438 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[DBO. 11, 1883. 



fully situated and well kept, me $9 per day for transient 

 hoarders, rind $10 and $12 per week for permanent. The 

 hoarding-houses ids;,, afford comfortable and pleasant trilflr- 

 ters lor more retired tastes at from $1 to *■"> per weak. 



RAWER, 

 Beaotort, South Carolina. No/. SO, 



in another 

 rey of part- 

 iem up, do 



ne. There 

 liman get 

 re were not 

 in in town, 

 enty men and dogs 

 e perhaps twenty 



NOTES ON GAME BIRDS. 



WINTER has fairly set in now, and in some places our 

 farmers are already feeding the quail. Not a great 

 many are left to feed, however, and if it were not, for the 

 foresight of some of our summer resident shooters, few 

 would remain on the necksof land which used to he the bOSl 

 shooting ground in this town. Some of these men post their 

 laud and stock ihe premises with birds: others warn off any 

 person whom they lind with dog and srun. One man who 

 follows the birds without any lei up from the first day in 

 the open season till it, no longer pays to shoot, told ma he 

 had killed one hundred and fifty partridges (rulled grouse). 

 He shoots for the market only, and the farmers, neighbors 

 and sportsmen generally look'ou him with some concern as 

 a man likely to make' the shooting very poor 

 year. lie says that in September he can find a co 

 ridges which, u hen his dog points and he puts I 

 not fly far. keep together, and he can gel every , 

 is no help fortius, hut to begin on time aihfca, 



his share. The writer can remember when the 



two pair of pointing dogs nor- a breech loading </ 



.Now. on the fifteenth day of October, tw 



come in on the morning train, and Ihere 



coveys of quail within two hours' walk of the station It 



requires but a moments thought, and one may well predict 



where they will he in a week. 



We knew where there were three coveys within ten min- 

 utes' walk from the house. There were about fifty birds all 

 told ; personally we got, thirteen of them. To-day 'one covey 

 hus been used up entirely: The writer started "live out of 

 another, aud he has not seen nor heard of the third for sev- 

 eral weeks. The last one we shot lies on the fire-frame lief, ire 

 us, a female; we skinned and stuffed it as well as our skill 

 admits, and it serves as a model for a picture of dead game. 

 A snipe, killed on the marsh in front of our house, and a 

 pair of quail, occupy the canvas, which is nearly finished 

 The skin of a ruffed grouse lies beside the quail. Wc got 

 hiin just before the snow. Old Roy— now in his twelfth 

 year— came to a point in an old field well grown with -young 

 oaks and pines. We quickly came to hand, and then on 

 went the dog, now pointing and then moving on. H. said 

 there were no birds, but I knew better, aud said it was a 

 partridge and thai it was running. We kept going round 

 and round among the bushes, and 1 told H. to look for the 

 bird on the ground. Finally 1 saw something on a stump, 

 and it, was that partridge, i wailed just long enough to 

 catch sight, aud pulled on him, Ought to let him fly, had 

 I? Couldn't have seen him a yard in that cover. Old Roy 

 is a most careful dog on grouse, and will hardly ever flush" 

 unless the birds are so wild that they rise out of shot. 



There is much in "^essmuk's" theory that is true The 

 hunting is the sport. Who is there but enjoys the tramp 

 through the woods and pastures? Who would 'cafe to shoot 



if there yvas no hunt to if? Who goes fishing in can ir 



sailing craft, or by brookside. but, thinks every 'moment well 

 spent and worth enjoying? He who is pleased only when 

 loaded down with game may be less of hunter than gunner. 

 We have been out gunning and fishing and enjoyed both. 

 We never got more than we could carry home unassisted, 

 though a back load of loons tired us once. 



In Eastern Massachusetts one cannot find game enough to 

 make a heavy load unless he is a good hunter as well as 

 gunner. Our game is mostly migratory; that is, the wild 

 fowl. Deer are found in parts of two counties— Plymouth 

 aud Barnstable— mostly in the latter, which is Cape Cod. 

