338 THE COMPLETE SHOT 



to be possible, although most useful work has been done by the 

 Duke of Northumberland, at Alnwick, in placing a metal ring 

 round a leg of all young woodcock found there. Amongst other 

 things thus established is that the movements of birds seem to 

 be governed by no law capable of definition. For instance, 

 a bird bred at Alnwick has been shot in the Highlands of 

 Scotland, whereas others have been shot in the extreme south 

 of England, and another in Ireland. But the strangest part of 

 the story is that most of them do not appear to have been shot 

 at all. Perhaps in that fact may lie the explanation why the 

 home breeding of woodcocks increases. 



It has been said that coverts devoted to pheasants save the 

 lives of many 'cock, but it is also said that these birds do not 

 like coverts in which there are many pheasants. It is suggested 

 that the pheasants eat all the food, such as insects and worms, 

 to be found under the dead leaves. There appears to be very 

 little in this contention. A woodcock in covert is generally a 

 woodcock asleep and not feeding. When flushed he is as foolish 

 as a daylight owl. But in hard weather, when he has been 

 unable to get enough food by night, and is compelled to feed in 

 the daytime also, and when you find him on the brook-side, he 

 is no fool then, and can fly as quickly as a snipe, and is as much 

 on the alert. The difference in manner proves that the wood- 

 cocks are very rarely feeding when flushed by the beaters. In 

 Ireland and the west of Scotland the warm heather-clad hills 

 hold the woodcock more than the coverts do, until the birds are 

 driven by snow or hail to the woods. Rain and mist will after- 

 wards drive the 'cock out of the coverts and back to the hills, 

 but it is thought that at Ashford fewer go back to the heather 

 on each occasion, so that the longer shooting is delayed in 

 January the more birds there are in those coverts. 



Woodcocks lay four eggs ; they pair, probably have two 

 broods each season, and they are in the habit of carrying the 

 young birds out to the feeding-grounds. They hold them by 

 various methods : sometimes they clasp them to the breast 

 by the pressure of the bill, sometimes they clasp them 

 between the legs or thigh. One woodcock has been seen to 



