DECOYS 437 



but on a much larger scale, nearly a hundred ducks being then 

 captured. 



The Wild Duck is subject to much variation in plumage, 

 Yorkshire examples being not uncommonly reported. Snowden 

 Sleights, the veteran wildfowler of East Cottingwith, told me 

 he had shot two pure white birds ; a specimen, nearly all 

 white, with yellow bill, feet, and legs, was obtained from a 

 flock of seven ordinary Duck at Stainsacre, near Whitby, 

 on nth February 1897 ; various other instances are com- 

 municated of pied or parti-coloured individuals, and an 

 example with yellow neck and breast was shot, during the 

 evening flight, at Redcar, on 17th January 1905. A duck 

 assuming drake's plumage was recorded by Mr. F. Boyes 

 in 1878. Hybrids between this species and other ducks 

 are also met with. A cross between the Mallard and Pintail 

 was recorded at Moreby, near York, and exhibited before 

 the York Naturalists' Club on 5th December 1849, while a 

 similar hybrid, believed to be a true feral bird, was killed by 

 Mr. W. H. St. Quintin from some wild Mallard {Field, 17th 

 November igoo). 



As to local names : — Grey Drake or Grey Duck is the 

 common term amongst coast-shooters. 



DECOYS 

 Past and Present. 



In former years most of the " Carrs " and levels of Holder- 

 ness and the south-eastern portion of Yorkshire, before 

 their drainage and reclamation from a state of nature, were 

 frequented by enormous numbers of fowl which not only bred 

 there annually, but these fastnesses afforded a suitable home 

 for vast hordes of Duck from northern Europe. The intro- 

 duction of duck decoying into this country was intimately 

 associated with the drainage and reclamation of these fenlands, 

 and the first in England to receive practical attention at the 

 hands of the reclaimer were those of south-eastern Yorkshire, 



