476 
FOREST AND STREAM 
OCTOBER, 1917 
CLOSE OBSERVATION USUALLY PAYS 
THE MAN WHO IS SUCCESSFUL IN THE GUNNING GAME, AS WELL AS OTHER 
UNDERTAKINGS OF LIFE, IS USUALLY A CLOSE OBSERVER OF CAUSE AND EFFECT. 
A S a rule the man who goes into the 
whys and wherefores of results, the 
close observer of cause and effect, is 
the one who wins success in the under¬ 
takings of life. 
Nowhere is this more true than in the 
gunning game, perhaps in a less degree at 
the traps where distance does not have to 
be estimated and the gun is held at the 
ready, as in the field where unexpected 
things are continually happening, but 
nevertheless a fact as to both. 
• 
There is no doubt in my mind that what¬ 
ever success came to me in waterfowl and 
upland shooting resulted from my custom, 
dating back to my kid days, of carefully 
examining my kill, particularly in the case 
of any long or unusual shot, and noting 
where and how the bird was hit, the num¬ 
ber of pellets and also their penetration. 
To do this in a reliable manner it was 
necessary to mark by cutting off a toe, 
splitting the bill or other like way, certain 
individual birds when such pains seemed 
desirable. Trouble? Well, yes, a little, 
but nothing compared to the knowledge 
gained in this way. 
Even this last winter after having been 
an expert at the shooting game for nearly 
half a century, I learned. Observation 
paid. It is the person who is too old—or 
too wise (in his own conceit) to learn— 
that is hopeless. One who has shot the 
same loads of the same make of powder 
out of the same gun for many years, cer¬ 
tainly ought to know how the gun should 
be held to get game. Yet the first few 
times out I did rotten work. “Why?” I 
asked myself. There seemed no failure of 
eyesight or lack of steadiness in aim. The 
gun was aimed the same as ever, but ducks 
that should have dropped at the report— 
close easy shots, kept on, untouched. Those 
killed were long shots, so very long that 
my blind-mate didn’t even make an effort 
to reach them. Toward sunset of the day 
By EDWARD T. MARTIN 
I found myself, a “can” sneaked by from 
behind going at the rate of about 146 feet 
a second. By intuition I fired, a snap shot, 
but even as the trigger was pulled, I felt 
I had not led the bird by a foot and a 
half. Yet it doubled and dropped dead. 
Here was a case for a postmortem. The 
duck was marked and with another of his 
kind taken home. Each was shot through 
head and neck, neither having a shot mark 
in the body, and the one I was so sure I 
was a foot and a half behind, had two shots 
through the head and through the neck. 
The answer to the “why” came instantly. 
It was a clear case. The powder in my 
shells though supposedly the same as that 
used for years, was at least a foot quicker 
at 30 yards. Hence the missing of close 
shots and the hitting of those killed, 
through the head. Hardly seems possible, 
yet it is so, and of about 50 ducks killed 
during the winter, fully 35 were shot in 
the head or neck and a large portion not 
body marked at all. 
Shooting a little too far ahead is a good 
fault for reason that as the distance in¬ 
creases, so does the spread of the shot and 
a single pellet, even an outside one, in the 
head or long neck of a duck, is worth more 
than half a dozen abaft the main beam, so 
except on slow fliers over the decoys I 
made no attempt to correct my lead; but 
observation told me what the matter was 
and there was a heap of satisfaction in 
knowing the reason. 
It is noting the effect of a small size shot 
on picked birds, that makes nearly every 
careful gunner an advocate of their use. 
As a rule, of course there are exceptions, 
the more observing a gunner and the more 
experience he has, the more he insists that 
for all waterfowl sixes are plenty large, and 
sevens or eights to be preferred on the 
smaller varieties such as teal and spoonies 
—yes, even on “cans” and mallards when 
they are working well. It was a matter of 
common occurrence in picking ducks for 
shipment to find one of the larger varieties 
shot through and through from stern to 
bow with number sevens and on a side shot 
a gun wasn’t thought to be worth much 
that wouldn’t drive shot of the same size 
in one side of the bird and out the other. 
In the case of my own gun, observation 
says that beyond a doubt, sevens are better 
than fours or fives for any bird that flies, 
not even excepting swan. 
Although arguing in favor of small shot 
as against the larger sizes seems much like 
pui-ting grain that has once been winnowed 
through a threshing machine a second time, 
my defense is thq frequent inquiries that 
come: “You have had much experience, tell 
us the .reasons why you are so strong an 
advocate of sixes and sevens as against twos 
and fours?” These letters and many per¬ 
sonal requests for information form my 
alibi for again threshing out the wheat. 
I suppose up to the time the law stepped 
in and said, “No,” to indiscriminate slaugh¬ 
ter, more geese, honkers, speckle-breasts, 
white-fronted, cacklers, all kinds, all sizes, 
were killed in the grain raising districts of 
California than elsewhere in the world. 
The geese were a nuisance at planting time 
and ranch owners were very willing to give 
certain gunners—men whom they knew to 
be careful and not likely to mistake a brin- 
dle bull for a Mexican brant—the right to 
dig goose pits and shoot on their land. To 
such an extent did the gunners avail them¬ 
selves of this privilege that I have been told 
their books showed often a yearly kill of 
eight to ten thousand geese per gun. These 
professionals must have been skilled at 
their business and to a man they used noth¬ 
ing larger than sixes. Personally I once 
killed 89, besides several sent sailing, with 
a hundred shells loaded with sevens, all sin¬ 
gle birds, score being kept on the bottom 
of a card board box as if shooting a pigeon 
match. Really counting as killed, the birds 
“dead out of bounds” and the half dozen 
at which both barrels were shot, the tally 
should have been about 94 out of 95, con¬ 
sequently it makes me only smile to read 
the stories of self-called crackerjacks who 
rush to tell how they killed two geese or 
perhaps even three with ones or B. B’s, 
buckshot or maybe scrap iron. 
Why, a rifle bullet will often fail to stop 
a goose if it hits abaft the center of the 
body. Yes, and also a grouse. I know of 
a honker, shot through and through with 
a soft nose bullet from a big bore Spring- 
field rifle that flew nearly a mile before 
dropping. I saw in the Olympics a blue 
grouse with the hinder part of its body cut 
completely away by a 30-30 soft nose, fly so 
far that the shooter didn’t even go to look 
for it. I myself once centered a ruffed 
grouse with a bullet from a heavy Colt’s 
revolver and had it fly to such a distance 
that it was only by chance I found it, yet 
a load of sevens properly aimed would have 
stopped instantly any bird of the lot. 
Don’t talk to me about B. B’s, nor even 
twos. If rifle bullets won’t kill feathered 
game except by the accident of hitting the 
1 
