THE WOODCOCK. 317 



retrieving the bird. The best time for making a big bag of 

 woodcocks is the mating period, as the males may then 

 be readily seen against the starlit sky, when they rise to 

 hover and to serenade the gentle sex with their hoarse 

 song of ' ' bisweet, bisweet, crock wank. " Very large bags 

 are rarely made, however, owing to the scarcity of the 

 birds, and the difficulty of getting fair shots at them. 

 Ten couples a day is considered good work even when 

 they are comparatively numerous, but I have heard of 

 persons who were said to have bagged twenty couples 

 in that time. The ordinary charge used in woodcock 

 shooting is two and a half drachms of powder and an 

 ounce of No, 10 or 13 shot. 



Woodcocks are very numerous in Florida and Texas 

 during the winter, being frequenters of the banks of 

 every lagoon where food can be procured. The negroes 

 often kill large numbers by " fire-hunting " them at iiight, 

 as all they have to do is to knock them on the head with 

 clubs. I was out with a party one night in Florida which 

 killed five, but they were satisfied with the bag, as it was 

 better— a very little better — than nothing. 



The best month for woodcock shooting in the Middle 

 and Western States is July, as the old and youno-are then 

 in cover along the courses of streams and the bottom 

 lands. They are supposed to go to the high grounds in 

 the month of August while they are moulting, and to re- 

 turn to their regular feeding grounds at night, only to 

 leave them again before daybreak. It is quite a common 

 belief that they only seek for food during the night, but 

 it is evident that they also feed in the daytime, as some 

 have been shot as la,te as three P. M. with worms m their 

 mouths, they not having had time to swallow them be- 

 fore being killed. They descend to the cornfields In Sep- 

 tember, and work diligently wherever the soil is soft and 

 damp, and remain there unless they are disturbed. To 

 make much of a bag then, a person must use a stool to 



