POACHING 153 



attention of more than one person, thus increasing the 

 chance of detection. The keeper, who in the course 

 of his rounds may happen to detect a number of 

 ' wires,' has two courses open to him. He may either 

 pull up the pegs and take the snares bodily away 

 (unless, of course, they have been set by an ' occupier ' 

 on land in his occupation, when the keeper has no 

 right to remove them '), or he may watch the place 

 to discover who comes to look at them. In the latter 

 case he should give the culprit time, and if possible 

 catch him in the act of taking a rabbit out of a snare. 

 The plan of putting a dead rabbit in a wire and allowing 

 the poacher to find it is not to be recommended, for in 

 the event of a prosecution this would afford a loophole 

 for escape, since the keeper, if cross-examined for the 

 defence, would have to admit that he himself placed 

 the rabbit where it was found. It is much better to 

 allow the culprit to walk away with any rabbit he 

 may have seen him kill, and then to question him. 



In the case of ' long-netting ' it is better to counter- 

 act the setting by ' bushing ' the field, or driving the 

 rabbits into cover at night (about lo p.m. and again 

 about I A.M.) with a good dog, than to take pro- 

 ceedings against the offenders after the rabbits have 

 been killed and removed. 



' See Hobbs v. Symons, The Field, March 31, 1888. 



