FOREST AND STREAM SEPTEMBER, 1919 
A MANUAL OF WILD FOWL SHOOTING 
PART ONE OF A SERIES OF ARTICLES DESCRIBING THE TRAITS. CHARACTERISTICS AND 
METHODS OF HUNTING OUR WATER-FOWL-THE WILD SWANS AND THE CANADA GEESE 
By FREDERICK A. WILLITS 
T here are two varieties of wild 
swans indigenous to North Ameri- 
ca, the trumpeter swan and the 
whistling swan. The plumage of both 
birds is white; feet, legs and bill black. 
They are distinguishable, however, by 
their size and by the presence of a yellow 
spot near the eye of the whistling swan 
which is absent in the other bird. The 
trumpeter swan is the larger, weighing 
from twenty to thirty-five pounds; the 
whistling swan weighs from ten to twenty 
pounds. The plumage of the young of 
both birds is gray, this changing to snow 
white as maturity is reached. The 
i/^.rumpeter swan is named from its voice 
xwhich resembles the loud, clear note of 
ai French horn. 
The trumpeter swan is distinctly a 
"Western bird and was formerly abundant 
jfrom the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific 
Ooast. The whistling swan was in past 
years very plentiful throughout the 
country in general and along the Atlantic 
Coast, especially from Florida, north to 
Chesapeake Bay. 
Wild swans were formerly extremely 
abundant in Southern California and 
about the Gulf Coast in Texas, also in 
sections of the Mississippi Valley. Here, 
as elsewhere, they did great damage to 
the wild-fowl feeding grounds, destroy- 
ing much more grass and grain than they 
consumed and thereby spoiling large 
tracts which would have supported the 
ducks and geese for a long time. 
Many thousands were killed annually 
by sportsmen and market hunters. The 
swans were sold on the market and the 
hordes of professional hunters found 
their pursuit a very profitable occupa- 
tion. There were 
few game laws then 
And the existing 
ones were rarely 
enforced. The in- 
evitable result oc- 
curred. Each year 
the great birds 
came in sadly di- 
minished flocks, un- 
til today the swans 
are never seen in 
many localities 
where once they 
were abundant, 
and only a few 
places remain 
where they can be 
found in anything 
like their former 
numbers. 
Fortunately for 
. the splendid birds 
and the coming 
generation 
of sportsmen, ade- 
quate game laws 
were enforced just 
in time to save our 
largest water-fowl 
A whistling swan 
from certain extinction. Laws in most 
of the states prohibiting the sale of 
game, thereby ending the days of the 
market hunters, were the most import- 
ant in saving the swans as well as 
many other species of our game birds. 
Swans are now and have been for a 
number of years protected during the 
entire year throughout the country by 
federal law. This law should receive 
the solid support of every sportsman 
and nature lover, for it was a wise 
step taken to save certain species of our 
migratory game birds from following the 
path of the passenger pigeon, the buffalo 
and others. A few swans are still to be 
found on Currituck Sound, North Caro- 
lina, and on other bays and sounds along 
the southern Atlantic Coast, also in re- 
stricted sections about the Pacific and 
Gulf Coast. Under the protection afford- 
ed by the government the birds are re- 
ported on the increase in Texas and on 
some of the southern sounds. The young 
birds, called cygnets, are good to eat; the 
old ones are tough. 
Swans are extremely wild and shy and 
their pursuit is often more difficult than 
the far-famed wild goose chase. When 
flying, swans are often high in the air, 
far out of range, and they are ever on the 
watch for a hidden enemy. 
T he swans are shot from shore blinds 
and from batteries or sink-boxes 
anchored out on the open water, but 
the latter method is now unlawful in 
many states since it tends to drive the 
fowl off the feeding grounds and is also 
very destructive. Both live and wooden 
birds are used for decoys. The live de- 
coys are, of course, the more attractive, 
and on some of the club grounds, where 
the swan shooting was still good before 
the federal law prohibited the hunting, 
large flocks of swans were kept to be 
used in luring their wild kindred within 
range of the guns. 
Pass shooting, point or flight shooting, 
as the sport is variously called, is often 
practised throughout the we?t. No de- 
coys are used. The hunter conceals him- 
self under the line of flight which the 
birds have established in flying between 
one feeding ground and another. At 
some place in this line of flight the fowl 
may be required to pass near or over 
a point where there is sufficient natural 
cover to conceal the hunter, and here 
some good shooting is often to be had. 
If natural cover is scarce, the hunter 
digs a hole in the ground in which to hide. 
Swans when coming to the decoys are 
flying slowly preparatory to alighting,and 
because of their 
great size are easy 
marks, but in flight 
shooting the birds 
are under full 
headway when 
they pass, often at 
long range, and 
the shooting then 
requires skillful 
handling of the 
gun. Because of 
their large size 
and great wing 
spread, they do not 
appear to be mov- 
ing very fast. But, 
as a matter of 
fact, they fly with 
great rapidity, es- 
timated at the rate 
of one hundred 
miles an hour. The 
point of aim should 
be yards, not feet, 
ahead of a swan 
passing at fairly 
long range, and 
this lead is all im- 
portant else the 
A flock of Canada or common wild geese 
