CONCERNING DUCK DECOYS 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream: 
H OW many shooters give much atten- 
tion to the choice and placing of their 
decoys? Nowadays, with ducks and 
geese as shy and careful as they are, 
decoys are essential and as an essential 
they should have much thought. 
A study of the habits of birds will re- 
veal many things which explain why 
certain ducks decoy better than others. 
Black ducks are notoriously wary, but 
often they swing into decoys which, to 
the amateur, look crude and poor. Why 
is it? Blue-bills, both greater and lesser, 
usually decoy easily; yet the reverse is 
often the case. From several years’ ob- 
servation it seems to me that the main 
trouble is in the choice or placing of the 
decoys. 
The average wooden decoy which is 
put on the market is well formed, but 
too brightly painted. The paint when 
wet shines and glistens. No one ever 
saw a duck that shone. The best way 
to overcome this defect is to allow the 
decoys to weather a little before putting 
them out. Buy them some time before 
the season opens and allow them to 
weather for a fortnight or so. This 
produces the required dullness without 
injury to the wood. Another point to be 
considered is the position of the birds. 
Buy your decoys so that you get some 
in a sleeping position, some with their 
heads turned, some with them erect. No 
flock of ducks floats with all the heads 
erect unless suspicious. This is just the 
a.ttitude you do not want to have. The 
decoys in front of your blind should look 
quiet and unafraid, as if there was no 
human being for miles around. With a 
mixed flock like this you will have bet- 
ter success. 
In pond shooting there is usually a 
mixed variety of birds flying. Black 
ducks, mallards, blue-bills or red-heads, 
with occasionally other species, will be 
around. Do not let a situation like this 
cause you to mix your different kinds of 
decoys heterogeneously. If you watch 
flying birds carefully you will see that 
black ducks, for instance, will not alight 
with blue-bills. They may alight some 
distance away and swim up to them, but 
they will not alight with them. Mal- 
lards will mix with black ducks, but not 
with red-heads or blue-bills. Canvas 
backs like to stay alone as do teal. A 
sheldrake will mix with anything. So, 
when setting out decoys, put the blue- 
bills in a little flock by themselves apart 
from the mallards and black ducks which 
can be mixed at will. 
Take pains to make your set-out as 
natural as possible. Have some birds 
feeding close to shore as sheldrakes are 
so commonly seen doing;. The divers, 
like blue-bills, should be farther out than 
the mallards who are shallow feeders. 
Many birds, like teal, should be off to 
one side as they would be in life. With 
such a setting birds are far more likely 
to decoy than if you had flung out your 
flocks any old way, seeing only that the 
anchors did not get tangled up. 
Live birds should be kept on the beach 
as much as possible. In the water they 
are silent, realizing that they are tied 
down. A few stools are necessary, but 
those on the beach will go to the water 
and look far more natural cliifibing in 
and out than those floating plainly tied 
to the end of a string. 
Naturalness should be the keynote of 
your set. Unhampered ducks and life- 
like decoys will do much towards making 
the season a successful one. A half- 
dozen more birds than usual should re- 
pay anyone for taking the extra pains 
to make his set look natural. 
Wynant D. Hubbard, Mass. 
FROM AN OLD READER 
To the Editor of Forest and Stream: 
D O you know I felt the other day just 
as if I had met some old time dear 
friend when visiting a neighbor I hap- 
pened to run onto an old copy of Forest 
and Stream? Furthermore I at once 
appropriated that copy and it lies before 
me now and I have journeyed over every 
line, ads and all, and as I read of gun 
and dog 'and fishing reel, the years fell 
away and I was again in fancy amid 
the scenes of days that are gone, days 
which for me cannot come back again — 
but — I have something which cannot be 
taken from me, sweet memories. And 
now while old Father Time in his pass- 
ing has in a way laid his hand upon me 
and marked off 60 years of my allotted 
time and just touched my hair with a 
trace of grey — yet he is powerless to 
chill with his touch the springs of youth- 
ful waters in my heart where I really 
live. I am and ever have been a nature 
lover and such never really grow old. 
The reaper in due time certainly will 
gather them to the harvest but in spirit 
they are still young. Many, many years 
ago, I was a constant reader of your 
good paper. My newsdealer always had 
my copy reserved and I have read of the 
happy days with gun and dog in many 
fields. I have hunted every game, 
fur and hair and feather from coast to 
coast, north and south of our country 
and a little bit outside — and my 60 years 
have not dimmed my sight for rifle or 
six-shooter or shotgun — but a hurt to 
my spine keeps me from walking much 
so my hunting is limited — but now I do 
not want to tire you so will just say I 
want the good old Forest and Stream 
sent to me. I am now in the kind of 
country dear to the heart of a nature 
lover, 100 miles from a R. R. and where 
the hand of man has scarcely made a 
mark on the face of nature. I am lo- 
cated on the Apache Trail in the Fouti 
Indian reserve, the wildest and most 
beautiful spot on earth to me, and I will 
be glad to give my brother sportsmen 
who are interested in this country what- 
ever information they would like to 
know concerning it. 
E. M. Saunders, Payson, Arizona. 
WEIGHT OF FOXES 
/To the Editor of Forest and Stream: 
A PROPOS of your invitation to sub- 
mit facts and figures as to the 
weight of red foxes, permit me to say 
that no two animals are quite so de- 
ceptive in appearance as the coyote and 
red fox. Both are “leggy” animals with 
rather elongated bodies covered with a 
wealth of guard hairs and fur greatly 
tending to exaggerate their size. The 
English have two expressions that are 
aptly applied to horses, viz: “fine drawn” 
and “cherry ripe”. The thoroughbred in 
good condition and ready for the track is 
“fine drawn” as opposed to “cherry 
ripe”, which would indicate that the ani- 
mal had been fattening on succulent 
grasses. The coyote and the fox cer- 
tainly fall in the former category. 
I have just been petting a coyote pup 
seven weeks old. He is a playful little 
rascal and is as active as an acrobat. 
At first glance you would think him of 
fair size, but not so. He is all sinew 
and muscle, and his bones -are small. 
Like the fox, Nature has endowed Tiim 
with the attributes of speed. I have 
watched the coyote move over holt and 
hill. His ordinary gait is an easy, 
graceful, shadow-like one, but like the 
fox he can flatten out and move like the 
wind. Both animals are speedy, and 
have stamina enabling them to move 
over tremendous areas under cover of 
darkness. Both are nocturnal hunters 
and range wide. Occasionally they move 
by day, but it is their custom to bed 
down after a night of marauding. 
Back at my native heath in the foot- 
hills of the Blue Ridge in Virginia, I 
once shot a red fox. I mention the mat- 
ter with extreme compunction. Why? 
Because that section is peopled by the 
progeny of cock-fighting and hard-riding 
squires. They all subscribe to the doc- 
