Game Bird Hunting [antikvár]

DucksOf all the birds we hunt on the North American continent, ducks probably provide the most sport for the most hunters. The sport of duck hunting is also the most diverse, and can be the most complicated of all our shotgun-ning sports. This, of course, is not true in all areas of the country. In the sparsely populated areas where ducks congregate in huge numbers during the fall, scarcely more than a shotgun and a pair of hip boots are needed to take a limit of ducks. In most parts of the country, however, successful duck hunting involves some complicated gunning rigs and equipment. For this reason, duck hunters are usually either "dyed-in-the-wool" types who go about their sport seriously and scientifically, or those who take a shot at a duck on opening day, and thereafter only when the chance presents itself while hunting other game.It could be said that duck hunting is the traditional shotgunning sport of the United States. Many of the pioneers and early homesteaders lived mainly on duck flesh during the times of the year when the birds were plentiful, and during the nineteenth century, many professional hunters made their livings shooting waterfowl of all kinds. To the initiate, duck hunting represents shotgun sport at its most suspenseful and most beautiful. Many of its adherents would pass up a week's gunning on any other game for one good flight of ducks swinging in to their decoys.There are two major groups of ducks: the surface feeders, or dabblers, and the diving ducks. The most important part of duck identification is being able to tell one type from another so that you can set up your equipment to suit the particular birds that are flying. There are many ways that these birds can be identified once they are in the hand (I will go into that later), but the important thing is to be able to recognize them when they are in the air and on the water.SURFACE FEEDERSWe shall consider first the surface feeders, which include the mallards, black duck, gadwall, pintail, baldpate, shoveller, wood duck, green wing teal, blue wing teal, and the cinnamon teal. These ducks are called surface