difficult, and sometimes impossible, the only certain alternative is the gun. The hen bird may be shot by the keeper's lying in concealment near the nest, if he can find a good position; but, having once placed himself, he must on no account move until a certain chance presents itself, as, if once detected, he would have great difficulty in getting a second chance. Before the keeper conceals himself, it is a good plan, and one which I have known adopted with immediate success, for two persons to accompany him to the spot, and, after having located him in concealment, to walk quietly off to a distance. The hen bird, thinking the coast clear, will descend to her nest within a few minutes; but as she will make many evolutions in the air above the nest, so as thoroughly to inspect the contiguous ground before she ventures to settle near the nest, the keeper must exercise every caution, and be prompt in availing himself of the first fair chance. If he succeed in killing the hen bird, and is not subsequently equally successful with the cock, the latter will most probably leave the ground, and will only return immediately in the event of his finding another female; but should he fail in this respect, he may not be visible till the ensuing spring, when he will be accompanied by another hen bird. As the hen-harriers build on the ground, they may be either shot or trapped early in the breeding season; but, as I have before insisted, the sooner the better, as each day's delay involves a serious loss of game, especially after the young hawks are hatched, and require food. I know an instance of seven young grouse, as I have mentioned elsewhere, being found in a hen-harrier's nest, after the keeper had killed the old birds; the young hawks were fledged at the time, as it happened to be late in the season when this nest was found. My opinion as to the policy of killing the hen bird immediately you can do so, is confirmed by each succeeding year's experience. I have recently killed four female hawks from the nest, one of them a falcon; the four were either laying their eggs or sitting upon them, I could not tell which, as the places selected for their nests were altogether inaccessible, being in high, rugged, precipitous rocks. A fortnight has elapsed since my killing them, and I have been constantly on the hills in the immediate vicinity of the nests, but not one of the cock birds has since been visible; from which fact, I think it may be fairly inferred they have left the ground, not having found hen birds. It is now in the beginning of the month of May the cock birds may return again with female birds this season; but they have rarely done so on any previous year of my experience, as far as I have been able to judge, after any long interval, till the following breeding season; and as I have been constantly on the same ground both winter and summer during the last three years, it is possible I may not be mistaken. If this be the case, the argument in favour of the immediate destruction of the female will preponderate over that urged in behalf of leaving the nest unmolested till the young birds are fledged, with the chance of trapping both the old birds; for, even admitting this method to be generally successful, I presume it is not invariably a certainty. But what is an infallible certainty connected with this plan, is a vast sacrifice of game, and that at the most important season of the year, just when birds are breeding; so that you may estimate your loss, when henharriers and falcons are left to breed, not by single birds, but by packs; and as the young birds would not be fledged for three weeks or a month from the time when the first opportunity of killing the hen bird at the nest might have presented itself, I leave it to those who are cognisant of the destructiveness of these hawks to form their own opinion on the subject. THE END. |