VERMIN AND TRAPPING 103 
eyes—in fact, any sort of eyes—are very attractive 
baits for jays, provided the trap is skilfully hidden. 
But the best bait that I know of is a piece of the 
yellow fat from the interior of afowl. This reminds 
me that once, while resetting a trap to such a bait, 
after catching a jay, I caught my little finger in its 
four-inch jaws. 
When it is desirable to thin jays, it is a capital 
plan, and both sporting and speedy, to take out a 
tame specimen and a gun to likely parts of the 
woods. To your bird’s squawks the wild ones will 
come, and give you a shot or two at a stand. You 
must be ready and pretty smart to hit the jays, 
as they come silently and swiftly—it is just a flash 
of blue, white, and purple, and they are come and 
gone. Failing a live jay, a useful imitation call 
may be produced by a laurel-leaf and one’s own 
lips. But there is nothing to equal the genuine 
squawk. Jays chiefly are responsible for the 
emptiness of so many pigeons’ nests, and there is 
nothing like a sprinkling of jays for checking the 
increase of home-bred pigeons. Unfortunately, jays 
are even more fond of rifling the nests of turtle- 
doves, which do as much good as pigeons do harm. 
Some owls occasionally kill young pheasants 
(even when they are big as old partridges), 
while others sometimes frighten them; therefore, 
all owls ought to be slain. So reason many keepers 
who ought to know better. The truth is this: few 
