352 THE COMPLETE SHOT 



gives a few very sporting shots, but neither plan is likely to give 

 great sport, and the best is undoubtedly to be had only by the 

 double means of the use of decoys and a constant and simul- 

 taneous disturbance of the pigeons in all the coverts of a 

 neighbourhood by a number of guns. 



In this way the birds are kept upon the move all the time, 

 they are attracted to your hide by your decoys or dummy 

 pigeons, and many times over 100 and sometimes over 200 

 pigeons have in this way been killed in one day by a single 

 gun. The shooting is all the harder because of the necessity 

 of shooting from a shelter, except in snow-time, when occasion- 

 ally a white nightshirt is a good substitute for any hide, and 

 the gunner may stand out in the open unobserved by the birds. 

 Very tall bamboo rods are useful to fix up dummy or stuffed 

 wood pigeons, head to the wind, on the tallest branches of the 

 trees near by the sportsman's hide. Others can be placed upon 

 the ground to give additional confidence to the coming birds. 

 Even better results can be obtained by the use of one or two 

 live decoys on the ground amongst the dummy or stuffed birds. 



A live decoy is best used on the principle of the " play bird " 

 of the bird-catching fraternity. He is made to rise from the 

 ground occasionally, so that he flaps his wings and settles again. 

 This is done by the pulling of a string which is fastened to the 

 pigeon and works over a lever. Anything in the shape of a 

 couple of sticks placed some yards apart, with the string fastened 

 to the farther from the shooter and running loosely over the 

 top of the nearer, will answer the purpose of hoisting up the 

 pigeon 4 feet or a yard. In tying it to the running string 

 between the two sticks, it is necessary so to arrange as not 

 to impede the wing movement and not to turn over the bird 

 in flipping it upwards. It is not the rise that must be looked 

 to for attracting wild ones, but the natural way the bird 

 settles after it has been flipped into the air. This will be seen 

 much farther away than the dummies on the ground, or even 

 those in the trees, but it is not so much because of the distance 

 whence it is seen as because of the confidence it begets that 

 it is the best form of decoy. In this sport the quicker one 



