122 THE COMPLETE WILDFOWLER 



are, as a rule, lean — due, no doubt, to the long flights they 

 take — but, despite this, when slowly roasted and well basted 

 they are quite a delicacy. After hard weather and living on 

 the tideway, grey geese are not then so good for food. 



The art of calling shore-birds is one only gained by long 

 practice. The usual method is to hide up in the daily flight- 

 lines of the birds. Ambuscades made of drift-ware, 

 CURLEWS 8'i'^sses, stones, and such like are erected to conceal 

 the gunner from the sight of the passing birds, and 

 as he mimics their cries he thus often attracts them within 

 range. This, however, is only practicable under favourable 

 conditionsj such as the flow of spring tides, when the birds are 

 floated off their feeding and resting grounds and compelled to 

 seek drier quarters inland or fly about at sea. The experienced 

 wildfowler is fully aware of these circumstances, and by taking 

 advantage of them often secures good sport. He is also 

 competent in imitating the calls of other shore-birds that will 

 entice them near, such as a low, short "kurr, kurr, " the call- 

 note of the curlew. Should he fail in accurately pitching the 

 tones, away go the birds. Curlews are exceedingly wary and 

 alert to detect unfamiliar sounds. Once the long-drawn whistle 

 which indicates alarm to the curlew has been set echoing 

 across the mud-flats every bird is on the alert. 



Shooting curlews from a hut or hiding-place is good sport ; 

 in fact, holes dug in the mud-flats are usually not so good as 

 a hut, because the tide invariably washes out the shooter from 

 the former just when most birds are coming. To describe 

 a night's curlew flighting from my own experience, let us 

 suppose that there is a fairly high spring tide at 6 p.m., and 

 we are down at the hut about 4.30 p.m. Far out over the flats 

 may be seen long strings and bunches of curlews and other 

 shore-birds winging along as the tide puts them up. They 

 are off to their high-water resting grounds, where, if un- 



