7O LETTERS TO YOUNG SHOOTERS LETTER 



LETTER V 



PHEASANT BEARING (PART. IV) 



THE SELECTION OF A BEARING FIELD HOW TO SET THE 



EGGS THE MANAGEMENT OF THE SITTING HENS 



HAVING at length, whether from wild nests in the 

 woods and fields, or from an aviary, obtained our 

 pheasant eggs, we next have to hatch them out, rear 

 the young chicks, turn these as fine strong birds into 

 the woods, and keep them there safely till and after 

 they are full grown, and to such time as the coverts 

 are shot through. 



The routine of rearing pheasants by hand is as 

 follows ; the details I will treat of afterwards. 



I. ' Selecting a suitable field for rearing, and sys- 

 tematically trapping vermin all round it, previous to 

 and during its occupation by the young birds.* 



* It is a common belief on the part of naturalists (not of keepers 

 fortunately) that ' kestrels ' are harmless to game ! For the first 

 week or ten days of their existence pheasant and partridge chicks 

 have no worse enemy than the kestrel. I have seen a kestrel, ere it 

 eould be shot, take five young pheasants from a rearing field in one 



