XX INTRODUCTION. 
of a particular decoy at Tillmgham, on the coast of Essex, 
is given in ‘The Field’ of 15th Feb. 1868. 
One of the best existing decoys in the kingdom is that 
known as the Ashby Decoy, in Lincolnshire. The late 
owner, Mr. Henry Healy, caused a careful account to be kept 
of each day’s capture from the winter of 1833-34 down to 
that of 1867-68 ; and the results, as arranged in the opposite 
Table (p. xxi), will give some notion of the immense number of 
fowl annually taken in a decoy, as well as of the proportions 
in which the various species are found associated together. 
From this it will be seen that the captures have averaged 
2741 head of wild fowl per annum, and in the course of five- 
and-thirty years there has not been such a decrease in num- 
bers as, from various causes, might have been expected. 
Contrary to general belief, the number of birds taken, it ap- 
pears, is influenced not by the coldness of the weather, but 
by the amount of rain. If it is a very dry autumn, few birds 
are caught; but if there is a good deal of ram im October 
and November, the reverse is the case. In very severe 
weather they betake themselves elsewhere. In the opposite 
Table it will also be noticed that the rarity of the Gadwall 
is well brought out. In five-and-thirty years, twenty-two 
specimens only were taken, and this in a favourable loca- 
lity on the east coast. In Ireland, for reasons elsewhere 
stated (p. 62), this Duck is much rarer than in England. A 
pair killed in Dublin Bay, and another pair in the county of 
Antrim (cf. Blake-Knox, ‘ Zoologist,’ 1871, p. 2644), are 
amongst the very few Irish specimens on record. 
It has been stated (p. 64), on the authority of Mr. Thomp- 
son, that the Ferruginous Duck has not been obtained in 
Ireland. One killed on the Dublin coast, however, in 1871, 
was noticed by Mr. Blake-Knox in the ‘ Zoologist,’ 1871, 
p. 2645. 
