gunner present is entitled to a full share of all the birds killed, the
problem of equal division of the only one brought to bag became
rather serious, but was finally amicably settled by "arbitration."
On April 24, the last party of the season, consisting of eight old stayers
and raw recruits, put in an appearance. The prospect was most gloomy
and discouraging. What few birds were left kept aloof and would not
approach the boxes. Every day as long as there was any show for
birds the boxes were faithfully manned, and every artifice known to the
club was resorted to without effect. Up to the morning of the departure,
not a bird had fallen before any gun, but on that morning " Lon "
brought in one brant, which on examination was'pronounced a " wing-
shock " or wounded bird, that was unable to continue the journey, and
was worthless. So ends the most disastrous season known to branting.
The reader, if he be interested in sporting matters, may like to know
why it is, that a club that has for more than thirty years been in exist-
ence, with an average score of about 350 birds yearly, is now so abruptly
reduced to twenty-nine ? We will endeavor briefly to explain. To our
mind, the failure is to be assigned mostly to two causes. First, failure
of food, and second, to over-shooting. The great gales and high water
that some years ago swept the sand dunes of Nanuet far from their
foundation, depositing the material in the channel, thereby ruining the
harbor and commerce of Chatham, also destroyed the best part of the
feeding ground, especially the channel and other attractive sections near
the town. We have observed for several years a growing disposition
in the birds to keep more and more off shore. The reasons are quite
obvious. They find better feed and exemption from danger, two im-
portant factors in a bird's existence. As these birds live to a great age,
it may be presumed that every spring, as in their northern migration
they reach Chatham Bay, where for so many years they have fared
sumptuously, they must stop to rest and partake of the delicious food
Zostera marina so bounteously supplied. Seemingly all the brant
that went north at that period stopped here. We have often imagined
what must be the surprise of the serried ranks of the veterans of many
a long journey, as they wheel majestically around Morris's Island, con-
fidently expecting the luscious feast, when, lo ! only a sand flat is before
them ! Memory is in birds strong, and it takes years to obliterate these
impressions. Let him who doubts consider that the same bird that built
a nest and reared its young on a particular tree by his window last year,
will, after an absence of many months, without a compass to guide it, or
even a blazed tree to mark its way, return again, year after year, to per-
form the same paternal office. About half-way down from Chatham to
Monomoy Point, on the westerly side, is a projection called the "inner
point," and from this point a natural bar makes across to the " Common
Flats." Fifteen years ago very few brant tarried there, as the water is
514 SUPPLEMENT.
deeper and more turbulent, but pushed on nearer the town, where there
was plenty of feed and shoal water. For several years the tendency to
abide south of the bar and inner point has been more pronounced, and
more especially has this been the case during the present season.
The second cause of failure this year, namely, "overshooting," is so
marked as to be apparent to any observer. Some forty years ago, when
we were first introduced to this shooting ground, there were but three
boxes on the whole distance up and down the flats. Now there are
twelve or thirteen. Then a simple sandbar, upon which stood three live
brant decoys, and a box buried in the bar, completed the outfit. These
primitive contrivance's worked marvellously well. The birds would
light in the water hard by and swim up to the bar and mingle with the
decoys. It is singular how soon word is telegraphed from this bar to all
the birds in the bay that all is well, and it is safe for them to assemble
there for a social chat or to make plans for the long journey to the north,
and they spring up from various parts and straightway proceed to the
bar. We have seen hundreds, nay, apparently thousands, pile on to and
around the box, nearly all of them within range. It is a critical moment.
The neophites become nervous, and the guide has hard work to keep
them down out of sight. Each of the decoys has fetters on his legs,
to which aline in the hand of a guide is attached. A gentle pull on the
line reminds them that a shot is to be made and they must move to one
or the other side of the bar. They seem to understand the situation
and quietly obey. The first discharge is usually quite destructive, and
the second, on the wing, less so. Often the slaughter was terrible,
twenty, thirty, and even as high as forty-four at a shot. They did not
seem so badly frightened when fired at in a sitting posture as on the
wing, and the same flock would appear two or three times during a single
tide upon the bars.
About fifteen years since, an innovation on this system was made by
the introduction of wood decoys. Before this period the birds were
rarely, if ever, shot on the wing. Since that inauspicious event most
of them are shot on the wing. We do not mean to say that the birds
never light with the woods. Young, inexperienced birds may approach
near enough to draw fire, but, as a rule, they soon discover the fraud,
and skip away. It is with difficulty that mature birds are brought
within range, although a pair of live birds are worked in conjunction
with the woods. Later came the labor-saving system of canvas covers,
as before remarked. This plan is rather against nature. With a goodly
number of inanimate imitations, the shy, cunning creatures may some-
times be coaxed within fair range ; but not probably a second time.
