THE NEW FORESTRY. 23 



approaching the same mortality prevailed among any other 

 kind of live stock as commonly prevails among home-reared 

 pheasants, there would be a panic on estates. 



With regard to this particular branch of the keeper's 

 business, and with a view to simplifying matters under the 

 system of management now proposed for the sake of the 

 woods, we venture here to discuss a subject that has, we 

 believe, not yet been thoroughly ventilated, namely, the com- 

 parative merits of the two systems of rearing pheasants gener- 

 ally practised the artificial system of raising birds under hens 

 in coops, and the natural system of allowing the pheasants to 

 breed wild in the coverts under due care. Assuming that the 

 latter system may be carried out, at least as successfully as the 

 former, there can be no doubt about its being by far the easiest 

 and most economical, and the one which relieves the keeper of 

 much care and anxiety which would be better bestowed else- 

 where. We have seen both systems at work on an extensive 

 scale on different estates, and we have taken great pains to 

 get independent testimony on the subject. 



The natural system we became quite familiar with on an 

 extensive and most successful scale, many years ago, in one 

 of the coldest and wettest districts in Scotland, where it has 

 been always practised ; and the artificial system we are also 

 ^uite familiar with, as practised in England, and it is here 

 proposed to discuss the two systems separately. 



What takes place under the artificial system is suggestive, 

 and is as follows : The keeper first picks up all the earliest 

 and best wild-laid eggs out of the coverts to set under hens, 

 and he is often tempted to prolong this gathering until too 

 late in the season, the wild birds continuing to lay as long as 

 their nests are robbed, and hatching late and inferior birds 

 from what eggs are left to them. Should the keeper not 

 secure as many eggs as he requires in this way, he buys from 

 other sources at an average price of about nine shillings per 

 dozen, and sometimes more. The price is tempting, and egg 

 poaching is common. Mr. Tegetmeir, in his excellent book on 

 pheasants, last edition, p. 102, states that owners of estates 

 have been known to buy eggs, from dealers, that had been 

 stolen from their own coverts, and that, " in the great majority 

 of cases," purchased pheasant eggs are stolen either from the 

 rearer's own preserves or those of their neighbours. A leading 

 article in the " Field," of April 2Oth, 1899, also deals with the 

 subject of " illegal traffic in game eggs," and states that : 



" The chief sufferers from the nefarious trade are those 



