File:Complete wildfowler (1912) (14569075767).jpg

Identifier: completewildfowl00dunc (find matches)
Title: Complete wildfowler
Year: 1912 (1910s)
Authors: Duncan, Stanley Gull, Cyril Ranger
Subjects: Game and game-birds Shooting
Publisher: New York, Outing pub. co.
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries

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spot cannot be fixed as the generalhabits of the bird. The best sizes of shot to use for sea-duckshooting are Nos. 3 and 2. A weapon not less than a choke-bored stout 12, capable of firing a heavy load for this gauge,is required to kill sea-duck, for they are very tough fowlindeed. Another form of flighting not yet referred to may often beenjoyed near the coast. This is plover-flighting. The speciesare the green plover or lapwing and the golden plover. Thesebirds are day feeders, and in mild winters become very regularin their habits. They wing each night just after sunset tosome large fallow field or open common to spend the nightAt daybreak next morning they return. Sometimes they flyhigh, but if a stiff breeze blows they invariably keep low. Atsuch times they afford fine practice with the gun, and, judgingby the number of empty cartridge cases which often remainsto tell how many shots have been fired, it will be noted thatthe bag is usually far from proportionately filled. Taking a
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MOVEMENTS OF SHORE-BIRDS 105 season through, if a shooter halves his cartridges—i.e. sixbirds per dozen cartridges—he does remarkably well. I haveseen half a dozen shots fired without a bird being bagged ;and on another occasion half a dozen birds with the samenumber of shots. In the long run my average will not be farout, but only in the case of good shots. Golden plover flyexceedingly fast in the dusk, and usually keep low. Greenplover prefer to keep higher. The latter often afford verydifficult shots, as they toss and squirt on wing—a habitthey much practise at evening flight-time. At ordinary timesthe green plover is not a difficult bird to shoot. , The best plover-flighting is generally enjoyed some fewfields from the shore, but in many cases they cross river-bankswhere the shooting is free. Plover flight a few minutes earlierthan duck, as a rule, but the last lots of plover have usuallynot passed before the first duck come in. Plover always flightat dusk, even if the moon

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