The Complete English Wing Shot

by George Teasdale Teasdale-Buckell

After birds have begun to lay in March and April, the next stage is to place the eggs under hens in sitting boxes. These are of two kinds: boxes in which the front opens out to a small wired-in network enclosure in which the foster-mother can feed when she is inclined; and the other sort, in which the only opening is from the top lid (which both kinds have), and from which the incubating broody has to be lifted by hand and then tethered to a peg while she feeds and waters. This is a tedious process when there may be from 500 to 1500 hens to treat every day. It is generally believed that the best kind of nest is one made upon the bare earth under these sitting boxes. That may very well be where there are no rats, but where this kind of vermin exists the author prefers a false bottom of turf to the boxes, with a real bottom of small mesh wire netting, which in no way interferes with the benefit eggs derive from moistened mother earth, but effectually prevents losses from rats, stoats, moles, and hedgehogs, although the latter would not be likely to make subterranean visits in any case.

The pheasant coop is another article of furniture the preserver cannot get on without. It is quite a light, simple, and handy contrivance, with a backwards slanting roof, three boarded sides, no bottom, and a sparred front, the centre bar being movable—that is, sliding upwards through the roof. These pens are set out in the rearing-field before the eggs hatch. That ensures the birds being brought from the nests to dry ground. For a few days the chicks have to be protected from themselves, and prevented from running away from their foster-parents. This is best done by the use of two boards about 6 inches high, which are placed so as to form a triangle with the opening of the coop as its base. Then the coop must be very well ventilated, for it has to have a shutter, one that is always closed at night, and the young birds are best not allowed to wander about in wet grass before the dew is off in the morning, so that they sometimes have to be fed, and then again shut up until the morning sun has done its work, but this is only when they are very young.

The field chosen for laying pens, as a matter of human choice, differs greatly from the ground the pheasant prefers. The latter is bog ground for feeding in, and also very frequently the dry grass patches or tussocks in the bog for laying upon, and only the coverts for roosting. Human judgment not being able to supply all these in one small confined place, compromises by supplying neither, and giving a dry, sloping, sunny, sheltered, but treeless bare ground patch of earth, often turf in the beginning, but bare earth before the termination of the laying season.

There are many other methods of providing for the wants of pheasants, some of which cannot be recommended. There is no space to mention all, and therefore the writer is obliged to confine his remarks to those he believes to be the best, and those he has known to succeed up to expectations. But a few remarks are perhaps necessary about some of them. For instance, the plan of having laying pens moved annually is good if suitable space can be spared. Wattle hurdles have been used to make these cheap movable pens of all sizes. But they are objectionable for small pens, as likely to keep the sun off the ground without keeping the draught out. Indeed, they are very draughty affairs, and pheasants hate wind, and do not succeed without sun. In order to successfully use wattle hurdles of 6 feet square, the ground should be large enough to fully benefit by the morning sun’s ray when at an angle of less than 30 degrees. Then, in order to keep out the draught, it is useful to convert the bottom 2 feet of the hurdles into wattle and daub. This has the misfortune of making them rather heavy to move about.

For years the annual digging up process was carried on with success at Sandringham.

In order to prevent insects from infesting the sitting hens, it is good to have dusting sheds, and occasionally to remove the hens to these. Slacked lime and earth kept dry under cover is the best material for this purpose, but if it is necessary the same results can be attained by the use of plenty of insect powder in the nests.

Pheasants in laying pens rarely get enough green stuff. It is for this that daily movable pens are the best, because they allow the pheasants to get grass shoots, which, however, are not the most suitable kind of green food. Onions, lettuce, cabbage, turnip tops, turnips themselves, and apples are all useful; but if the grass is full of clover none of these will be necessary. Naturally everything depends upon the quality of the grass and whether the birds eat it or not. Boiled nettles are useful, but vegetable is best given to old birds uncooked, except when potatoes are used. They have been known to eat the fresh uncurled sprouts of the bracken, but the pheasant farmer who relied on this kind of food would not be likely to make his fortune. Fresh smashed-up bone seems to be necessary for the well-being of laying birds, and of course grit—that is, small gravel, and if this has its origin in the seashore it will probably contain enough shell of sea-fish to make a supply of bone unnecessary.

The choice of food for penned pheasants will depend largely upon prejudice and circumstance. Of necessity grain of some kind will be the stand-by. If it is desired to keep the same hen pheasants for laying for several years, but little Indian corn will be employed in the best regulated establishments. It does not matter that this food, like acorns, spoils the flavour of the flesh, but it does matter that the birds become too fat inside for health. Probably the first season they do not show a loss of egg productiveness, but later they do. Maize in the coverts, to keep the birds at home when they scramble for food in every field, is less objectionable than for birds that do not get much exercise and live in want of it. Barley, oats, beans, peas, and wheat are all useful in turn; and besides, as the breeding season comes on, a warm breakfast of cooked oat or barley meal is useful. Greaves are remnants from the soap boilers’, and are not very reliable foods; but if fresh meat can be obtained, a little of it stewed to rags in the water in which the food is afterwards cooked is distinctly useful in egg-producing time, but is not necessary then, and certainly is not so at any other period after the birds are half grown. At the same time, to make up for the absence of slugs to the penned pheasant, the author would always give a little if it could be cheaply obtained. Very little in the way of animal food comes amiss to the wild pheasant, which has been known to eat mice, wire worms by the thousand, slugs of all sorts, snails with shells and snails without, frogs, blind worms, and young vipers.

The greatest misfortune about penned pheasants is that they take no exercise. As gallinaceous birds they ought to scratch for a living, and that is difficult to arrange in movable pens on turf. It is quite possible that they would be more healthy upon ploughed fields, especially if a part of their daily grain was raked in before they were removed to the fresh ground, but in that case they would lose the plucking of grass and clover.

Pens with open tops and birds with one wing clipped have been recommended in order that the wild cocks should visit the penned hens, but whether it has ever succeeded or is merely a pretty theory the author is not aware: he does know that it has often failed, and infertile eggs have been the consequence.