Casting Digital Nets

South Dakota Game Laws.

The hunting season now being on it might be well for hunters to know what the conditions of the new game laws are in relation to shooting game birds and the number of birds each person is allowed to kill or have in their possession. Article 3054, sections 2, 3. 7 and 8 is as follows:

"Every person who shoots or kills any wild duck, wild goose, brant or wild crane between the first day of May and the first day of September following, or shoots or kills any plover or curlew between the fifteen​ day of May and the first day of September following, or at anytime kills or shoots any wild duck, goose or brant with any swivel gun or any other gun, except such as is commonly shot from the shoulder, or in hunting such birds makes use of any artificial light or battery; or knowingly hunts in any way, upon the enclosed, occupied or cultivated lands of another without the content of the owner or tenant; or shoots or kills in one day more than fifteen of the game birds mentioned in subdivisions 1, 2 or 3 of this section, is guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof before a justice of the peace of the county, is punishable by imprisonment in the county jail for not less than five days nor more than thirty days, or by a fine of not more than ten dollars for each of the birds mentioned in subdivisions 1, 2 or 3 of this section, so shot or killed, or nests of eggs destroyed, or by both fine or imprisonment in the discretion of the court."

Article 3055 says, "any person who has in his possession any of the birds or animals mentioned in the preceeding sections after fifteen days from the close of the respective seasons during which it shall be lawful to hunt or kill the same, and any person, firm or corporation who at any time in the year shall have in his, their or its possession more than fifteen of the birds named in subdivisions 1 and 2 of said section of this act,unless the same have been lawfully received for transportation, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and upon conviction thereof before any justice of the peace of the county is punishable in the manner and to the extent provided in said section for the killing of the same, provided that the fine in no case shall exceed the sum of one hundred dollars in any one offense or be less than ten dollars."

By the game laws it is made the duty of the game warden and his deputies, or the sheriff, constable or any other officer of the law, to see that these laws are strictly en-forced and to make complaint and to prosecute all violaters of the provisions of said laws, which shall come to his knowledge or of which he shall be credibly informed; and such wardens are author- ized to arrest without warrants any person violating these laws. Any of the above named officers who shall wilfully fail or refuse to perform the duties of his office shall be fined not more than fifty dollars for each offense.

If these laws are properly enforced the practice, heretofore, of parties coming to the lake for a day's hunt and going home with fifty and sixty ducks, each, will be stopped. Had such laws been enforced ten years ago in relation to prairie chickens, there would still be good chicken hunting in this county, but hunters have always been allowed to go out and kill all the birds that could be found, day after day, the consequence being that in but a short time the prairie chicken, which in the past has furnished the finest hunting for sportsmen, will be completely exterminated. Unless some effort is made to put a stop to the wholesale slaughter of ducks and geese on the lakes and rivers of the country, it is only a question of a few years until that class of shooting will be done away with,as is the case with the prairie chicken.