86 
ANAS RUBRIPES 
skill and an intimate knowledge of tides and winds, and was mostly used by pro- 
fessionals. During northeast storms, many were taken from these floats on the 
marsh in the daytime. Floats are also used in other regions. In Merrymeeting 
Bay, in Maine, the shooter anchors a fleet of decoys both live and wooden, and then 
hides in his float in a nearby rice-bed. When a flock alights among his decoy ducks, 
he sculls down wind upon them and shoots them as best he can. 
Audubon mentions the gunners near Boston using live decoys and shooting from 
hidden boats in his day. On Nantucket we are told that shooters used to put out a 
live decoy gull with their live ducks, to make the wild ducks “tamer. ” On the coast 
of Virginia many used to be taken with nets at night, but this practice has now been 
stopped. All along the southern coast the species is much tamer, and comes more 
readily to wooden decoys. 
Baiting is practised now in a great many places, particularly on Martha’s Vine- 
yard, on Long Island and on the big club properties of North and South Carolina. 
This is of course a very effective method of attracting ducks, but it makes the shoot- 
ing rather too easy at times. 
Here and there it is possible to shoot Black Ducks from batteries, — cofRn- 
shaped boxes, sunk with weights to the level of the water, — but as a rule Black 
Ducks fly high enough to see the battery before they come to it. 
Of course there are other ways of getting a few Black Ducks. I have shot many by 
crawling to them in small ponds or walking them up in a marsh. The latter method 
is not usually successful unless there is a hea\^ wind blowing to keep them from 
hearing you, and you lose many unless you have a good dog. There is really no 
more sportsmanlike method than stalking, and one has to use every precaution to 
get within shot of Black Ducks, especially if crawling through woods or brush. A 
windy day gives one the best chance. 
The “ Red-legs ” that winter in New England seem to have learned all about live 
decoys, and approach them either not at all, or with the utmost caution and reserve. 
I have lost many shots at these “winter” ducks by having an energetic call-duck let 
out a high-pitched quack at the wrong moment. 
It appears that in early Colonial days some pipe decoys after the style of the 
Dutch and English ones must have been attempted here in Massachusetts, for I ran 
across an old reference to a permission granted a resident of Salem in 1638. As I 
never before heard of “duck-coys” in New England, this paragraph from a book on 
Salem witchcraft (by Charles W. Upham, Boston, 1867, p. 41) is worth quoting. It 
says, “At a general court held at Boston, September 6, 1638, it was voted that 
‘whereas Emanuel Downing Esq hath brought over, at his great charges, all things 
fitting for taking wild fowl by way of duck-coy, this court, being desirous to en- 
courage him and others in such designs as tend to the public good, . . .’ orders that 
liberty shall be given him to set up his duck-coy within the limits of Salem ; and all 
