move on slowly; finally down he fell, all at once, dead--he never kicked after he fell. I then skinned him and laid his skin up across some sticks on a tree, and went home. The next day I took out a horse and packed his skin home. That was a monster in size you may know from this: Out of his hide I cut eleven pair of traces and two bed cords, and had some large scraps left. Judge Davisson, my brother-in-law, and Josiah Lambert, my wife's father, had some of the traces. They lasted in our families for many years."

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net

[Curt Schmidt]

Re: Indegenous Wildlife ca. 19th century America

Hallo!

Thanks Herr Hank!
You saved me from looking it up!!

But I will add that the "last" mountain lion was shot in Pennsylvania in either 1856, 1874, 1891, or 1914 depending upon the source. ;)

Curt

[roundman]

Re: Indegenous Wildlife ca. 19th century America

Both the Elk and the red wolf are being re-introduced into the Great Smoky Mountains NP, according to an article I read on the wall of the ranger station in Cade's Cove.
Robert Myers

[Horace]

Re: Indegenous Wildlife ca. 19th century America

Two sidebars to this subject: There is the story, related by Ernest B. Ferguson in 'Not War But Murder' of Black Vultures actually introducing themselves into the state of Virginia during the war because of all the new carrion there.
Then in relation to fauna: I went to Virginia for the first time last year. I was on the outlook for dogwood trees. Their white blossoms are mentioned as being in abundance in period accounts. I hardly saw any. I was told by a local that they used to be very common, had all but died off, and are now starting to be seen again.