26 A GAMEKEEPER'S NOTE-BOOK 



that have been feeding on carrion sheep and lambs. 

 Shortness of food has the effect of prolonging the 

 business of coat-changing, as is well seen in the case 

 of a ferret kept on short commons. A white ferret is 

 deep yellow in the spring before it has changed its coat. 

 Stoats, too, show yellow on parts which will be white 

 in the new coat. 



We met, by chance, an old keeper who, on first 



acquaintance, seemed a remarkable specimen for he 



informed us that his orders were to set not a 



The single trap anywhere on his ten thousand 



Vermin mi . , . , , 



acres. Thinking that we saw r a movement of 



his eyelid, we put the blunt question to him : 

 How many traps did he usually set ? And he replied 

 unblushingly, " Forty dozen." He kept no record of 

 his bag of vermin ; but as he trapped on such a whole- 

 sale scale (remembering that the estate is supposed to 

 be trapless), no doubt his employer would be startled 

 if he knew the numbers of vermin killed ; his vermin 

 bag must be exceptional. The old-fashioned keeper 

 is stubborn ; the kestrel, as we have said before, is 

 seen too often on his gibbet, and he has no respect 

 for the useful wood-owl, which he ruthlessly exter- 

 minates. A record of a year's bag of vermin on one 

 big estate reads thus : Jays, 350 ; magpies, 160 ; 

 crows, 150 ; squirrels, 140 ; weasels, 80 ; cats, 70 ; 

 stoats, 60 ; hedgehogs, 40 ; hawks, 30 ; total, 1080. 

 This record says nothing of rats, rooks or owls, 