 They survive on the Cape because the pine lands are too 

 poor to cultivate and were never cleared. Very few deer 

 are killed by still-hunting. Some hares, rabbits and foxes 

 fill out the list, of mammals found in this part of the State. 

 Once in a while a story is start, d about a wild cat or lynx. 

 I have heard of a panther in Worcester county, and know oi' 

 two lynxes which were killed in Carver, Plymouth county. 

 Several cats with short tails and stout bodies, weighing 

 about thirty pounds, have been killed in Wan ham. One 

 was killed near my grandfather's house, and another at 

 Maple Springs; this last was shot by two gunners after he 

 had killed their dog. Why they didn't shoot him before he 

 killed the dog I can't say. ' 



Among our birds the raffed grouse takes the lead and the 

 Bob White follows. The grouse are found all over the Cape 

 clear to Princetowu; though if they were once killed out in 

 that place there would be no more unless they were brought; 

 as none would ever cross East Harbor beach nor come 

 around by the hills from Green Head in Truro. 1 do not 

 know that any are foundin Naut ucket or at Martha's \' i ncyard, 

 though a very few pinnated grouse are found in tin: latter,' 

 some mention of which has been made in the columns of 

 Forest and Btbeam. One pinnaled grouse was shot by 

 Mr. T. A. Churbuc.k, in Wareham. some years ago, or at, best 

 a grouse that was not our common raffed variety. The 

 partridge will long continue to be one of our commonest 

 game birds, because in our town many swamps are so 

 thick, and in MiddlebOJO most of the woods that one cannot 

 get in and shoot at the birds his dog points. Little Bob 

 White is fast learning that the woods arc his only salvation 

 He is now quite a woods bird." 1 have found him several 

 miles from any cleared land and why not? lie is a native, 

 and when our fathers came he was here to whistle a welcome 

 to them, and where were the fields then? 1 wonder if the 

 Indians ever killed the little fellow ; I guess they trapped 

 him as some persons do at this day. 



Our little bird likes to feed in the Lop of fallen locusts- 

 these trees bear a little pod with a few hard Hal, beans in it, 

 and Bob will open these and eat the seeds. 1 have watched 

 them hours at a time. Often have 1 seen one jump up and 

 natch on to a pod with his hill, and hang on till he jerked I he 

 pod down. There is as much sport in watching a flock as in 

 bringing them to bag. that is to the hunter— I make an ex- 

 ception in favor of the gunner— he goes shooting, a hunter 

 may not have a gun with him. 



The voice of a quail is one of the sweetest and most melo- 

 dious of all our birds; not the clear -'ah-Bob- White" of spring. 



or the simpler "Bob White" and 

 aud fall, but, the many varii 

 gossip, perhaps, when feed 

 stand what they were say 

 twenty in a locust top at t. 

 ah-cle-o-kie, ill-oleokee. elicit 



qu 



of ll, 



' of summer 



lay talk and 

 ould under- 

 ■ould count 

 ' Clcar-kie. 

 ,1 many other 



a male crow in spring; he sat on the top rail of a feme and 

 crooked his neck, and made a peculiar sound— inimitable. 

 Whether I hey have gular sacs like a pinnated arouse lain 

 not certain, but 1 never found any or heard of them. 



I have seen a quail run up a tree trunk that was inclined 

 at an angle of sixty degrees. The sunny ends of a stone wall 

 is a lavorite place with them in the winter. Fallen timber 

 old brush heaps and thick, tall grass are eagerly sought by 

 them for shelfev when feeding, and whoever tries feeding 

 Them will do well to have some such cover nearby, so they 

 can retire quickly at any approach of danger. They have 

 so many enemies that one cannot do much for them except 

 to supply cover and shoot all the stray cats, animals, skunks, 

 weasels aud foxes that come in range. Hawks probably get 

 some, and 1 newer let a hawk get away if I can help it. 

 Their nests are not, so easy to find as one might suppose, 

 and they lay a good many eggs, all of which seem to be 

 fertile, as I never saw a rotten one or one that did not hatch. 

