TEAL AND TEAL SHOOTING.
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BY HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT, AUTHOR OF FRANK FORESTER’S “FIELD SPORTS,” “FISH AND FISHING,” ETC.
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THE GREEN-WINGED TEAL. (Anas Carolinensis.)
THE BLUE-WINGED TEAL. (Anas Discors.)
In this present month, the sport of duck-shooting on the inland streams, rivers, and lakelets, may be held to commence in earnest, as contrasted to the pursuit of the same tribes on the outer bays, estuaries, and surf-banks. About the end of September, and thenceforth through this and the next ensuing month, according to the variations of the seasons, and the longer or shorter endurance of that delicious time, the most delicious and most gorgeous of the whole American year, known throughout this continent as Indian Summer, the Mallard, and the two beautiful species which we have placed at the head of this article, begin to make their appearance on the little lakes of the interior, and in the various streams and rivers which fall into them, and thence downward to the Atlantic seaboard.
In the vast northern solitudes of the great lakes of the northwest, in all the streams of Upper Canada, even to the feeders of Lake Superior, and throughout the western country so far south as Texas, and northward to the Columbia and the fur countries, the Blue-Winged Teal breeds, literally by myriads. Throughout the great lakes, it is abundant in the early autumn, becoming excessively fat on the seed of the wild rice, with which the shallows of all those waters are overgrown, and being deservedly esteemed as one of the best, if not the very best, of the duck tribe. But it is the first of its race to remove from the wild, limpid waters, and wood-embosomed rivers of the great west, to the seaboard tide-waters, taking the inland water-courses on their route, rarely visiting the actual sea-shores, and proceeding on the occurrence of the first frosts, for they are singularly susceptible of cold, to the Southern States, where they swarm, especially in the inundated rice-fields of Georgia and South Carolina, during the winter months.
The Green-Winged Teal, which is the nearest congener, and frequently the associate of the Blue-Wing, has a far less extensive range, so far as regards its breeding-grounds, in as much as it never, so far as has been satisfactorily shown, has nidificated or produced its young south of the Great Lakes, nor even there in great numbers, its favorite haunts, for the purposes of reproduction, being the extreme northern swamps and wooded morasses almost up to the verge of the arctic circles. It does not come down on its southward migration, at nearly so early a period of the autumn as its congener, being less susceptible of cold, and tarrying on the Great Lakes till the frosts set in with sufficient severity to prevent its frequenting its favorite haunts with pleasure, or obtaining its food with facility. It is rarely or never seen in the Middle States during the summer, but is tolerably abundant during the autumn on all the marshy lakes and pools, and along the shores of all the reedy rivers from the great lakes downward to the sea-board, though, like the last named species, it is purely a fresh-water duck, never frequenting the sea-shores or salt bays, finding no food thereon with which to gratify its delicate and fastidious palate, which, eschewing fish, the larvæ of insects, and the lesser crustaceæ, relishes only the seeds of the various water plants and grasses, the tender leaves of some vegetables, and more especially the grain of the wild rice, Zizania panicula effusa, which is its favorite article of subsistence, and one to which may be ascribed the excellence of every bird of air or water which feeds on it, from the Rice-Bird and the Rail, to the Teal, the Canvas-Back, and even the large Thick-Billed Fuligula, closely allied to the Scoter, the Velvet Duck, and other uneatable sea-fowl of Lake Huron, which are scarcely, if at all, inferior to the Red Heads of Chesapeake Bay, the Gunpowder, or the Potomac. On the Susquehanna and the Delaware, both these beautiful little ducks were in past years excessively abundant, so that a good gunner, paddling one of the sharp, swift skiffs peculiar to those waters, was certain of filling his boat with these delicious ducks within a few hours’ shooting. Both of these species are rather tame than otherwise, the blue-winged bird more particularly, which has a habit, on the lower waters of the Delaware especially, of congregating on the mud in vast flocks, sunning themselves in the serene and golden light of a September noon, so careless and easy of approach, that the gunner is frequently enabled to paddle his skiff within a few yards of them, and to rake them with close discharges of his heavy batteries. At times, when the tide is out, and the birds are assembled on the flats out of gunshot from the water’s edge, the thorough-going sportsman, reckless of wet feet or muddy breeches, will run his skiff ashore, several hundred yards above or below the flock, and getting cautiously overboard, will push it before him over the smooth, slippery mud-flats, keeping himself carefully concealed under its stern until within gunshot, which he can sometimes reduce to so little as fifteen or twenty yards, by this murderous and stealthy method. The Green-Winged Teal is much less apt to congregate, especially on shore, than the other, and consequently, affords less sport to the boat-shooter, keeping for the most part afloat in little companies, or trips, as they are technically called, very much on the alert, and springing rapidly on the wing when disturbed. They, and the Blue-Wings also, fly very rapidly, dodging occasionally on the wing, not unlike to a wild, sharp-flying Woodcock, and when they alight, darting downward with a short, sudden twist among the reeds or rushy covert, exactly after the fashion of the same bird.
The commoner and, in our opinion—where these birds are abundant either along the courses of winding drains or streamlets, or in large reedy marshes, with wet soil and occasional pools or splashes—far the more exciting way of killing them is to go carefully and warily on foot, with a good medium-sized double-gun, say of eight to ten pounds weight, and a thoroughly well broke and steady spaniel, to retrieve and occasionally to flush the birds, which will sometimes, though rarely, lie very hard. A good sportsman will frequently, thus late in the autumn, when the mornings are sharp and biting, and the noons warm and hazy, but before the ice makes, pick up, on favorable ground, his eight or nine couple in a day’s walking, with a chance of picking up at the same time a few Snipe, Golden Plovers, Curlew, or Godwit; and this, in our mind, is equal to slaughtering a boat load by sneaking up in ambush to within twenty yards of a great company, whistling to make them lift their heads and ruffle up their loosened plumage, so as to give easy entrance to the shot, and then pouring into them at half point-blank range, a half pound of heavy shot.