Page 53 GENERAL DIRECTIONS IN DECOYING.

GENERAL DIRECTIONS IN DECOYING.

    Do not try to decoy in a flat calm, a little wind is always necessary to success. It gathers the fowl off the centre of the pond about the sheltered pipes, and by rustling the herbage conceals footfalls. Besides, as I have said, the birds never drive well unless more or less heading the wind.
    However anxious to make a catch, do not press the fowl too hard with your allurements-doing so only makes them suspicious. By waiting, a successful drive may result later in the day.
    Eight, twelve, and four o'clock are the best times to try for a catch by feeding, three o'clock for the use of the dog.
    It is not much use trying between ten and eleven o'clock in the day, as the fowl are by that time becoming sluggish after their night's flighting in search of food, and after a wash and drink prefer resting on the bank, or sleeping on the water.
    At four o'clock they are beginning to feel hungry, as well as to move off the banks into the water previous to leaving the Decoy for the night, and are then more likely to feed up the pipes than at an earlier hour in the afternoon.
    Avoid casting shadows on the water of the pipe between the dog-jumps when in the act of Decoying. Such will certainly spoil a catch if the sun is low and behind the Decoyman, as may happen late in the afternoon.
    If fowl are banked on the breast-wall landing and will not take notice of either dog or food, the former; may be sent right among them over the dog-jump between the screens that flank them, into their midst.
    The effect of this is to cause the ducks to scurry off the landing in great alarm, though as soon as they get into the water they face about andswim defiantly towards the dog as he disappears round the corner and behind the screen again.
    They are then all on the alert, and will probably follow the dog under the net, as he is sent along from one screen to the other as usual up the side of the pipe.
    I have before alluded to the necessity of keeping the mouths and the water outside the entrances of the pipes clear of ICE in a frost, especially those pipes which, when the wind sets in during frost, suits as to working them-namely, the upwind pipes.