TURKEY-ROOSTS. 



" When, therefore, this game is wild it requires no little 

 skill to bag him without a dog especially trained. The hunter 

 must work on foot against the wind, cautiously pushing his 

 way without noise. If he is discovered, the turkeys silently 

 disappear in the cover, and the hunter knows only of their 

 vicinity by seeing their tracks. If however he succeeds in 

 approaching near enough for a shot, the explosion of the gun 

 throws them into a panic of which the knowing hunter will 

 take the fullest advantage. Some will fly up and alight in 

 the nearest trees; some will squat where they are in any 

 little cover that promises protection." * 



Colonel Dodge goes on to explain, that by taking 

 the first shots at those in the trees, and afterwards 

 walking up those that remain hiding upon the ground, 

 a flock of 20 or 30 turkeys will under such circum- 

 stances sometimes yield six or eight birds to a good 

 hunter. 



It is however not often that so favourable a chance 

 as this will be hit upon; and a man generally has to 

 work pretty hard to get even a single good specimen 

 of the wild turkey. The American backwoodsmen 

 therefore generally took the easier (though somewhat 

 unsportsmanlike plan, according to our ideas), of seek- 

 ing for their roosting places after the fall of the 

 leaves, and shooting them down while sitting aloft 

 on some clear starlit or moonlight night, the lowest 

 bird being always taken first, so that his fall might 

 not alarm those below him ; in this way a whole roost 

 numbering twenty or thirty birds could sometimes be 

 killed for the market. Like almost all birds, the 

 turkey had a favourite spot where, so long as he was 

 allowed to perch there undisturbed, he was accustomed 



* The Hunting Grounds of ttie Great West, by Col. R. I. Dodge, 

 U.S.A., 1877, p. 233. 



