GROUXD GAME SHOOTING (PART /) 381 



sit in after you have expelled them from their 

 burrows, as, for instance, fern, bracken, furze, or 

 thick brambles, you may calculate even in wet 

 weather on obtaining tolerable sport. If you have no 

 cover for the rabbits to hide in after they are ejected 

 from their cosy burrows, and they are prevented by 

 wire netting from going to ground, you will surely 

 find that many will die of cold, or be too cramped to 

 run, after a couple of days and nights of forced 

 exposure to frost or heavy rain. It w r ere better every 

 rabbit you have turned above ground should be 

 allowed to return to its burrow than that this should 

 occur. 



If there is a thick warm shelter available for them 

 it is another matter, as a rabbit will then form a snug 

 nest, untouched by wind or wet, to squat in during 

 the day, and from which he will steal forth at night 

 to feed, and then return to, .and unless snow or excep- 

 tionally heavy rain occurs, he will for a week or two be 

 almost as comfortable as if in his home beneath the 

 surface. 



I have known rabbits to be kept above ground for 

 three weeks, because it was impossible to turn several 

 thousands out of their burrows under that time, and, 

 though so long in the open, I have seen them dry and 

 full of spirit on the day they were shot ; but on these 

 occasions the animals had an abundance of cover to 

 hide in, atid the weather was unusually fine and dry. 



On the other hand I have seen rabbits so perished 



