METHODS OF SHOOTING THE RED 

 GROUSE 



WHETHER we ask the driver of game or the dog man 

 does not matter, all are agreed that the red grouse 

 is the most sporting bird we have. It is only necessary to see 

 how artfully grouse butts are placed, in order to make the 

 shooting as easy as possible, to know that the grouse's flight 

 is a match for the shooter. Successful drivings, or big bags in 

 the day, which is the same thing, require every assistance to 

 be given to the gunner, for in grouse shooting height is an 

 assistance to him, although it is the reverse in pheasant shooting. 

 The reason is that the grouse usually flies too low for a clear 

 sight of it against the sky, and also low enough to make 

 shooting dangerous when the birds cross the line of the butts. 

 The time has not yet come with grouse, as it has with pheasants 

 to a great extent, when beats are planned to make the shooting 

 as difficult as possible. This is not wholly true of pheasants 

 either, because no one for the sake of increased difficulty places 

 shooters amongst trees, and especially fir trees, and nobody for 

 the added difficulty shoots his pheasants when the leaf is still 

 on. In the same way, a grouse driver does not put his butts 

 where grouse cannot be seen approaching, but selects a position 

 40 or more yards behind a slight rise in the ground, in order 

 that the guns may see the game before it is within range, but 

 not so much before that the sight of the gunners in the butts 

 will turn the grouse. So, then, to make big bags, every ad- 

 vantage has to be taken to drive the grouse as easily for the 

 guns as can be done, and besides this the " crack " gunners 

 excel in being best able to select the easiest, or perhaps it would 



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