DEC0Y8 rOK WILD FOWL. 235 



wire, and, by so doing, capture tlicmselvcs ; and, 

 in tlie same wa}^, it permits any birds that arc 

 pinioned by the gun, and for the time lost, to come 

 where they can be taken and killed, or fed luitil 

 they recover. 



A porid, if thus wired-in with wire of a small 

 mesh and with due care, also acts as a trap for 

 vermin, as, though they can leap in very easily, 

 they cannot jump out, nor get out, unless they 

 burrow through the bank, which they never have 

 the patience to do in any one place long enough 

 to compass a sufficient hole by wdiich to escape 

 to the wilder lands. 



In these small decoy ponds for teal, there 

 should always be made a feeding-place for those 

 delicate little fowl. Supj^osing there to be from 

 two to three couple of pinioned teal, a feeding- 

 house should be made for them of very fine wire, 

 the lower part of this wire^ amounting to a sort 

 of small iron rod, to bear the stress that in two 

 places would be continually laid upon it by the 

 passing in and out of the teal, and the attempts to 

 force their way in of the larger wild ducks outside. 



This Avire feeding-house should have four sides, 

 one side being made by the upright Ixink, the 



