It is generally known by the older “Squirrel Hunters” that from their first knowledge of the North-west to beginning of the railroad era, 1855, Ohio was a paradise for the sportsman with dog and gun. The fields abounded with covies of quail; the forests with wild turkeys, grouse, pigeons and squirrels; and the streams with ducks and geese. Up to the period named the conditions of the country underwent but few changes detrimental to the propagation and preservation of game, and the abundant supplies afforded amusement and subsistence equaled at present nowhere within the limits of the United States. The settlements as yet contained many reservations of continuous tracts of undisturbed forest, wild ranges, islands along the larger water-courses, overflowing lands, unmolested parts of large estates, military and school reservations, etc., often embracing sections of rich soil heavily timbered and densely covered with an undergrowth of bushes, and in topography well adapted for resorts and homes of game birds and beasts. Few, if any, of those timbered reservations failed to be occupied by every species and variety of nature’s household. Some locations from time immemorial had been the favorite and undisputed habitation of that most wonderful American bird, the wild turkey. For he is not migratory, nor an aimless wanderer of the forest. His instincts and attachments to place, the home of his ancestors, are so great that generations after generations live and die in the same selected site of wild territory. No persecution can induce him to abandon his accustomed haunts. Nothing but death or the removal of his forest ends his family. The area of his home requires several square miles, and includes a nursery, feeding grounds, ranches, roosts and places of refuge in times of danger. And if by pursuit he is obliged to flee beyond the limit of his range, he returns to his associates, to his familiar trees, rocks and mountain streams.