8B0BE AND INLAND WATER SHOOTING. 47 



All your shooting will be within 25 yards. Keep well down in the battery until 

 you have the birds where you want thein. Ducks in coming to decoys look at the decoys 

 for a good place to settle, but if they see a head more that does not belong to a duck, 

 then "Good-bye." 



The interior lakes such as the Sitai, Tahu, and Eding and the marshes of the islands 

 at the mouth of the Yangtze are capital places for fowl, and a bag such as mentioned 

 might, on a favourable day, without much difficulty be obtained. 



SHOOTING FROM BLINDS. 



Natural blinds are made of reeds or grass as like as possible to the grass in the 

 place where you are shooting. One should generally study the ground a bit to find out 

 where the ducks are in the habit of feeding and at what hour they come (at Block House 

 it was as the tide came up) ; and one ought to be on the ground about an hour before the* 

 tide begins to make, in order to build the blind and place one's decoys. Always try and 

 get the wind behind you, or as nearly so as possible. 



My best day's sport was on the bank, and near its mouth, of one of the numerous 

 creeks on the east side of Block House Island. Had I had a battery and sunk it in the 

 mud just about the limit of high water, and covered the float with dry grass, I should have 

 done much better than I did. An arrangement of this kind would ensure magnificent 

 shooting every day for 3 or 4 hours. There are some 30 small creeks on the east side of 

 the island at whose mouths quantities of ducks, geese and swan come in to feed at every 

 high tide ; so one need never shoot two days in succession on the same spot. 



A good scheme is to notice where ducks are feeding, scatter two or three bags of 

 paddy, which should be left alone for a day or two, then plant the battery ; and shoot at 

 your own sweet will. For successful shooting at Block House one requires 



100 decoy ducks ; 

 25 do. geese; 

 12 do. swan. 



Never use duck and geese decoys together. Geese fight the ducks in nature, and ducks 

 will never alight to geese decoys. But ducks and swan feed together, or rather the ducks 

 hang around the swans, and when Mr. Swan goes down with that neck of his and brings 

 up a sweet root which Mr. Duck has not the strength to do, Mr. Duck snatches it away before 

 the swan can clear his eye of the water. 



The great secret of duck shooting is not to move when ducks are in sight. If a flock 

 or pair come in unawares do not dodge down behind the blind: simply do not move. 

 One's clothes also " should be as near the natural colour of the grass as possible ; and 

 white when snow is on the ground." 



In the absence of a proper box the tub the natives use in tending and collecting their 

 water chestnut crops might, slightly ballasted, be very advantageously employed. In fact, 

 in very shallow waters, among the reeds and tussocks, nothing could well be more suitable. 

 It certainly would be stiffer and consequently safer than the flimsy dug-outs in which the 

 native shooter pursues his calling in the lagoons. 



