WHY DUCK SHOOTING IS ON THE WANE

By Charles H. Morton

WHEN the chill of winter has relaxed,and the iron grip of Jack Frost hasreleased the lakes and rivers from

their icy bonds, the appearance of the wildfowl on their way to the northern bound-aries of their summer home heralds theapproach of spring. The sportsman, everon the lookout for the first straggling flock,as early as the latter days of February, notestheir cordons sweeping overhead in long,swiftly-moving wedges; and in March theflight along the river has begun, and thelakes and ponds—even the very mud-puddlesalong the country roads, are swarming withpintails, mallards and teal. The whistle oftheir wings shrills in the air each rainynight, and their vociferous “call” is musicindeed to the farmer boy, as he steals, in thegray of the spring morning down to thepond in the pasture lot, with his double-barrel. He is after “meat,” and his am-munition is too dearly purchased to waste onflying game. He cautiously crawls to theconfining embankment, and stealthily peersover its grassy edge. His hasty glance takesin the confines of the small pond, and restsupon the comfortable bunch of mallards,swimming within easy range, unconscious ofdanger. Now both hammers are raised, thegun is gently brought to shoulder, two re-ports blend into one, and death and conster-nation follow. The remnant of the flock, sorudely startled, mount into the air and wingtheir way into the distance. Our pot-hunter,as he deserves to be called, follows the flockwith satisfied eyes, and his keen gaze is espec-ially directed toward a laggard duck vainlystriving to keep up with his mates. Fartherand farther grows the gap between. There!he leaves them now, and swings down to theprairie, not five hundred yards away. Ourfarmer boy picks up the dead ducks whenthey drift to the bank; shoots a couple ofcrippled ones, gathers them, and goes afterthe one on the prairie. To his surprise,this duck is not so dead after all but thatat his approach it struggles into flight andwould escape if the lad was not a wing shot,as he proves to be. So, although distant a

good forty yards, the duck drops back toearth once more, as the smoke drifts away.

The changing weather of early springincites the ducks to change their migratoryflight quite often. An early spring, withthe ice rapidly breaking up, causes themto swarm from the south, and for a few daysthe air is filled with their flying wedges; thenthe weather grows colder, the north is ragingagain, and the wild fowl seek the southernclimate for refuge once more. Spring shoot-ing is performed under the most unfavorableof conditions. Generally the best shootingis to be obtained during the worst weather,and a person must be of remarkable endur-ance, and a possessor of sturdy health, toundergo the dubious delights of duck shoot-ing with the thermometer lingering nearzero, the wind blowing a freezing gale, andthe water turning to crystals on hip-boots,clothing and decoys. The hunter who cankeep his temper while engaged in the self-inflicted punishment of taking up decoysafter an unfruitful morning’s vigil in thesnow and ice of early spring, can lay claim toattributes worthy of a better cause. Springshooting is to be condemned, as it is killingof game during nesting time—which meansextermination, pure and simple. Neitherare ducks in the best of table condition in thespring, being poor and rank in flavor.They are wilder, too, and more wary thanthey are in the autumn. It is certainly farbetter sport to bag half a dozen fat, juicymallards in the golden days of our gloriousIndian summer, when the weather and allconditions make the shooting enjoyable, thanto shiver away the long hours of the dawn-ing day in the hope of having a shot at a fewsuspicious pintails, whose edible propertieswould rank well with a pine-knot—the usualspring flavor of all ducks. If spring shoot-ing was universally ended, the Book of Num-bers of the duck family would be a largeedition indeed; the autumn shooting wouldbe all the better.

In the middle States the pintail is the firstof the ducks to arrive in the spring. He andhis fellows take very good care of themselves,

52 Why Duck Shooting is on the Wane

and the straining eyes of the early huntermay mark their scudding flocks against thefar away sky. Byron must have receivedhis inspiration from the pintail when hewrote:

“Vainly the hunter’s eyeMight mark thy distant form to do thee

wrong,As, dimly painted on the eastern skyThy figure floats along.”

