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Show CocWs Popular There are more registered Cocker Cock-er spaniels In this country than any other breed. In the case of the Cocker, reasons for this popularity are not difficult to find. Lovable and friendly, they are perhaps the best pets and companions one can find in all dogdom. As a child's pet, the Cocker outranks all other dogs. It Is disturbing to most hunters hunt-ers that the Cocker, formerly a good hunting animal, has been allowed al-lowed to degenerate Into a lap-dog. There are plenty hunting-strain Cockers and the gunner who finds one is fortunate, indeed. Too frequently, fre-quently, the Cocker will be found lacking the nose and bird-sense that must go Into the making of a good hunting dog but If one finds a specimen of the real hunting-strain Cocker, he will have a jewel in the field. This Is true because this strain is wide-awake, smart; short and stocky and yet possessed of sufficient suffi-cient strength to retrieve even a Canada goose. The dog's desire to please Its master is another of the oHmntrnkla llnUe tirVltpVl TYlfllfA It SO universally loved. However, the Cocker is a sensitive little fellow and must be handled accordingly. The Cockers stand at the bottom bot-tom on the size list of hunting dogs, seldom exceeding 28 pounds in weight. He hunts his game with a zest that is a joy to behold, and hunts carefully throug all manner of cover. He keeps his nose close to the ground and he really uses it! While he covers a lot of ground in a hurry, he is a natural at quartering back and forth in front of a gun, so that he rarely flushes birds out of range of the gun. The Cocker, like most spaniels, flushes his birds rather than point them, and the speed of his wagging tail is an unfailing signa-1 of how close he is to the birds. Just before he flushes the birds, his tail is moving so fast that it is virtually- a blur. Watch that sign, and you'll seldom be flustered when the busy little dog sends the covey or single boom ing Into the air. AAA Word for Cais Scientists in Missouri have taken a perfunctory swipe of the polishing polish-ing cloth at the tarnished halo of the house cat in announcing the results of an analysis of 41 stomachs, mostly from highway-killed highway-killed cats, according to the Wildlife Wild-life Management Institute. To those who believe that the feral house cat survives solely on young game and songbirds, the results re-sults of this study will come as a surprise. In per cent of volume, the aggregate last meal of these deceased de-ceased pussies was comprised of 38.1 per cent mice, 25.6 per cent rabbit, 9 per cent cotton rat, 6.9 per cent table scraps, 2.7 per cent terrapin, terra-pin, 2.4 per cent rat, 2.4 per cent pig, 1.9 per cent grasshopper, 1.8 per cent unidentified meat, and 1.5 per cent chicken. No songbirds were found and, of course, some of the material, particularly par-ticularly the pig, was carrion. AU of the quail, parts of three birds, came from a single cat shot in the act of stalking young quail. Rats and mice made up 49.5 per cent of the total diet. Korschgen (conductor of the study) said that this is not enough evidence to form the basis of policy on, house cats but that the high percentage of rodents and absence ab-sence of songbirds give food for thought. Mice compete heavily with quail for food and rats are seriour quail predators. AAA Lean Days Here Now are really the lean days for wildlife. February and March still can produce the kind of blizzardy, chilling chill-ing weather that takes heavy toll among bird and animal life. It is now that natural food is scarcest ana the denizens of the woods are hard-pressed to get enough to live on. Sportsmen and conservationists can aid wildlife and give Mother Nature a mighty big hand by providing pro-viding feeding stations where na tural foodstuffs have disappeared, or where ice or snow covers vegetation. vege-tation. Once feeding stations are established, estab-lished, however, it should be remembered re-membered that they should be filled regularly. This should be done because be-cause many wildlife species will keep returning to the same spot, once they have been accustomed to feeding there. AAA Vaterfowl Longevity According to the U.S. fish and wildlife service, waterfowl live much longer than upland game birds. In captivity, the service reports. European geese and swans have lived 70 or 80 years, and ducks from 15 to 40 years. Wild ducks, geese and swans do not live so long, but wild, banded ducks have been reported as old as 18 years, and geese and swans at least 20. |