386 AN ENGLISH GAMEKEEPER, 



day long, busily searching the leaves and 

 grass to find their food. Whilst they are thus 

 engaged they cannot be rambling away on 

 some other person's fields, hedges, woods, 

 springs, plantations, etc., and the poacher 

 does not get the chance of killing eight or ten 

 birds at one shot. He can only put up one bird 

 at a time, and that he must shoot flying, so 

 that he will have to shoot eight or ten times 

 to kill the same amount of birds. He will 

 probably miss five out of ten, and then there 

 is the chance of the keeper getting up with 

 him, and this has a very deterrent effect on a 

 poacher. 



Under the old method of feeding, the birds 

 have cleared up all the corn in about ten or 

 fifteen minutes, so that there is nothing more 

 for them to do until ten o'clock the next day, 

 which is the usual time for feeding. The 

 pheasants are all gone, possibly have eaten 

 just enough to make them wish for more ; 

 and, being great wanderers, they are soon 

 straying on someone else's land. If your 

 neighbour is unfriendly disposed towards you 