The pintail well deserves his scientificname of Dafila acuta, for he is cautious tothe highest degree, and rarely ever pokeshis long, slender neck into danger. He isessentially a river duck, but likes the coun-try, and is found in great numbers linger-ing around those farms where cattle arebeing wintered. The mallard and green-winged teal arrive from the south nearlyas soon as the pintail, and ponds and waterholes attract them, especially if there aregood feeding grounds near at hand. Fol-lowing the mallard and teal, come theredhead and canvasback, the aristocrats ofthe duck tribe. While these are found tosome extent along the larger rivers andponds, they belong to the sea coast andlakes, and are looked upon as rarities else-where. The little, plebian bluebill is agood substitute for them, and his speed anddiving powers compare favorably, as sports-men well know. In the inland States,where wild celery is not to be found, andthe food of all ducks is the same, thetable qualities of mallard, bluebill and tealtaste much the same as the redhead andcanvasback. The teal, perhaps, is the bestof the lot. His little body is always encasedwith fat, and its flavor is unexcelled. Thewidgeon, or bald-pate (so named from thepatch of white feathers on his head); theshoveller, with his sluggish disposition, the“section hand of the duck family,” and theslowest flyer; the gadwall, closely allied tothe mallard; the butterball, or ruddy duck,diver and buffoon of the webfeet, contempt-uous of danger, and trusting to his im-mense webbed propellers for safety, ratherthan to his diminutive wings; all these comeand go during the latter part of Marchand the early April days, and leave behindthem thousand of victims, slaughtered by amistaken people and sacrificed on the altarof greed.

Along toward the latter part of April, whenthe fields are becoming once more green andthe birds are singing their spring song in

wood and meadow; when the willow buds arebursting into puffs of whiteness like pigmybatteries bombarding the nervous sand-piper as he dodges up and down the sand-bars, we find the river tenanted for a fewdays by a beautiful little duck, whose shin-ing plumage flashes with brilliant hues as hesits proudly on the water, or flies here andthere along the willow-masked banks. Thisis the blue-winged teal, of all the ducks mostunsuspicious and approachable; and thosewho know his habits can sadly misuse him,for he is always hungry, always on thelook-out for food, always hustling up anddown the river, searching for new feedinggrounds, and always loath to leave thesetempting spots.

One great defect in the otherwise excel-lent scheme of existence made and providedfor the welfare of all ducks is to be ob-served whenever there occurs that markedchange in the weather presaging a “flight.”Since the late “unpleasantness” in SouthAfrica, the English have learned the bale-ful effects of a close order advance on anenemy, even at extreme range. They findit far more comfortable and less disastrousto scatter out when attacking a Mauser-lined area on sun-scorched scrub. If theducks could take the hint from Tommy At-kins, and scatter out more, when migrating,instead of pouring in in dense hordes when-ever the vagaries of the weather advise,they would be gratified at the great changein their death rate, but they do not profitby experience in this line. Duck shootersknowing their habits, board the train forthe lakes and marshes and establish theirconcealed batteries with all the ingenuity ofthe Boer marksman. So it transpires thatthe advance guard of the web-footed armyis met with a withering fusilade from everylake and pond and swamp they visit, andthe main guard and followers of the vansuffer the same reception. In autumn it ishard lines enough for the poor duck, but inthe spring it is another step toward thatsure extinction that awaits all wild creaturescondemned by a cruel custom of man tosuffer death because he must be amused.

The pot-hunter and spring-shooter—verily these twin agents of destruction gohand and hand, but they are not alone.The unthinking greed of the hunter whodelights in making a great score, entitleshim to swell the list of exterminators. Itis true he is a sportsman; he does not hunt

AN UNEXPECTED OPPORTUNITY.

