F.L.S. John Watson

“ A happy hunting ground is furnished by farmers who require a lad to keep the birds from their young wheat or corn, as when their services are required the country is all like a garden. At this time the birds seem creatures born of the sun, and not only are they seen in their brightest plumage, but when indulging in all their love frolics. By being employed by the farmers the erstwhile poacher is brought right into the heart of the land, and the knowledge of woodcraft and rural life he there acquires is never forgotten. ”

“ Birds' sounds are coming from over and under—from bough and brake, and a harmonious discord is flooded from the neighbouring copse. The oak above my head is a murmurous haunt of summer wings, and wood pigeons coo from the beeches. The air is still, and summer is on my cheek; arum, wood-sorrel, and celandine mingle at my feet. The starlings are half buried in the fresh green grass, their metallic plumage flashing in the sun. Cattle are lazily lying dotted over the meadows, and the stream is done in a setting of green and gold. ”

“ But neither the hares on the fallows, the grouse on the moor, nor the pheasants on the bare branches brought us so much pleasure as the partridge. A whole army of shooters love the little brown birds, and we are quite of their way of thinking.
A long life of poaching has not cooled our ardour for this phase of woodcraft. At the outset we may state that we have almost invariably observed close times, and have rarely killed a hare or game-bird out of season. The man who excels in poaching must be country bred. He must not only know the land, but the ways of the game by heart. ”

“ A freshly impressed footmark, the scent of dog or man, almost invariably turns them back. Of course these traces are certain to be left if the snare be set on the near side of the gate or fence, and then a hare will refuse to take it, even when hard pressed. Now here is a wrinkle to any keeper who cares to accept it. Where poaching is prevalent and hares abundant, every hare on the estate should be netted, for it is a fact well known to every poacher versed in his craft, that an escaped hare that has once been netted can never be retaken. ”

“ In this women are by far the most successful. Sometimes they are seen labouring under a heavy load carried in a sack, with faggots and rotten sticks protruding from the mouth; or again, with a large basket innocently covered with crisp, green cresses which effectually hide the bright silvery fish beneath. Our methods of fish poaching are many. As we work silently and in the night, the chances of success are all in our favour. We walk much by the stream side during the day, and take mental notes of men and fish. We know the beats of the watchers, and have the water-side by heart. ”

“ I was bred on the outskirts of a sleepy town in a good game country, and my depredations were mostly when the Game Laws were less rigorously enforced than now. Our home was roughly adorned in fur and feather, and a number of gaunt lurchers always constituted part of the family. An almost passionate love of nature, summers of birds' nesting, and a life spent almost wholly out of doors constituted an admirable training for an embryo poacher. If it is true that poets are born, not made, it is equally so of poachers. ”

“ It is the time of the bloom of the first June rose; and here, by the margin of the wood, all the ground by fast falling blossom is littered. Every blade teems with life, and the air is instinct with the very breath of being. ”

“ They see the night side of nature, and many of them are as good naturalists as the poachers. If a lapwing gets up and screams in the darkness the cleverer of them know how to interpret the sound, as also a hare rushing wildly past. I must add, however, that it is in the nature of things that at all points the fish poacher is cleverer and of readier wit than the river watcher. ”

“ After getting to the near vicinity of our work, we lay down beneath a hay-rick to wait for a degree of darkness. Then we crawled on hands and knees by the side of a fence until it brought us to a familiar pool which we knew to be well stocked with salmon and trout. As we surveyed the water we heard voices, and knew that the pool was watched. These sounds seemed to come from the lower limbs of a big tree, and soon one of the watchers hidden in the branches stupidly struck a match to light his pipe. ”

“ Poaching is one of the fine arts, and the man who would succeed must be a specialist. If he has sufficient strength to refrain from general "mouching," he will succeed best by selecting one particular kind of game, and directing his whole knowledge of woodcraft against it. In spring and summer I was wont to closely scan the fields, and as embrowned September drew near, knew the whereabouts of every hare in the parish—not only the field where it lay, but the very clump of rushes in which was its form. ”

“ They judged to a nicety the speed at which a hare should be driven to make a snare effective, and acted accordingly. At night the piercing scream of a netted hare can be heard to a great distance, and no sound sooner puts the keeper on the alert.
Consequently, when "puss" puts her neck into a wire, or madly jumps into a gate-net, the dog is on her in an instant, and quickly stops her piteous squeal. In field-netting rabbits, lurchers are equally quick, seeming quite to appreciate the danger of noise. ”

“ It is well for the poacher, and well for his methods, that the pheasant is rather a stupid bird. There is no gainsaying its beauty, however, and a brace of birds, with all the old excitement thrown in, are well worth winning, even at considerable risk. In a long life of poaching I have noticed that the pheasant has one great characteristic. It is fond of wandering; and this cannot be prevented. Watch the birds: even when fed daily, and with the daintiest food, they wander off, singly or in pairs, far from the home coverts. ”

“ Everything out of doors testifies that autumn is waning, and that winter will soon be upon us. The colours of the few remaining flowers are fading, and nature is beginning to have a washed-out appearance. ”

