The Bon's Column. Notes for the Young Hunter. BY WILL WOODMAN.

Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1845, 3 May 1884, Page 6 (Supplement)

The Bon's Column. Notes for the Young Hunter. BY WILL WOODMAN.

As the young hunter will soon learn, there are all kinds of ways of shooting game, and, moreover, all kinds of game to shoot ; bnt it is not only how to shoot, when to shoot, and what to shoot that is needed to be known. One must know how to obtain something to shoot. One of the most common means employed for drawing game is what is called a " decoy." Tbe principle of the decoy is very simple, and will be understood at once by any boy who has ever watched chickens hunting for food. Should some lucky chick wander from the rest and discover a choice grub, the others are quick to notice it, and will immediately rush to share it. So with snipe, or plovers, or ducks. If in flying over the country they see any of their fellows engaged in feeding anywhere, they naturally want to share, and at once alight. It is a knowledge of the habits of animals that always makes a good hunter, and enables him to secure game when another will seek in vain. Remember that, my young hunter, and pay every attention to the ways of the animals you wish to shoot. When you wish to shoot snipe, select a marshy spot, and scatter your decoys about on it in a way to resemble as near]y as possible a small flock of real snipe feeding. Then take your station in a hid-ing-place, and wait for your game to come. Your hiding-place or "blind" may be in a clump of reeds or in the crotch of a low tree sufficiently covered with foliage to hide you. Or, if there should be no natural covert, you may make one, always taking care to imitate nature, which should not be difficult if there be any bushes or reeds anywhere near. You have only to cut these and put them in the ground, or mud, as it may be, in the spot selected for your covert. As for the decoys, you may buy them if you choose, but I would not give much for a sportsman who could not make them for himself. I have always made my own decoys, and this is how Ido it. For snipe I cut a bhingle as nearly as possible into the shape of that bird, getting perhaps four or five snipe out of one shingle. I paint the birds the proper color, and provide them with wings, made sometimes of bark and sometimes of old pieces of leather. The feet and legs are represented by a long, thin piece running from the under part of the bird, and will serve the purpose of fixing the decoys in position. A plover decoy is made in the same way. For a duck decoy I contrive first to shoot a duck. This I skin and stuff — not a difficult task, though it may seem so. For a temporary decoy a dead duck makes the best kind of a decoy. I place it on a wooden float, just buoyant enough to let the decoy rest on the water in the manner of a live duck, and if necessary prop tip its head with a light Y-shaped twig. An anchor line should be fastened at the front end of the float, in order to keep the head of the decoy to the wind, which i8 the position a live duck always takes. Another important matter in this' connection is that you must always take up your position with the wind at your back, as that will bring the duck's face to you either in alighting on the water or in rising from it ; for a duck cannot or will not do either unless it has the wind in its face. The importance of obtaining a front shot at a duck will be very apparent after you have wasted your ammunition on its back a few times. A true sportsman will never attempt to shoot a duck, or any other bird, for that matter, except on the wing. One of my most amusing decoys when a boy was a tame hawk, which I would secure in the'middle of a field. It was a good study in bird life to see how quickly the smaller birds comprehended that their old enemy was a helpless prisoner. It seemed as if word was passed through the woods, fields, and clouds, for in a short time the little chaps would gather and Commence swooping and pecking at the defenceless hawk. Sometimes game birds would come, and then 1 would reap a harvest ; but sometimes only birds not usually eaten would put in an . appearance, and then I would have to rescue my pet. These are only a few of the ways of decoying birds. There are other ways, such, for example, as imitating call notes, which many boys are experts at, and which are quickly learned when the young hunter has his heart in his sport. You all of you know "Bob White," of course, He has given himself the name, and after a little practice you can leai-n him by it, so that he will come quite close to you. Thesfeme is true of many other birds which have peculiar calls of their own that may be imitated. A last word is, never kill merely for. the sake of killing. No true sportsman, "boys, ever does this. There can be no fun in the wanton destruction of life for any rightminded lad. Shoot only such birdd as are fit for the table, or those that have rare plumage, and which it • will afford you pleasure to stuff and keep. Let the rest go, and, above all, never aim' your gun at a harmless little song-bird.— HarpeY's Young People.