 Two biters or hatchings are the rule with ns; this I know 

 from seeing a mixed flock of two sizes with only one pair 

 of adult birds. 



Quail will sometimes lie so close as to puzzle the shooter. 

 I got one this summer into a small hunch of old limbs and 

 leaves at the foot of a tree, The dog pointed and I looked, 

 threw slicks, ami at last kicked the rubbish, and still he did 

 not, fly. I though! he was a dead or crippled bird, and 

 reached down and pulled over the sticks and up he got, and 

 off he went, before 1 cculd catch a sight at, him. 



Once, after a light snow, my brother and I tracked three 

 into a heap of brush that could all be got into a bushel bas- 

 ket. We knew they were under it, and we looked all over 

 it in vain, then stood on it and stamped, none, got up. "Dead," 

 says Phil. 1 began to dig after them, but they were not 

 dead, and two didn't, die that day. 



1 ouee picked up a quail that Roy pointed. 



Sometimes they learn wisdom very soon after being shot 

 at. I know one covey that will rise out of gunshot and fly 

 clear over a, wide pie'ee of woods, and get out into the field 

 on the other side before one can hunt through to them. 



I never got a "pot shot.'' and seventeen is as many as 1 

 ever knew any one to kill at one shot; that was in Maryland, 

 the shooter was a farmer who was out, after rabbits, he 

 tracked the quail in the snow, and came up with them 

 in a path through a field: they hid under a little pine 

 bush, and two got away with broken wings, for he could not 

 lind them in the briers'. Seventeen he took home, "And there 

 was a right smart of feathers then," he said, ne never 

 hunted quail and would not shoot at less than six or seven. 

 Mr. Charles Pierce, of Elk Neck. Md., told me that when a 

 boy he saw a quail light by the side of a water hole and 

 fired: he went there and picked up nine: they were all there 

 to drink and lie did not see but, oue. The writer oncewent 

 with his father, and the dog pointed some quail in a pit 

 where stone had been taken out. The old gentleman saw 

 something start to run aud fired; two quail rose and the son 

 killed right and left for the first time in his life, that was all. 

 Six lay where the old gentleman saw the one starting. We 

 killed the whole covey, aud it wasn't much of a day for 

 quail either; still it was a long time before we explained 

 how we killed so many in so few shots. MiUiGi/s. 



ON THE VIRGINIA BROADWATER. 



I HAVE just returned from a two weeks' shooting on the 

 Broadwater, by wdiieh term I mean that section of sea 

 meadows some forty miles in area, bordering the Chesapeake 

 Bay. Time yvas in* the memory of mac, when these islands. 

 mud flats, and sandbank over which the ocean broke in high 

 tide, was the finest sporting ground on the American conti- 

 nent. I have heard old sportsmen tell of the quantity of 

 wildfowl that wintered here, so vast in quantity as almost 

 to stagger belief. Among the many varieties were the two 

 gamest birds that fly, the brant and black duck. This Broad- 

 water was the stopping place of the migrating wildfowl, and 

 estuaries of the Chesapeake Bay were alive with them, and 

 royal sport could be had. I have often heard old man Cobb 

 speak of the huge' flocks of brant that wintered around his 

 island, and Nathan, his son. who was the spoilsman of the 

 family, made some heavy hags, as high as oue hundred and 

 eighty brant in one day's gunning over the decoys. 



Just after the war the duck shooting was fine" but it has 

 steadily declined ever since. I have spent several Weeks in 

 every winter since 1876 in the Broadwater, and I ought to 

 know something about ducks by this time, and what 1 

 learned was beat in my head and impressed on my mind by 

 the hardest kind of experience; 1 have risked my life over 

 and over again in the stormiest weather, have been capsized 

 twice, cast away on a barren sandbank, losing my decoys; 

 have undergone enough hardships in fighting the storm, and 

 been in the blinds in such weather that nothing but a sea gull 

 had any business to be abroad ; so I write this BOt in a boast- 

 ow what I am writing 

 ileum warning to my 



sguidfcd man who con- 

 on his shoulder. 