Our seasons are about six weeks long, or from March 20 to May I.
During this time the canvas becomes bleached quite white and con-
BRANT SHOOTING, 1895. 515
spicuous, and if the wild birds ever. come on to it we have failed to see
it ; in fact, our observation leads to the conclusion that they are
suspicious of that white cap, surrounded by queer-looking, stiff-necked
imitations, and keep shy of them, especially after one or two season's
experience. Nor will they, in any considerable numbers, come on to the
flats or near the boxes, but keep off in the bay or south side of the bar
and inner point. We have enumerated a dozen boxes planted up and
down the flats ancj beaches contiguous to the feeding grounds. From
eve^y one of these boxes more or less guns are fired, and every shot
seems to weaken the confidence of the birds in the security, the safety,
of the situation.
The relative number of birds passing directly over and not stopping
at all is greater this year than ever before. It is but the natural
outcome of too much shooting. The law of self-preservation is strong
in birds, as in other creatures, and when destroyed in one location they
will seek another. Very little shooting at birds on their feeding grounds
will soon drive them all away, and shooting on the wing while on
the passage to or from the feeding places produces disastrous results.
We attribute the failure of the present season more to the increase of
boxes and bars, covered and uncovered, and the constant banging at all
sorts of birds that come along, than to the food failure. And then there
are very few young birds this season. Out of the twenty-nine birds
killed only two were young. Last year our club killed 285 brant, 153
young and 132 adults.
The flight of all kinds of birds has been this spring remarkably small,
we should say less than half the usual number. We hardly suppose
that the swimming birds would be caught in the ice and perish, or that
any, especially brant, who are bred in cold regions and are clothed with
a double jacket, could hardly suffer by low temperature, and they
certainly could in a few hours reach a warmer climate where food is
plenty, and we are puzzled about the cause of the greatly diminished
numbers. Being on the elbow of Cape Cod, most of the fowl and shore
birds pass Chatham Bay, but this spring, if there are as many birds as
usual, they must have taken some other road. Sea ducks, coot, geese,
brant, sheldrake, black ducks, and even gulls, have all been very scarce.
The scarcity of song and insectivorous birds is more easily accounted
for. With the mercury at 22 and 14 in. of snow covering the winter
home of these lovely creatures, it is a marvel that any are left to cheer
the hearts of toilers upon northern soil, and aid the husbandman and
horticulturist in his efforts to produce most valuable crops. The almost
unparalleled cold weather at the South brought not only ruin to fruit-
growers and fruit, but also killed millions of small birds. The dead
were strewn broadcast over the land. In a little village in North
516 SUPPLEMENT.
Carolina, where we have often hunted partridges, the gale blew down a
martin box containing twenty dead, or nearly dead, bluebirds, and seven
more bodies were discovered in a hollow stump. Gunners from that
section report heavy losses among the partridges (Bob White), and it
must take several favorable years to overcome these deplorable losses.
W. HAPGOOD,
President Monomoy Branting Club.
SPRING, 1896.
[From Shooting and Fishing-.]
AT the close of winter, or, as the warm days of spring begin to reveal
themselves, the mind of the branter naturally turns toward the scene of
royal sport in previous years. In this latitude the winter months offer
very few opportunities for relaxation from business, or out-of door
sport of any kind, and as the birds begin to return from their genial
winter homes, the sportsman's enthusiasm begins to glow with fervid
heat, and preparations are made to meet them in the field.
Brant are supposed to arrive in Chatham Bay the latter end of
February, or early in March, and arrangements are made about that
time for their reception. On February 25 the resident members of the
branting clubs left Chatham town for the bar formerly island upon
which are located the camps of the Monomoy, Providence, and Man-
chester branting clubs. The weather was severely cold, the flats were
covered with ice, and it was with considerable difficulty that the houses
were reached. After being closed for ten months, the work of clearing
up and putting things in order for the reception of the non-resident
members, the stockholders and invited guests, is no inconsiderable task,
and then three or four hundred wood decoys are to be overhauled, re-
paired, and painted; but the heaviest part of the labor is the building of
the bars and planting the boxes ; and this cannot be done till the ice
goes out, which will not occur till they are favored by a southerly wind
to loosen the ice, and a high tide to float it away; and even when it did
go the mercury fell to 16, and new ice formed so as to seriously obstruct
the work.
The clubs have now, as heretofore, four boxes, South, Mudhole, West,
and North. The South received first attention, but was not in position
before March 10, and in no condition for use before March 13. This is
the only bar not covered by canvas. All efforts to secure a footing for
BRANT SHOOTING, 1890. 517
the Mudhole were baffled up to March 17, when a small bar was con-
structed, and covered by canvas to hold in place.
