70 A GAMEKEEPER'S NOTE-BOOK 



boiling the addled eggs for several hours in lime- 

 water. He makes up the false nests in places where 

 the eggs shall be comparatively safe ; his great 

 object being to induce his birds to lay at home, and 

 not to stray away into his neighbour's coverts. The 

 method saves much time in searching for nests. But 

 even when he has the best of luck, a keeper would 

 not be a proper keeper if he did not complain that 

 his hens are laying on his neighbour's ground. Not 

 unusually, three or four hens lay in the same nest 

 we have known six to lay in one nest, and on one day. 

 From three nests within fifty yards of each other we 

 have counted more than one hundred eggs and 

 this in a place where pheasants were few. It is a 

 great satisfaction to the keeper to find one of these 

 co-operative nests. He knows that if he leaves the 

 hens to themselves, their eggs will soon be piled up in 

 the nest on top of each other, like a heap of stones. 

 No one pheasant could hatch out such a prodigious 

 clutch, even if left in undisputed possession. What 

 usually happens is that some hens want to lay and 

 others to sit, so that between them the eggs are 

 spoiled. The keeper anticipates trouble by collecting 

 the eggs and distributing them elsewhere for hatching. 

 He knows that his fowls will not hatch out as high a 

 proportion of pheasant eggs from large nests as from 

 smaller ones, since few are given the regular turning 

 necessary to preserve their fertility. But, in spite of 

 this knowledge, there is a deal of friendly rivalry among 

 keepers as to who shall find the nest with the most eggs. 



