Nov. 7, 1908.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
73 7 
Opening Day in California. 
Los Angeles, Cal., Oct. 31.— Editor Forest and 
Stream: A Scotch mist ushered in the quail 
season and sent a horde of hunters home early, 
wet to the skin; their bags for the greater part 
innocent of birds. 
The valley quail flies faster than the Bob 
‘ White, and given an even start, no man can 
head him in an uphill race. This alone ought 
to prove a considerable asset to any game bird, 
but running is only one-third of the valley 
quail’s resources. Swift enough in flight to 
puzzle all but the .fairly expert, he can on oc¬ 
casion, dodge like any scared snipe, and in 
heavy cover displays all the partridge’s cunning 
at interposing trees between himself and shot. 
As he whirrs up with a beating of wings that 
leaves the tyro paralyzed, the quail presents a 
dazzling variety of shots when flushed in flock. 
The majority offers straightaway or easy 
quartering shots, and the expert generally picks 
his two birds going in the same direction, and 
drops both without losing mark of either—a 
fatal error in quail shooting unless accompanied 
by the best of dogs. Some birds in every band 
will double back and whizz past the gunner 
within twenty-five yards at sharp angles, mean¬ 
ing misses or “quail a la Hamburg,” which are 
equal in evils. A cylinder-bored barrel helps in 
this work, but is outclassed when the birds are 
rising at thirty-five yards and over. Then the 
hardest shooting chokes are surely in their 
element. He who selects the choke generally 
can withhold his fire an instant, but there are 
some exceptions to the rule, particularly in such 
hill hunting as finds the birds lying just below 
the ridges. The close range, and brief interval 
before they pop out of sight over the crest per¬ 
mits only the snappiest of mechanical shots. 
Some alleged authorities on the subject have 
said the valley quail of California would not lie. 
I No one can accuse them. When these books 
were published, such may have been the fact, 
but the quail has taken his degree in gun 
knowledge, and now, between lying this day 
and running the next, these birds can puzzle the 
most accomplished of gunners. 
The progress in education made by the quail 
has placed a premium upon a good dog. Time 
was when a dog was considered of no use in 
I this form of hunting. An eastern dog seldom 
is; he is used to roading birds to a lie and hold¬ 
ing them there until flushed. Such an animal 
I soon would go crazy in California. The birds 
would run from every point. What local con- 
ditions demand, is a dog that is broken to crowd 
1 the birds to the extreme of flushing them out of 
I range, and only stopping short of that cardinal 
sin in a well-trained animal. Personally, I can 
1 count the really good dogs I have seen in ten 
years’ experience upon as many fingers. Only 
one in many has the natural stamina, endur¬ 
ance of limb and nose, and ability to do with¬ 
out water without harming his scent. Some 
dogs never learn to accord due and proper re¬ 
spect to cactus and lay themselves up within 
the first hour. The ideal dog is apt to be 
rather deliberate; hunts out the cover closely 
when birds are around, and ferrets out each one 
rom his manzanita or live oak clump when the 
luail are disposed to lie close. 
Sunday was the big day, but another brief 
shower came up Saturday afternoon, just 
enough to knock out a number of automobile 
trips. This did not deter an army of hunters 
from taking trains and electric cars to points 
where sport was supposed to be in store. Bet¬ 
ter results were reported than on the first 
day. 
The rain, coming as a sort of forerunner of a 
big storm up north, which dissipated itself be¬ 
fore crossing the Teliachepi mountains, proved 
of real service to the duck hunters, however. 
The local bird supply has been shot down ma¬ 
terially, and the remnant has gone off woefully 
in condition. A small flight of sprigs, teal and 
spoonbills came in from the Imperial valley on 
the southeaster, and the last two shoots have 
produced good bags on most of the club 
grounds. Some widgeon have appeared. Snipe 
are growing scarce. 
Our duck season was ushered in by a 
cannonade so continuous during the first two 
“will you have the goodness to hand me that 
LITTLE BIRD I’VE JUST SHOT OFF YOUR HEDGE?” 