Up to about this time, as far as the eye could reach, nothing but ice
could be seen. Now water appeared, and with it about 200 brant. The
early part of winter was warmer, and a few of the birds lingered in the
bay, but were later driven away by the ice.
It had been arranged for the first weekly party to arrive at camp on
March 18, but owing to the extreme cold weather, and difficulty in
placing the shooting boxes, it had to be abandoned. Work on the north
bar was prosecuted with commendable vigor, but the canvas cover was
not on till March 24.
On March 25 the first party of six arrived. Each of the boxes has
room for a guide and two gunners. But the birds had not arrived in
usual numbers, only about 300 in all, and what few there were kept off
shore, and not one was killed during the week. The party was a cheer-
ful one, and glad of an outing if no birds were killed.
On All Fools' Day the second weekly group of eight young sportsmen
arrived in fine spirits, and a determination to beat any other party of the
season, and we rejoice to say they did. The birds came on in goodly
numbers, and the party scored forty-one for the week. The west box
was in position, and everything was in fine working condition.
Another thing the party of the first week had to contend with the
second escaped, viz. the scallopers. The ground where these bivalves
abound is quite near the South and Mudhole boxes, and as the business
is, for a time, prosecuted with energy, it proves quite disastrous to
branting. At one time as many as seventy-one of these boats were
operating in close proximity ; but financially the scallop industry exceeds
that of branting, though brant have a commercial value in addition to
much sport. The scallopers are a hardy, industrious set of men, who
eke out the winter's supplies for the family by this industry, and while it
seriously affects our interests and success, we can in no way restrain,
and would not if we could. Better for us to " bear those ills we have
than fly to others that we know not of."
April i brings closed season on scallops, and boats and bivalves dis-
appeared, much to the joy of the branters ; in fact, the fleet of boats
retired a few days before the end of the open season, so as to dispose of
their catch. Quite different fiom our cunning poulterers, who encourage
shipment up to the last day, and then claim two weeks to dispose of stock
on hand. This, however, is only an evasive trick of the dealer to get an
extension of the open season.
" The boys' party" came third, and they usually rely on taking home
with them the title of " Champions," but this year they failed. We need
not here reiterate that owing to the destruction of the best feeding
518 SUPPLEMENT.
ground for brant, our score has been comparatively small ; that the birds
find other feeding places some miles away, and do not tend the flats as of
yore. They probably never will, unless some force shall again open a
channel, and bring back a luxuriant growth of Zostera marina, upon
which they feed. Sand, being the principal material of which the cape
is composed, is so readily moved by wind or water, that no one can pre-
dict with any degree of certainty where the next bar or channel will be
formed. The same force that ruined the commerce of the town, a few
years ago, may restore it, and the same friendly wind or wave may again
bring to us our long-cherished feathered friends, now, unhappily, so far
away from us.
But the third party, with all its valor and prowess, made a bag of only
thirty-one brant; and this, a peculiar and favorable season for large
bags, most of the birds being young. For more than twenty years the
season's score averaged 300, and on special years, like this, when young
birds predominated, ran up to 700. Last year the whole season pro-
duced but twenty-nine, and this, under the most favorable auspices, gives
us but 109.
The Providence party were ushered in during the heated term, when
swarms upon swarms of brant arrived and departed, but they did not
tarry long. At first they seemed to forget that their old haunts and
luscious feeding grounds were in ruins, but viewing the situation with
no prospect of comfort or safety for themselves or offspring, again
spread wing for Prince Edward Island, and the fourth party, with all
its skill in sportsmanship and propitious environments, retired with a
meagre bag of only fifteen brant.
The fifth and last party of the season, composed of veterans who have
for years and years seen service from Labrador to the lagoons of Florida;
who repose in confidence by the side of hard work, and can read the
inmost thoughts of a brant or bantam, or "call" a friend when most
convenient to "see" him, struggled on through the week, receiving the
poor reward for such skilful service of only twenty-one brant, making a
total for the season of 109, as above.
And here one may pause and reflect. We have seen the canvasback
hunted and harried nearly out of existence. Will the brant, now so
numerous, ever be reduced in estate so low as the canvasback duck?
There are circumstances attending the brant not applicable to the can-
vasback. The area of feeding ground of the latter is comparatively
limited. This brings him more nearly within the grasp of the gunner.
The quality of his flesh is so desirable as always to command a high
price, which is against his perpetuity. His migratory flight is over-
land, some of it densely populated, whereby, he may be in jeopardy.
