There is no better bird for the table than the landrail, but he is hardly a sporting bird. His flight is very slow, but he is sometimes missed by quick shots who have been shooting rapid rising partridges and shoot too quickly at these slow flying birds. The landrail has from 7 to 10 eggs, breeds successfully in insect-breeding seasons, and has been shot in large numbers in a single field. A little more than a quarter of a century ago, Mr. Farrer, Mr. C. W. Digby, and Alex. M. Luckham shot 24½ or 25½ couple of landrail in a field of clover-heads at the end of Nine Barrow Down, Purbeck; and in 1905 there were 26½ couple killed in the day about two miles west of this field. Sparrow hawks used to be trained especially for taking landrails, as mentioned in Chafin’s History of Cranbourne Chace, dated 1818. In 1880 there were 211 landrails shot at Acryse Park, Folkestone, and 35 birds in one day by two guns in two clover-fields. The landrail, or corncrake, is known as Crex pratensis.
Teal
The teal breeds freely in this country, and only requires to be less often shot in the early days of the shooting season to multiply rapidly. In those early days it affords no sport, but becomes a wonderful flyer when full feathered. It has from 8 to 15 eggs. No captured teal can be made use of for breeding, but their eggs are easily dealt with, just as those of the wild duck are treated. It is possible to introduce teal to a new place by placing their eggs in the nests of moorhens. The scientific name of the common teal is Querquedula crecca.
The Golden Plover
This beautiful bird lays 4 eggs; it breeds on all suitable moorlands in this country, but the majority of the golden plover found in winter are migrants. When they first arrive, the shooter may boldly advance to a flock upon the ground, which will often not move until within range; but the bird soon gets wild, although after a successful shot the flock will often return to see what is the matter with its disabled or dead comrades. Its scientific name is Charadrius pluvialis.
Roe Deer
Too frequently the roe deer is killed in August, whereas then he is never in condition. In driving Scotch woodlands for these little deer, a very few good beaters are better than a great crowd of noisy boys. Shouting and talking leads to the deer breaking back, for they are less afraid of a crowded line of yelling boys than of the silent unknown enemy which gives but an occasional tap together of two sticks. This is a more effectual plan than tapping the tree trunks. Six beaters in this way can be effective in a beat half a mile wide, and will send the deer forward, where forty shouting boys will cause all the deer to break away at the flanks, or to lie still until the line has passed, and then to “break back.” The reason is probably that when the path of each boy is accurately to be gauged by the sound made, the deer know whether they will have to move or not long before the line approaches near, and consequently act just in that way which is best to avoid a known danger. But the few beaters, with the occasional tap of a stick, is something quite unknown, and the nerves of the deer cannot stand it. They are up and off long before the line approaches near, and they flee not to the flanks or back, but straight ahead.
Roe deer are as easily killed with shot guns as hares—indeed, more easily. The writer has known one to be killed with No. 6 shot at 60 yards range, and instantaneously dead, too. It seems to be causing unnecessary danger to take out high velocity or express rifles for these deer drives; and besides, with them it is impossible to make a bag of winged game at the same time. A rabbit rifle is hardly powerful enough to avoid wounding and losing deer, unless the vitals are hit with an expanding bullet, and as the roe is generally shot running, the author is not inclined to condemn the use of the shot gun as unsportsmanlike. No. 4 shot are equally useful for roe deer and capercailzie and black game, or the three principal occupants of the Scotch woodlands. Pheasants also can be equally well killed with No. 4 shot as with No. 6, and will be the better for the table by reason of the change. If a rifle of any kind is used, an expanding bullet is by far the best to avoid wounded beasts getting away. Roe deer are often condemned as inferior to mutton, but the writer is not of that opinion. Half the mutton is spoilt in flavour by the “dressings,” or rather “dips,” used for the protection from or cure of sheep scab—a horrible disease with a filthy cure.
The Ptarmigan
Ptarmigan are generally walked up by a line of guns when a party can all be got to ascend to the high tops inhabited by these birds, Alpine hares, and little life besides, except for the eagles, which greatly appreciate both bird and mammal. The eagle has been known to strike down a ptarmigan in the air, although it probably catches them generally on the ground. The reason why dogs are not much used for ptarmigan is that the almost constant foot scent of hares leads to false pointing or else to hunting their lines; both tricks are equally objectionable, and show that the dogs have only been partially broken, possibly in the absence of hares. In a hare country it is quite easy to have high-couraged dogs that will point hares in their seats but will not notice the foot scents. These are so seldom seen, though, that it is best, in their absence, to walk up or to drive ptarmigan. They are in a sense the wildest of British game, but it is a wildness that induces hiding for safety rather than flight. Their protective coloration enables them to deceive their greatest enemies, the eagles and the falcons, and they naturally rely on the device of absolute stillness to escape detection by other creatures. Generally they fly away at sight of an eagle, but lie stone close when a falcon comes in view. The eagle can sometimes kill them on the wing, but this is more frequently the falcon’s method, and the birds know it. In winter they change to white, and the snow affords them protection, not only because of its similar whiteness, but also because they bury themselves in it for safety as well as for food. In summer they are grey and white, showing grey from above and looking white on taking flight. It is a mistake to say that they feed upon heather; the majority of ptarmigan live winter and summer above the highest altitude of the heather. The number of birds is nowhere very great, nor could they be expected to increase very much; for the vegetation on which they mostly live is scanty on their chosen rocks, and is indeed the moss which grows on these apparently almost bare surfaces. Were numbers large, ptarmigan would be more valued as game birds, because of their greater activity in flight than the red grouse. Often they fly like rock pigeons leaving their cliff caves, and, unlike the red grouse, they frequently make very steep angle flights at a very great velocity down hill, and then they can twist and swerve and curve in a wonderful manner. To be seen at their best they must be visited in October, but it is dangerous work when a chance exists of a snowstorm. Ptarmigan are found all round the Arctic circle, although some people think the American variety a different species. The birds sold in the game-dealers’ shops as ptarmigan are nearly always willow grouse—the rype of Norway. There the ptarmigan is the Fjeldrype, and in Sweden it is the Fjallripa. Its scientific title is Lagopus mutus. The ptarmigan is monogamous, and has from 8 to 15 eggs. Neither nests nor birds are easy to find in the breeding season, and on the most open spaces, where there is no covert whatever, the bird frequently escapes observation; and, besides, the croak of the bird is very misleading, and will rarely assist in the discovery of the locality of origin of the voice. Probably the rocks assist this ventriloquism. Ptarmigan are not found in England or Ireland, and no farther south than the Grampians on the mainland, and Islay in the isles of Scotland. The largest bag ever made, as far as is known to the author, was the 122 obtained by the late Hon. G. R. C. Hill at Auchnashellach on 25th August, 1866. But the 142 obtained in the year on the whole of the Duke of Sutherland’s property in 1880, when over 50,000 grouse were shot, much nearer shows how little sport may be expected even on good ground. Ptarmigan, in common with grouse and partridges, feign lameness to draw an enemy away from their young.