SNIPE SHOOTING 



fields may be added to the bag and give variety to your 

 dinner. The sport is excellent, and you require to be in 

 good training to keep it up, for the walking is hard under 

 our tropical sun ; but just don't you appreciate your bath, 

 feed, and long chair at the end of the day ! 



In the local paddy fields I could seldom secure more 

 than two to about six couple of birds, during a morning 

 or afternoon shoot, partly on account of my poor shoot- 

 ing and partly on account of the scarcity of birds, which 

 were few and far between. 



I may say also that the shooting, having usually to 

 be done off the narrow dividing ridges which only afford 

 about six inches of precarious foothold, is anything but 

 easy. 



Birds do not come in such numbers nowadays to our 

 fields owing to the great extension of tea and cacao 

 cultivation, clearing up the scrub land in the vicinity of 

 the paddy fields. The following entries, taken haphazard 

 from my diary, show the style of sport I was able to 

 enjoy of a morning or evening, and, for that matter, 

 in a good year can still enjoy in the fields around the 



estate : 



3 snipe for 6 shots. Local fields. 



10 26 

 6 ,, 16 

 6 ,, 10 



11 21 

 ii 17 

 1 6 26 ,, 



5 5 



6 8 



9 *4 > 



And so on, some years birds being more plentiful than 

 others. I usually put in a little snipe shooting during 



ii 



