WALKING UP 165 



are naturally not much help to the stock of birds. 

 But in many parts of the .Lowlands, as in the north 

 of England, the fringe of the moor or hill ground, 

 lying next to the arable land, affords good protection 

 for nesting ; and the extensive cultivation of potatoes 

 provides a class of cover which the birds are very fond 

 of frequenting, and which is a welcome change from 

 the eternal turnips, as birds can run very freely along 

 them. In wheeling in a potato field, I would always 

 recommend that the pivot flank should retrace its steps 

 on the return beat over a portion of the same ground ; 

 that is, when you are beating across the drills. You 

 will often find that, owing to the protection of the deep 

 drills, they have crossed back again on to the ground 

 you have beaten. 



I would always try to force birds into potatoes 

 rather than turnips, early in the season, while the 

 cover in the former is pretty good, supposing that the 

 management of the beat admits of it. Besides that 

 they are pleasanter walking, birds show better, and are 

 therefore more likely to be well killed, as well as more 

 easily picked up than in turnips. There is always a 

 better scent, and dead birds are more easily seen in a 

 potato field. 



The question of finding the birds, in spite of the 

 bare character of the modern stubble, is much more 