 Virginia Broadwater 



Island, Cape Charles, 

 tation of having any 



ing vein, but simply to show that I ki 



I i 



id 



)gn 



ad vie,: 



■do 



i Cobl 



you do, yon will go t I 



things too line aud sweet lor phonetic spelling. 1 have heard 



about. And 

 brother sport 



which will be of great 

 templates comingthis -i 



It, is this: Don't cor 

 duck hunting. Don't 

 Kiiiiiuni's or the Cape 

 brant or wild goose she 

 home a wiser and a ma, 



Brant shooting is the most fascinating sport 1 ever expe- 

 rienced ; | heir size, their rapid flight, the beautiful way they 

 approach the decoys, all combined thdll the sportsman with 

 a keen delight, and make him sit for hours in a blind with 

 the numbing northwest wind blowing a gale, and chilling 

 him to the marrow of his hone, content "indeed if he can 

 every now aud then stop one of these black-headed, white- 

 breasted brant in its careering flight, and see the heavy body 

 strike the water with such force as to send the spray high in 

 the air. ll requires much infinite patience, and a" capacity 

 to wail, equal to that of a Pawnee Indian; thereare not, on an 

 average, more than two day- oul of the week when you cm 

 shoot brant— three requisites are absolutely indispensable, a 

 high wind, a flood tide, ami a brighl sun— if unless al! three 

 perfectly conjoin it is nouse to set yonr decoys, ll is weaiy 

 waiting for the days to drag their weary lentgh out, especially 

 if vou are m the confined hold of a vessel." or some island 

 hut. 



For the last two years there has been absolutely no brant 

 shooting. There are plenty of birds, but they are us wise as 

 serpents, aud have obtained a degree of sagacity that that 

 bird of the devil— Ihe crow — would be prOudlO possess. The 

 brant keep together in one large flock, and neither tempest 

 nor gale, can break them; they avoid a blind, with or without 

 decoys, as a jail bird does the policeman. It is simply im- 

 possible to stool them. Captain George Hitching-! of the 



Coast Guard of Division No, 5 told me yesterday that though 

 that king of gunners, Nathan Cobb, with all "of his thirty 

 years' experience, and with the aids of perfect decoys, only 

 lulled eight brant last winter, Tom Spadv, of Cobb's Island, 

 an ardent and enthusiastic sportsman, has riven up tin :pi 

 in disgust. 



For two weeks I have Iried the most famous blinds in the 

 Broadwater, and have not had a single shot at the braul 

 that would not come within a half mile, of the blind I am 

 done; never again in my life will I try brant hunting in this 

 region; it is, to use a slang expression— simply "played out." 



I he black ducks are very scarce, but toany one with more 

 ammunition than he knows what to do with, and who is 

 fond of popping at feathered things, there are hundreds aud 

 thousands of coots, loons, didappers. water witches bull- 

 heads, etc.. that he can fill his hag— but hardly his stomach 

 with. 



The Hygeia Hotel is thronged with sportsmen on their 

 way to Florida and the South. This seems lo be the lavorile 

 stopping place of the fraternity, and to see some of the out- 

 fits that some of them carry, one would think they were on 

 a trip with Stanley in the heart of Africa instead "of simply 

 going to spend a couple of months in the land of flowers 



Old Point Comfoiit. Ya„ Dec. '-JO, ClIAs*Ens. 