From a Seymour picture in the Woodward Collection. 
hours that the shots literally ticked off the time 
by seconds. “Opening day” on the sixty-odd 
preserves of Southern California by no means 
resembles a New England Sabbath in any year. 
Imagine two Grand American Handicaps run 
off over half a dozen sets of traps, and the 
mental picture may suggest something of the 
sham battle that was waged in the Bolsa section 
of Orange county on opening day. 
The day’s bag is by law placed at thirty-five, 
and twenty-five would suit the club members 
better still. The old limit of fifty was reduced 
at their solicitation, thirty-five being practically 
prohibitive of market hunting when enforced. 
All that has been done to protect the ducks in 
Southern California has been done by the clubs 
which have bought large areas of waste land, 
flooded them, provided feed, and afforded the 
web-footed tribe a place of sanctuary five days 
in the week. 
The legal hour for opening the ball was 5:18, 
half an hour before sunrise, and shortly before 
that a poacher on the road had fired several 
times. The clubs mistook the signal; some¬ 
times the squad captain fires instead of whist¬ 
ling. Perhaps in their anxiety the club gunners 
were not over particular; at any rate, the shot¬ 
guns began to rattle like a park of rapid-fire 
machine guns. 
Opening day found a large portion of the 
duck clubs short of water, wells flowing less 
than last year, after a winter of heavier rain¬ 
fall than average. In many organizations, 
things run themselves. There seems to be no 
head to anything. From Feb. 15 until the ex¬ 
citement of a week before opening day, the 
club is forgotten. Much work must be done on 
a Southern California duck marsh each season, 
and the longer established, the more work as 
a rule. Once the alkali is leached out by the 
shifting fresh water, grass grows freely during 
the warm months when the water is turned in, 
particularly if the rise be slow. Many clubs ex¬ 
perience this trouble to-day, and their shooting 
suffers grievously in consequences. Sprigs are 
wary fowl; they want large clear spaces to de¬ 
scend upon, and will not alight unless able to 
keep a sharp watch for a long distance around, 
which their long necks and sharp eyes admirably 
fit them to do. Filling half-empty ponds a 
week before the season is a hopeless task usu¬ 
ally, but an expert can handle the grass situa¬ 
tion in spite of soft-bottomed ponds. It takes 
a specially equipped mower; a team used to 
water work and a man of experience directing 
operations are equally necessary. The three 
working together can do yeoman service, how¬ 
ever, and the proof of it can be found on our 
grounds, the Canvasback Duck Club. Three of 
our best ponds were so grass-choked that 
hardly a duck would alight in them a week be¬ 
fore the season opened; the grass used up water 
faster than normal evaporation, but a day to 
the pond handled the situation so well that now 
our grounds are as neat as a new pin, and quite 
the cleanest in the Bolsa. 
One feature of local shooting worthy men¬ 
tion is the few dogs that are used. Retrievers 
are not necessary, and none but the very best 
have any excuse for being. A half-broken cur 
can ruin the shooting for half a dozen men in 
a morning, and the only man who cannot see 
the harm being done is the cur’s owner, who is 
not likely to admit it. Ducks are picked up in 
bunches; generally the first hour’s shooting will 
yield from one to two dozen. 
The way our sixteen-gauges turn ducks over 
would surprise eastern wildfowlers, many of 
whom, I understand, still cling to their ten- 
bores as the proper arm for ducking. A large 
majority of the local crack shots use sixteens, 
and are unanimous in opinion that the small 
guns kill quite as far as the larger, and much 
cleaner. No. 6 shot is used and 2)4 drams of 
powder. 
Owing to the high price of grain, the clubs 
are experimenting with other food. Beans, 
grape seed, potatoes (old wormy ones ground 
or sliced) all seem to interest the ducks, which 
no doubt like some variety. Some pestilence 
has broken out in their ranks in the San Joaquin 
Valley and the fowl are reported dying off by 
thousands. In some seasons the spoonbills, 
particularly, become infested with a small 
nematode worm which seems to work from the 
intestines into the pectoral muscles after the 
fashion of a trichina, but whether this is what 
ails the birds now, I cannot say without seeing 
some of them. Edwin L. Hedderly. 
