THE WILD GOOSE. 341 



The sportsman whose business is such that a goose- 

 hunt is only permissible during the winter months will find 

 a visit to Texas filled with pleasant results. The geese 

 generally arrive in that locality about November 1st, and 

 keep coming until the middle of December. The natives 

 will tell you that but three varieties winter there, namely, 

 the Canadas and the white and black brant. As in 

 many other localities, eveiy thing in the goose family is 

 a brant except the Canadas. In Texas the geese resort 

 to the pond-holes and marshy grounds as a loafing-place 

 and to the high, dry, upland prairies for feed. The hours 

 for feeding are the same as in more northern localities. 

 They feed chiefly on the young sprouts of green grass 

 and such insects as they can pick up on the prairie. As 

 the prairies are studded all over with pond-holes and 

 marshes in many portions of the State, the geese have no 

 trouble in finding ample feeding-grounds in close prox- 

 imity to their roosting-places; hence they fly very low in 

 going and coming, and in moving about from place to 

 place in search of food, in localities where not much 

 hunted, they also fly close to the ground, not over twenty 

 or thirty feet high. The sportsman can therefore find 

 good shooting by roaming the prairies in a hap-hazard 

 manner, and keeping both eyes open for passing flocks. 

 The general plan of hunting them, however, and the most 

 successful one, is by building a blind upon the shore of 

 some marshy place, or, if the indications are better, in 

 the center. If the hunter is supplied with profile decoys, 

 they can be set out by binding a stick to the supporting 

 rod, and shoving it into the mud, until the decoy presents 

 a life-like appearance. A dead goose may be set up as a 

 decoy by pushing one end of a stick in the mud and the 

 other end, sharpened, up through the neck into the head. 

 This is easier written than done, however, as it is quite a 

 trick to set up a dead goose or duck so that it will look 