The Quail for States Island.— Mr. G. Walter, chair- 

 man of the game, law committee of the Brooklyn Gun Club, 

 having consulted Mr. Francis Endieott in reference lo a 

 published report that BOO quail were to be taken from Lon^ 

 Island to stock Staten Island, Mr Endieott has written the 

 following letter which explains itself: Editor F„ r ,:st mid 

 Stream: A statement has been published in some of the New 

 York papers that, the Riehmoud County Game and Fish 

 Protective Association were about to procure livequail from 

 Long Island for the purpose of stocking Staten Island. Will 

 you permit me to say that there is nn truth in this. story. We 

 have turned out over 600 quail on Staten Islaud in the last 

 three years, the progeny of which are living to-day, but the 

 birds we have obtained are from Stales where they are so 

 plentiful that the few taken would he but as a drop in the 

 bucket. We have never thought of obtaining them from any 

 or the counties of New York, deciding that it would be 

 simply robbing Peter to pay Paul.— Fkax< ts Exdioott 

 (President Richmond County Game and Fish Prote, tivo As 

 sociation). 



"That reminds me." 



WHICH ARE THE BEST? 



/ \UR last issue contained, in a special supplement, the en- 



^ tire series of Camp-Fire Flickering^ from the beginning 

 Of the column in July, 1882, The ninety-six stories wen- 

 given in the order in which they were printed, and each one 

 is numbered. Of these ninety-six stories every reader is 

 asked to select the ten which he thinks the best; to write 

 dowu the numbers of these ten, oue below the other, iu their 

 order of merit, putting the best first, the next best second, 

 etc., and then to semi the list to the Fouest and Sttieam. 

 Each list should be signed with the name and post-office ad- 

 dress of the .voter. It is requested that the lists hes'niou 

 postal cards; if iu envelopes they should he written on slips 

 of paper the size of a postal card. 



To send in this list of ten stories is all that the reader is 

 asked to do. 



There is no entrance fee. All who wish to do so an- < ov- 

 dially invited to put in a vole. The balloting is not limited 

 to subscribers, nor lo those who buy the paper— the privilege 

 is extended to the neighbors who borrow; the friend to 

 Whom it is sent alter ihe subscriber has read il ; yes. even lo 

 the postmasters who keeps it over Sunday and puts it -into 

 fin, subscriber's box Monday morning (and who is hereby 

 warned to desist from this I rick, for we have his name, and 

 by and by the time will be ripe for civil service reform in 

 that village); in short, this is an opportunity for thpse to vote 

 who never voted before, and may never have a chance to vote 

 again; without regajd to age; sex or previous condition of 

 non-sportsmanship. 



Two sets of seven prizes each will he awarded, one to (lie 

 writers of the winning stories, the other to the voters who 

 send m the best lists. The method of determining the win 

 ners in each class was explained in our lasi issue. 



The j irizes for the w ril era a ud the prizes for the voters will 



be flic same. They will be for each class as follows: 



first pnrzE. 



A copy of I lie hook "Sport h ill, Gun atld Rod," in embossed leather 



binding, or any other book or hooks of same value (815), at option of 



winner-;. 



"Sport Willi Ohio liu't Hot." ,-i,.,li I, in. lint. or any ,.,ther book of 



same faliie ' -ne. at option of winners: 



THIRD PIUZE. 



Noi'rts's "American Angler's BoSli e 5.5 ipri ■ 



"Uoge-l the. Urittsh Islands*' l8r.:>i).,, or Couoa's "Key to North A,,.. ■■, ,. .,. 

 Birds" (.?,,!. or any other book or hooks of same value, at option oi 



The Forest am, Strkam for o 



l year. 



TheFoiiEsi A.su HtkXAM for six months. 



sixth ee.i/.E. 



"Training vs, t&ea]ciug,"by S. T- Hammond (which, bj tin- way, 



contains some capital Htoriesi. 



SKVEKTn PRIZE. 



--Angling- Tuiki." by-Geo. Dawson. 



In ease of a tie the prize will be divided, Ro person wiU be awarded 

 more (nan one. prize. If two prizes are voted to the-sBHu; 



he will be given die highest of them, aud the other will pass to ihe, 

 next man on to ' 



Ballots should he sort in as soon as is,, in j 

 give distant readers an opportunity to vote, lists will be 



received u]j to Fein uary a, aud as Tin edi 



Kennel Rtgiisti!' so often -ays, "none can be received later," 



The polls are open 



