268 WILD NATURE'S WAYS. 



shore shooter, taking full advantage of this piece 

 of knowledge, baits such streams with bruised 

 corn during severe weather, and works sad havoc 

 in the ranks of the hungry fowl from some place 

 of concealment near by. 



Wild ducks seek their food from dusk until 

 within two hours or so of dawn, when they 

 begin to wash and preen themselves. At the 

 first intimation of daybreak they commence to 

 fly back to the sheets of water upon which they 

 are accustomed to spend tlie day. 



There is no prettier sight for the naturalist 

 than to peep through the narrow vertical slit in 

 a decoy screen and see two or three hundred 

 wild ducks scattered over the ice beyond the 

 open water at the mouth of the pipe on a sunny 

 winter's day. Some of the birds are sleeping 

 peacefully wdth their broad bills sheathed in 

 their back plumage, others stand about in httle 

 expressionless groups, whilst here and there a 

 belated fowl may be seen busy preening itself. 



I have noticed that inland wild ducks appear 

 to have the strange facult}^ of knowing during 

 the first onslaught of hard weather which of their 

 feeding places will be frozen over and which will 

 not, without even taking the trouble to visit them. 



They are also somewhat fastidious in regard 

 to the direction of the wind. I have waited 

 long and patiently at a favourite feeding place, 



