A minor difficulty inherent to this pursuit is to select the precise psychological moment to spring up to shooting-position. This indeed is a feature common to most forms of wild-shooting—such as duck-flighting, driving geese or even snipe; in fact there is hardly a really wild creature that can be dealt with from a comfortable position erect on one’s legs. Imagine partridge-shooters at home, instead of standing comfortably protected by hedge or butt, being told to hide themselves on a wet plough or bare stubble. Here, in Spain, it may also be necessary to conceal the gun under one’s right side (to avoid sun-glints), and that also loses a moment.
All one’s care and elaborate strategy is ofttimes nullified through the blunders of a novice. Some men have no more sense of concealment than that fabled ostrich which is said to hide its head in the sand (which it doesn’t); others can’t keep still. These are for ever poking their heads up and down or—worse still—trying to see what is occurring in front. We may conclude this chapter with a hint or two to new hands.
Never move from your prone position till the bustard are in shot, and after that, not till you are sure the whole operation is complete. There may yet be other birds enclosed though you do not know it.
Never claim to have wounded a bustard merely because it passed so near and offered so easy a shot that you can’t believe you missed it. You did miss it or it would be lying dead behind.
All the same keep one eye on any bird you have fired at so long as it remains in view. Bustards shot through the lungs will sometimes fly half a mile and then drop dead.
Wear clothes suited, more or less, to environment—greenish, we suggest, for choice—but remember that immobility is tenfold more important than colour. A pure white object that is quiescent is overlooked, where a clod of turf that moves attracts instant attention.
In spring, when bustards gorge on green food, gralloch your victims at once, otherwise the half-digested mass in the crop quickly decomposes and destroys the meat.
Here is an example of an error in judgment that practically amounted to a blunder. Before our well-concealed line stood a grand pack, between thirty and forty bustard beautifully “horseshoed,” and quite unconscious thereof. Momentarily we expected their entry—right in our faces! At that critical moment there appeared, wide on the right flank and actually behind us, three huge old barbones directing a course that would bring them along close in rear of our line. No. 4 gun, on extreme right, properly allowed this trio to pass; not so No. 3. But the culprit, on rising to fire, had the chagrin to realise (too late) his error. The whole superb army-corps in front were at that very moment sweeping forward direct on the centre of our line! In an instant they took it in, swerved majestically to the left, and escaped scot-free. That No. 3 had secured a right-and-left at the adventitious trio in no sort of way exculpated his mistake.