THE BOOK OF DUCK DECOYS. | Owing to alterations in drainage, and drying up of the creek on which it stood, the Decoy ceased to answer, and about 1870 was dismantled. Holkham, 3 miles from Wells, the princely scat of the Earl of Leicester. -On the marshes at Holkham, half a mile north of the church, traces may still be seen of an old Decoy and its pipes. It has not been worked since the commencement of the present century, and no one now living can give any information about it. Its position is shown on a map of Norfolk by Faden, published in 1797. The lake in the park at Holkham is resorted to by immense numbers of wildfowl every winter, many of which remain to breed. In 1884-5 it was calculated that as many as 10,000 Wigeon passed between its sheltered surface and the adjacent coast every dusk and dawn, the reason being that a vessel laden with corn was wrecked on the sandbanks off Holkham. Such a vast store of grain being scattered on the shore and its flats, the fowl assembled in multitudes from all along the coast to feast on it by night, and so the majority passed the day resting in the seclusion of Holkham Lake, safe from persecution by the gunners. Langham.-Mr. Southwell states that there was a Decoy at Langham, miles SW. of Cley, constructed for the late Captain Marryat, R.N. (the well-known author.) After his death, in 1854, the property was purchased by Mr. S. F. Rippingall, and the Decoy dismantled. The site of the Decoy is now a field, with a small stream running through it; plantation, lake, and Decoy all gone. The Rev. E. W. Dowell, who had often seen this Decoy worked, says the proportion of fowl taken was about Wigeon 3, Mallard 2, Teal 1. Wolterton 4½ miles NNW. from Aylsham.-Mr. Southwell states, in his paper on Norfolk Decoys, that at the south-west corner of Wolterton Park there is a wood called the Decoy Plantation, and in it the remains of what was once a Decoy, but he was unable to learn anything with regard to it, except that it had certainly not been worked for more than fifty years. Cawston 3½ miles NE. of Reepham.-At the commencement of the present century there was a Decoy in the Bluestone Hall plantation at Cawston, but it was demolished by the grandfather of the present owner of the property, Captain Bulwer, when he headed the pond and enlarged the water. No one now living is able to give any information respecting it. |
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