OCR Text |
Show Foresters Ask Hunters To Shoot Porcupines "Porky" porcupine, stealthily working timber renegade, is on the upgrade in many intermoun-tain intermoun-tain national forest areas. Populations Popu-lations are increasing in spite of reduction programs, Ranger Bower said today. To decrease the porcupines the Forest Service is asking hunters in certain areas this year to "shoot them on sight." A letter being issued to those who will hunt in areas where iwriioine damage to trees is sev- ere asks the sportsmen to help save the forest by cooperating in an intensive effort to destroy the porcupines they see while hunting hun-ting big game. The Forest Service recognizes that even though the quilled rodents rod-ents are a natural part of a forest habitat, an overpopulation can do serious damage to future timber supplies and destroy recreational and scenic values by stripping the bark from thousands of young trees One of the rodents can ruin many young trees in a plantation, it was stated. Contrary to folklore, porcupines are not protected by game laws. They should not be spared as possible pos-sible 'food for people lost in snowstorms snow-storms because they don't cooperate cooper-ate that way. When the snow gets deep they hide out in rocky dens. Aim for the head - It's usually the end farthest from the tree trunk. Use the same safety you would when shooting your game. Porcupines are often seen at sundown sun-down in or near mountain roads grassy meadows, and streambanks. The local areas overpopulated i by porcupines are Dry Creek, Oak Creek Pine Plantation, and Whis-' Whis-' key Creek, forest ranger Kenneth ' Bower said. |