To manœuvre single bands of geese as above, three or four guns at most, with the same number of drivers, are best. A great crowd of horsemen (such being never seen in these wilds) unduly arouses suspicions already acute enough. With any greater number of guns, it is advisable to extend the field of operations to, say, two or three miles, thereby enclosing several troops of geese—this requiring a large force of drivers. It does not, however, follow that each of these enclosed troops will “enter” to the guns; for should one pack come in advance, the firing will turn back the others. This mischance—or rather bungle—may be averted (or may not) by the leading driver firing a blank shot behind so soon as the first geese are seen to have taken wing. Needless to remark, once a shot has been fired ahead, it becomes tenfold harder to force the remaining geese to the guns.
Each gun should hold his fire till the main bodies of geese are well on wing and seen to be heading in towards the shooting-line. The “best possible” chances are thus secured, and not for one gun only, but quite possibly for all, as several hundred geese pass down the line. A premature shot, on the contrary, will ruin the best-planned drive, and bring down merited abuse from the rest of the party with scathing contempt from the drivers.
Taking single troops at a time, as many as six or eight separate drives may be worked into a long day. Our first drive to-day produced three geese, the second was blank, while five greylags rewarded the third attempt. In the last instance three of the guns received welcome aid from a string of ojos, or land-springs, around which grew a fringe of green rushes, affording excellent cover.
By four o’clock we had secured, in five drives, eleven geese and a wigeon. We then, on information received, changing our plan, rode off to a point which the keeper of that district had noted was being used by the geese as a dormidero, or sleeping-place; and here, as dusk fell, an hour’s “flighting” added six more greylags to that day’s total.
The above may be put down as a fair average day’s results in a dry season. From a dozen to a score of driven geese (and occasionally many more) represent, with such game as greylags, a degree and a quality of sport that is ill-represented by cold numerals.
There are spots in the marisma where the configuration of the shore-line enables the flight of the geese, when disturbed, to be foretold with certainty. For geese will not cross dry land: their retreat is always to the open waters. In such situations excellent results accrue from placing the gun-line at a right angle to the expected line of flight, while all the “beaters,” save one or two to flush the fowl, are stationed as “stops” between the geese and their objective. On rising, the birds thus find themselves confronted by a long line of horsemen who intercept their natural retreat, and, in effect, force them back towards the land. Should the operation be well executed, the landmost gun will probably be the first to fire; while the geese thereafter pass down the entire line of guns, possibly affording shots to each in turn.
Two guns can then be effectively brought into action. Needless to add, the second must be handled with the utmost rapidity.
In wet winters, when the marisma is submerged, “driving” is not available. Obviously you cannot place a line of guns, however keen, in six inches of water, much less in half-a-yard.
My first impression of wild-goose driving (writes J.) was one of wonder that such intensely astute and wide-awake fowl would ever fly near, much less over so obvious a danger as the little loose semicircle of rosemary twigs behind which I lay prone on the barest of bare mud. Peering through between their naked stalks, I could plainly see the geese some half-mile away, and it seemed incredible that I should not be equally visible to them. Possibly the brown leaves on top of the twigs may have concealed me from the loftier anserine point of view, and the equestrian manœuvres beyond no doubt greatly aided the object. Anyway, the whole pack—three or four hundred, and proportionally noisy—did come right over me, and a wildly exciting moment it was, I can assure you! We had six or seven drives that day, and bagged twenty-eight splendid great grey geese, of which eight fell to my lot.
I may perhaps be allowed to add (since such details are taken for granted, or regarded as unworthy of note by regular gunners of the marisma) that to-day we had no less than six times to cross and recross a broad marsh-channel called the Madre—floundering, splashing, slithering, and stumbling through 100 yards of mud and water full three-foot deep. It may be nothing (if you’re used to it), yet twice I’ve seen horses go down, and their riders take a cold bath, lucky if they didn’t broach their barrels! To follow Vasquez about the marisma is a job that requires special qualities that not all of us possess or (perchance fortunately?) require to possess.