PERISCOPING GROUSE.

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 6, Issue 278, 25 May 1917, Page 2 (Supplement)

PERISCOPING GROUSE.

A POACHERS NOVEL INVENTION

Tho latest use which tho periscope has been put to is in the capturing of grouse. In the Highlands of' Scotland a great number of small holdings and farms border forests and tracts of moorland. The wet season this year has seriously hampered the farmer in securing h's crops and oats and other grains have been left on the field in stonk for weeks instead of for days. Tho ravage* of winged game are a serious loss to the occupier of the holding. Tho birds alight in flocks on the stooks and the farmer who shoots them renders himself liable under the Game Act to lino and imprisonment. An enterprising poacher last year conceived the idea that the periscope might be utilised to aid him in his illegal work. After some experimentation with and adjustment ofthe instrument he set to work. Taking possession before daylight of ;i stook on the edge of a field )>ounded by a grouse moor, ne put the periscope into the middle of a she.if and stood it on end among the other sheaves. He then got ins'do tins stook, lay ll.it upon his back, and waited developments. The hungry birds, as soon as daylight . anio in, swoo|K>d down on the stooK*, and a- they d'd so on the one concealing the poacher they speedily vanished. An invisible hand pulled the birds suddenly and noiselessly to their (loom. So rapid and s'lent vvene i\f- poachers movements that the other birds rein ii tied undisturbed until the same doam overtook each of them.

The poacher amazed at hi> suecos*. His first week's hag miniliered over -ixty liirils, winch ho sold at tho '•adtior-gr'neer's \anmnii at a shilling iipvi o. Sinoo tlit-ii h- l:as improved tho periscope for poaching purposes and tlii'iii'_'h it ho ha- heon onahlod to widen ron-iidorahly the field of his operations.