652 
FOREST AND STREAM 
Nov. 23, 1912 
RAILBIRD SHOOTING—PATUXENT MARSHES. 
head, dropped his gun and began to kick and 
cuss something awful. I managed to understand 
that he had been calling some geese; that they 
had their wings set for the descent, and in a 
few seconds would have been ‘‘right on top of 
us” if I, like a fool, had not frightened them 
away. They were just out of range when I 
reached up for the two mallards. Right there 
we arranged some signals for a possible recur¬ 
rence of such luck. The ducks now began to 
be rather scarce. 
“Pshaw,” declared Sherman, ‘‘I can show 
you better shooting than this right on my place. 
I tell you there is too much open water here; 
they want more shelter from this wind. Come 
over with me and I’ll show you something worth 
while the next day or two. This is going to 
end in snow inside of twenty-four hours’, and 
you know what that means.” So we lugged the 
ducks and decoys back to the hotel, loaded our 
traps into Sherman’s buggy and drove out to 
his farm, where I had warm bed and such fare 
as his Swede farmer’s wife could prepare, which 
was plenty and good. That night we got a few 
ducks, but the flight had not really begun. It 
was the next day that I started to tell about. 
We did not have far to go and set out our 
decoys in a little marsh behind a hill, protected 
from the northwest wind. The flight did not 
begin early—it never does on these cold morn¬ 
ings—but by 10 o’clock the air was full of them. 
They had little use for us or our decoys or call¬ 
ing. They rightly judged that ducks that knew 
no better than to sit still with such a storm com¬ 
ing were not fit company for sensible birds whose 
business was to get south as fast as possible. 
We could see them away up in the sky, it looked 
like a mile, but of course it wasn't a quarter. 
Only a few silly ones came near us and we 
missed most of them. We were so cold and had 
so little shooting we did not rightly judge the 
high speed. But about noon the snow began to 
come a bit, and Sherman jumped and danced 
with joy. “Now we’ll get ’em!” he shouted. 
“Might as well go in and get a hot dinner. We’ll 
have plenty of time to kill all the ducks we can 
eat the rest of the winter. Why, you can just 
stand up in plain sight by 4 o’clock and let your 
gun off in any direction and kill ducks,” he 
exulted. I had never tried this before and Sher¬ 
man had, and being quite ready for the hot din¬ 
ner I took his word for it. 
As soon as we had eaten Sherman made me 
put on all the warm clothes I had till I declared 
I felt as still as a mummy and could not handle 
a gun. “Don't matter,” he assured me; “any 
old woman can kill ducks this afternoon. I tell 
you I am going to show you some sport. Don’t 
you see it's getting colder every minute and 
snowing harder? The cold is driving the ducks 
to fly south and this snow is blinding and con¬ 
fusing them so they hardly know what they are 
about. We can’t begin to carry the ducks we’ll 
get this afternoon. Come on.” 
Sherman knew what he was talking about. 
We hid near a slough, without decoys, and they 
began to come in great numbers. We killed 
many, all big ducks, but had trouble in getting 
them, so we got out away from the pond in the 
way of the flight, and still they came—mallards, 
redheads, canvasbacks, pintails, widgeons and a 
few bluebills and blue-winged teals. Just for 
the sake of moving about we located in a corn 
field, and there the mallards late in the after¬ 
noon found us ready to receive them. Finally, 
as it was nearing dusk and we were a couple 
of miles from home, Sherman insisted that as 
we had all we could carry and would get more 
on the way home, we better pull for shelter. 
“But get a plenty while you’re getting,” he ad¬ 
vised me, “for they will all be gone to-morrow 
and everything frozen up solid for winter. This 
is the last day. Isn’t it great? Hope you’re not 
disappointed.” 
About 200 yards from the farm house was 
a little pond, really overflowed meadow, very 
shallow and close to a big ditch with a high 
bank. There we took our last stand, “for we 
can come back for a second load if we can’t 
carry them all at once” my provident host ob¬ 
served. It was now nearly dark. I have hunted 
ducks all my life, often with a fair amount of 
success, but I never saw or heard of such shoot¬ 
ing as this for about thirty minutes. The ducks 
sa»r this water, still and sheltered, and they came 
fj .’ it so thick and fast we could not begin to 
tell what we were doing. It was simply shoot 
and load as fast as the guns would operate and 
Sherman had a repeater. Finally we came out 
of the little cover we had and stood in plain 
sight, and they came just the same while we 
were picking up our birds. It was the most ex¬ 
citing half hour's sport I ever had, but the light 
was so bad and the confusion so great that I 
did execrable shooting, while Sherman was 
pumping his Winchester with deadly effect. Of 
course we did not find half the birds we killed, 
but many were discovered frozen in the ice next 
morning. 
We made our way to the house under a 
staggering load, pockets full, duck stringers full, 
dozens tied together with string and rope which 
the farmer produced from his pockets. “I knew 
wed need this string,” he remarked. We hung 
the birds up to freeze, and I spent the evening 
trying to express my appreciation. Sherman was 
satisfied with his success in showing me a good 
time. 
Next day he took me to the station in 
weather below zero, but I did not mind that, 
for I carried eighty beautiful ducks, having 
enough left when the baggage man stole ten of 
them after I had paid him to carry them. These 
fine fat birds went into cold storage, and it was 
worth all the hardship they cost to be able to 
telephone down any day for some weeks after¬ 
ward and have some of them sent up, dressed, 
ready for the madam’s final touches. Also to 
send various pairs to friends. 
I cannot refrain from just a word about 
cooking a wild duck. I don't want my duck raw 
or stinking from lack of washing, and I venture 
to say that very few would if they tried our 
way. The duck should be thoroughly scrubbed 
inside and out. It is even sometimes desirable 
to use a pure soap, followed by much rinsing, 
both outside and inside. Then stuff him, using 
a moist dressing, containing apple, celery and 
the merest suggestion of onion. Roast the duck 
till it is done, but never parboil a duck. It is 
a sin, unforgiveable and almost as bad as to skin 
the duck instead of picking. It will take from 
forty-five to sixty minutes to put the duck in 
shape to suit us, unless it is a very small one, 
and the tighter your roaster the better. Basting 
helps. Ducks prepared this way will overcome 
the objections of those who do not like “that 
wild taste.” A large part of “that wild taste” 
is just unremoved filth. Have your duck clean 
if you want it good, then roast to taste, but don’t 
decide against my way till you have tried it. 
And thus we had our Thanksgiving ducks. 
HONK! HONK! 