54 Why Duck Shooting is on the Wane

for market, and he always shoots his gameon the wing. He gives his friendly each amess of ducks—and thus clears his conscienceof the crime he has committed. But hisis a dangerous element, and when thewild fowl are gone, at his door will belaid a great part of the blame.

This may be resented by some, whoaffirm that ducks are plentiful yet, andtherefore there is no reason for alarm be-cause a man kills more than he can use,once in a while. Until sportsman learnthe law of moderation, game laws are ofno effect, and there is need to cry caution.What can a man, unless he is a shooterfor the market, possibly do with a bag ofone hundred or more ducks, killed in asingle day? He may be proud of the feat,and entertain his friends with a recitalof his grand sport, but it is to be hopedthat somewhere, deep in his heart, he isashamed of the slaughter and will neveragain be guilty of such a doubtful exploit.One hundred ducks is a large number fora man to kill in a day’s shoot, but at LakeInman, in Central Kansas, and on the greatsalt marsh near the lake on the line ofthe Rock Island Railroad, the feat hasbeen performed many times by hunterswho have allowed their greed to overcomethe voice of conscience. It is a hardmatter to leave a duck pond while thereis good shooting to be had, but any fair-minded lover of sport will admit that aday’s kill of twenty-five ducks should sat-isfy the cravings of any hunter. LakeInman and surroundings constitute thelargest duck preserves in Kansas. Influen-tial sportsmen have leased the property forshooting, and a vast number of ducks arekilled there every spring and autumn.

Lake Inman is but one of the number-less shooting grounds in the United States.Ducks are slain by the thousands, un-necessarily and wantonly, throughout ourcountry by men who claim the title ofsportsmen, because they love to shoot,and own shares in the duck preserves,where preservation is never even thoughtof, or made a clause in the club rules.Even if over-ambitious sportsmen and theirbrothers, the pot-hunters, should carry ontheir warfare against the ducks, the wildfowl would rapidly increase if spring shoot-ing was absolutely prohibited.

A few, alas, a very few, of the Statesare learning to realize what game protec-tion means. Only ten have laws prohibit-ing spring shooting. These are California,Idaho, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hamp-shire, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washing-ton and Wisconsin. Of these, Minnesotaplaces a limit of twenty-five ducks per dayto each shooter; Vermont limits the shooterto twenty, and Washington to ten. Itis a wise provision. Vermont and Wiscon-sin prohibit duck shooting between sun-set and sunrise. Only five States, out ofall the rest that allow spring shooting,place restrictions upon the shooter. Colo-rado allows each hunter fifty ducks perday; Maine, fifteen; Montana, twenty; theDakotas, twenty-five. A few of the Statesprohibit the sale of game, but ducks arenot protected by this provision. Ohio pro-hibits Sunday and Monday duck shootingand some of the larger clubs owning duck-ing privileges abstain from shooting oncertain week days. Other than these fewexamples, the slaughter of wild fowl cango on unchecked. Pot-hunting, spring-shooting and a biased idea of sport areserving to exterminate the wild fowl, notslowly and surely, but with a rapidityand certainty that is astounding. Oldhunters may easily recall how plentifulwere the ducks twenty years ago, and thepossibility of their extinction was thenunthought of.

With the invention of the breech-loadertheir extermination began, and now, withthe aid of powerful shotguns loaded withsmokeless powder and handled by a classof over-zealous gunners, it will be but aquestion of a few years until the wildduck is classed with the wood pigeon (sowell known by our grandfathers), the wildhorse of the plains, and the buffalo. Un-less prompt legislation comes to the aidof the wild fowl and strictly prohibits allduck shooting in the spring, when theyare mating and nesting, and also placesa restriction upon the number of ducksto be killed in a single day, the cominggeneration will be obliged to apply to oldnumbers of sporting magazines, ornitho-logical works and the museums in orderto realize some idea of the bird, once soplentiful, that gave their thoughtless fathersthat best of sport, wild-fowl shooting.