WHAT WILDFOWLING REALLY IS 15 



a distinct and peculiar method. All these must be studied 

 and learnt by means of long and arduous experience, and 

 there are fifty or sixty varieties of fowl the gunner may 

 meet with. In addition to this the fowler must generally 

 shoot in the most uncertain lights — dusk, dawn, and moon- 

 light. He must shoot from cramped and seemingly im- 

 possible positions, and often with a rapidity and certainty 

 that may spoil or ensure the only shot he will obtain for 

 many hours. 



I have said that the wildfowler must endure hardships 

 and dangers, and indeed, both of them are inseparably 

 attendant upon him. 



He must lie in wait in the bitterest cold and dark to 

 circumvent the wariest and most cunning of created things. 



Up to his waist in ice-cold waters when the touch of the 

 lock and trigger burns like fire, prone and motionless in a 

 frail punt upon some deep and treacherous estuary of the 

 sea, leaving his bed at all hours of the dark to face roaring 

 winter winds — these are some of the things the wildfowler 

 endures and glories in enduring. 



And his knowledge of the habits of his quarry must be 

 profound. He must distinguish the myriad calls of the wild 

 birds of marsh and sea ; he must literally understand what 

 they are saying to each other, what each individual note means 

 to him ; he must be skilled in locality, in plumage, in species ; 

 he must be able to judge exactly what this or that species of 

 bird will do under the most varying conditions of wind and 

 tide, in all kinds of weather and light. 



Yet another point goes to the education, and must be part 

 of the equipment of the complete wildfowler. He must have 

 a comprehensive knowledge of guns and ammunition far more 

 extensive than is necessary for the ordinary sportsman. The 

 question of punt-guns with their intricate mechanism must be 

 at his fingers' ends. He must know all about eight-bores, 



