PIGEONS, DOVES, BITTERNS, ETC, 343 
set, as a pigeonry which is deserted one week may be 
occupied again the next. 
After all the mast in a pigeonry has been eaten up, 
the old birds start on foraging expeditions at daylight, 
and some go so far that they do not return until mid- 
night. The distance the latter traverse in that time must 
be very great, when we consider how swiftly they can fly. 
One of the greatest wonders connected with these birds 
is the instinctive manner in which they find their own 
nests at any hour of the night, although they are the 
counterpart of millions of others in the neighborhood. As 
soon as the pigeons take up their residence in a forest, 
the men and boys in the neighboring districts arm them- 
selves with guns and clubs and saliy forth to deal destruc- 
tion among them. Those who have guns shoot them 
all night, and those possessing clubs climb the trees and 
knock them down as fast as they can. Thousands upon 
thousands are slaughtered in a night in this manner, yet it 
does not seem to diminish their numbers from year to year. 
Sportsmen generally take their stands in glades and shoot 
the birds as they fly to and from their roosts each morn- 
ing and evening, and though this is somewhat better than 
killing them on their perches, yet the destruction is al- 
most equally as great, owing to the density of the flights. 
Vast numbers are also caught alive by netters, for the 
purpose of being used in pigeon tournaments, or to be 
kept until they are wanted for market. The netters some- 
times pay the owner of forest land from ten to a hun- 
dred dollars for a spot where the flight is good, or for a 
drinking place or salt marsh which the birds frequent 
regularly. Their first movement is to bait the ground 
with salt, and then to set their seines. When everything 
is ready, they conceal themselves, and wait until the first 
pigeon arrives and announces the finding of the bait. 
The moment it does that, they make preparations for 
casting. The satisfied piping of the discoverer of the 