“ At dusk the rabbits used to come down from the woods, and on to the sandy saline tracts to nibble the short sea grass. As twilight came we used to lie quiet among the rocks and boulders, and, armed with the old flint-lock, knock over the rabbits as soon as they had settled to feed. But this was only tasting the delights of that first experience in "fur" which was to become so widely developed in future years. Working a duck decoy—when we knew where we had the decoyman—was another profitable night adventure, which sometimes produced dozens of delicate teal, mallard and widgeon. ”

“ Just as in an old rambling house there are always strange noises that cannot be accounted for, so in the night-paths of nature there are innumerable sounds which can never be localised. To those, however, who pursue night avocations in the country, there are always calls and cries which bespeak life as animate under the night as that of the day. This is attributable to various animals and birds, to beetles, to night-flying insects, even to fish; and part of the education of the young poacher is to track these sounds to their source. ”

“ Black game grow very stupid also when on stubbles; they will let a man fire at them, and if they do not see him, will fly round the field and settle again, or pitch on a wall quite near to him. Grouse will do the same thing. There is not much 'sport' in such shooting as this, but when out alone, and wanting to make a bag, it is a sure and quick way to do so. It may be called 'poaching'—all I can say is, there would be many more gentlemen poachers if they could obtain such chances, and could not get game in any other way. ”

“ Every poacher observes, year by year (even leaving his own predaceous paws out of the question) , that it by no means follows that the man who rears the pheasants will have the privilege of shooting them. There is a very certain time in the life of the bird when it disdains the scattered corn of the keeper, and begins to anticipate the fall of beech and oak mast. In search of this the pheasants make daily journeys, and consume great quantities. They feed principally in the morning; dust themselves in the roads or turnip-fields at mid-day, and ramble through the woods in the afternoon. ”

“ When a salmon is seen the hooks are simply thrown beyond it, then gently dragged until they come immediately beneath; when a sharp click sends them into the soft under parts of the fish, which is then dragged out. As the pike, which is one of nature's poachers, is injurious to our interests as well as those of the angler, we never miss an opportunity of treating him in the same summary manner. Of course, poaching with click-hooks requires to be done during the day, or by the aid of an artificial light. ”

“ The nets are long—the first small in mesh, that immediately behind large. When a rabbit or hare strikes, the impetus takes a part of the first net and its contents through the larger mesh of the second, and there, hanging, the creature struggles until it is knocked on the head with a stick. Immediately the nets are set, two men and a brace of lurchers range the ground in front, slowly and patiently, and gradually drive every feeding thing woodwards. A third man quietly paces the sward behind the nets, killing whatever strikes them. ”

“ The "Otter," more thrifty than the rest of us, has purchased a cottage with the proceeds of his poaching; and I know four or five families who live by it. Whilst our class provide the chief business of the country police courts, and is a great source of profit to the local fish and game dealer, there is quite another and a pleasanter side, to the picture. But this later. The wary poacher never starts for the fishing ground without having first his customer; and it is surprising with what lax code of morals the provincial public will deal, when the silent night worker is one to the bargain. ”

“ Shades of brown and fawn are preferable for colour, as these best assimilate to the duns and browns of the fields and woods. The process of training would take long to describe; but it is wonderful how soon the dog takes on the habits of its master. They soon learn to slink along by hedge and ditch, and but rarely shew in the open. They know every field-cut and by-path for miles, and are as much aware as their masters that county constables have a nasty habit of loitering about unfrequented lanes at daybreak. ”

“ During night poaching for rabbits and hares the ground game is driven from its feeding ground to the woods or copses. Precisely the reverse method is employed during the day when the game is in cover. The practice is to find a spinny in which both rabbits and hares are known to lie; and then to set purse nets on the outside of every opening which may possibly be used by the frightened animals. The smaller the wood or patch of cover the easier it is to work. A man, with or without a dog, enters the covert, and his presence soon induces the furry denizens to bolt. ”

“ Two or three feet away from the hedge is the most killing position—for this reason: when a hare canters up to a fence it never immediately bounds through; it pauses about a yard away, then leaps into the hedge-bottom. It is during this last leap that it puts its neck into the noose and is taken. If a keeper merely watches a snare until it is "lifted," good and well; but to put a hare or rabbit into it and then pounce on the moucher—well, that is a different matter. It is not difficult to see where a hare has been taken, especially if the run in which the snare was set was damp. ”

“ When I was night poaching, it was important that I should have the earliest intimation of the approach of a possible enemy, and to secure this the dogs were always trained to run on a few hundred yards in advance. A well-trained lurcher is almost infallible in detecting a foe, and upon meeting one he runs back to his master under cover of the far side of a fence. When the dog came back to me in this way I lost not a second in accepting the shelter of the nearest hedge or deepest ditch till the danger was past. ”

“ Then, if time and leisure be allowed, and the poacher is a good "caller," almost every bird on a moor may be bagged.
The greatest number of grouse, and consequently the best poaching, is to be had on moors on which the heather is regularly burned. Grouse love the shoots of ling which spring up after burning, and the birds which feed upon this invariably have the brightest plumage. On a well-burnt moor the best poaching method is by using a silk net. By watching for traces during the day it is not difficult to detect where the birds roost, and once this is discovered the rest is easy. ”