Page 62 THE BOOK OF DUCK DECOYS.

THE BOOK OF DUCK DECOYS.

Lipscombe, who wrote in the year 1831, remarks : "Within this lordship is an ancient Decoy pond of about 3 acres for Wild Duck, Teal, Wigeon, &c., which abound in the contiguous marshes called Otmoor The Decoy consists of several narrow channels communicating with a lake to which the wildfowl resort, and being prompted by a number of tame ducks (obedient to the signal of their keeper, who invites them with a small pipe to their food) to follow them into these channels, are prevented returning by a trap, and their escape being intercepted by nets spread over the channels, the keeper with his dogs secure the captives, of which great numbers find a ready market in the neighbouring towns; and some are sent to a distance."
    The Decoy stands on the second tier of rising ground above and to the south of the low swampy tract of country, many thousand acres in extent, called "Otmoor," which was formerly part of the forest of Bernwode.
    To the south of the Decoy the land gradually rises, and at a mile distant are the Brill Hills, the highest point of which (Muswell Hill) is 744 feet above the sea level. The Decoy pond itself consists of about 24 acres of water with four pipes (formerly six), standing in the centre of a wood of 14 acres. A keeper's lodge adjoins the wood, and the Decoy is regularly worked; a dog is used and a few Decoy ducks. The yearly average of fowl taken is 800, and the best season on record produced over 2,500 head.
    The keeper, who has been eighteen years in charge of this Decoy, says that he has noticed only a few Pintails on the pond since 1879 ("at that date there were several"), and that he occasionally sees Shovellers. He reports that a few Divers are generally on the pond in February. The Decoyman's cottage at Boarstall is within a few paces of one of the pipes.

At Winchendon, near Aylesbury, formerly belonging to the Duke of Marlborough, but now the property of Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild, there used to be a trap Decoy, a farm there being still called "The Decoy," but it has not been worked within the memory of man.