The brant feeds on eelgrass, which grows everywhere; his flesh is
BRANT SHOOTING, 1896. 519
less esteemed, and his flight along the seaboard or over uninhabited
regions, and breeds in circumpolar lands, where no man, except
Nansen, has ever set foot. That there is such land, that the climate
is mild, that vegetation is abundant, has for a great many years
been known by many persons who have studied the habits, food, and
migrations of these birds. Most of our sea-fowl ducks, geese, coot,
loons, etc. are known to breed in fresh water. The nesting-places of
brant are not to any extent known to civilized man ; presumably, a
brant, being a goose, breeds in fresh water. In confinement they drink
fresh water wholly. Their food is entirely, as far as known, vegetable.
Arctic explorers, other than Nansen, have reached points within 500
miles of the pole, and brant in large swarms were still going north.
The next seen of them is coming out with vast numbers of their
offspring. Whence do they come? Can there be but one answer? No
man has followed them to their breeding ground, and judgment
necessarily rests upon circumstantial evidence ; but the solid facts are
as patent as observations. If a ship should sail for some undiscovered
land, and should return with a cargo of fat cattle, corn, and gold dust,
would not the conclusion be inevitable that the country visited had a
warm season, fertile soil, intelligent and industrious inhabitants, and
mines ? Millions of our little winged vegetarian explorers go annually
to the circumpolar region, lay their eggs, incubate, rear their young,
unmolested we trust, and as cold weather the long Arctic night
approaches, bring them south to warmer climes. It has, we believe,
been asserted by Greeley and others, that an ice-cap hundreds of feet
thick covers the polar region ; but do our little navigators say distinctly,
" No, we do not lay our eggs on the ice, or incubate there, nor could we
do it in a frigid region, nor would that luscious vegetable growth, we so
much enjoy, and which makes our offspring so fat and strong as to
endure the long voyage out, grow there. We build our nests on the
pond's margin, of sticks, grass, and moss grown along its sunny banks."
And why not ? We speak of the birds spending the winter at the sunny
South ; why not say also that they spend the summer at the sunny North,
where the sun shines constantly for months? Mrs. Brant says plainly,
Greeley's ice-cap is a myth, and common sense stands unstultified beside
Mother Goose. Why should it not be warmer at the poles in summer,
with a noonday sun shining for months, as it is colder in winter under
months of constant night ? Distance of the sun could not avail anything;
angularity of rays might. We suspect electricity has something to do
with heat, northern lights, and other phenomena.
This view of the case would seem to insure the brant a more
permanent tenure of earth than is possible for Aythya 7'al/isneria,
unless sturdily protected by the strong arm of the law. The freedom
520 SUPPLEMENT.
from legal restraints enjoyed by gunners in this country, the facilities
for travel bringing game centres within easy reach of sportsmen, and
the natural love of the pastime, with ample means to indulge, would
seem to render a long term of existence almost impossible to many of
our most valued species. The black duck, one of the most valued of
all the duck family that visits our waters and breeds here, is already a
mere remnant of its former greatness. The friends to protection of
these noble birds deserve protection ; but their enemies, the game
dealers and their accomplices, the pot hunters, with specious arguments
and cunning devices, have deceived the Legislature into the belief that
game birds need no protection.
An effort was made by the Massachusetts Fish and Game Protective
Association and others during the present session to secure a close
season on black ducks for January and February. These are the
months when the inland waters of the state are closed by ice, and the
ducks are driven to the seashore. If the cold is severe the estuaries
and inlets are sealed, so that the birds are deprived of food and water,
except in a few isolated places. There are hardly a half dozen towns
in the Commonwealth where these birds are found in any considerable
numbers in midwinter, and these few towns form the shores of Cape
Cod Bay. The birds are massed here, and become an easy prey to
perhaps a score of pot hunters. Does any sportsman, any man of
refined taste, care to lie out in an ice or seaweed blind with mercury at
zero, or even 20 above, and call it sport? It must be sheer avarice
that holds to the work.
The change of location from fresh water to salt also brings a change
of diet. The fine vegetable food of the ponds, that gives such a rich
flavor to the flesh, is now replaced by the periwinkle, and it is astonishing
how quickly they lose not only their flesh, but their flavor as well ; and
when they are put on short allowance of both food and fresh water, by
the ice embargo, in a very few days they become fishy, and of little value
as an article of food.
In good condition these birds bring in the market $1.50 per pair;
but the half-starved creatures huddled together in these few patches for
food or water, where they are slaughtered by the hundred, bring about
20 cents a pair, and are dear at that price. Is it not a shame, a disgrace
for the Commonwealth, to allow such a monopoly to exist, and such a
waste of delicious food allowed ?
Forty years ago our ponds and rivers were well stocked with these
toothsome birds. To-day the country sportsman looks in vain for black
ducks. If the people of the rural districts would consider that all the
black ducks, not only of this State, but of all the territory north of us,
that do not go further south, linger about Cape Cod, and it is here, in
BRANT SHOOTING, 1896. 521
this worthless condition and in their distresses, they are being extermi-
nated, the next Legislature would be so molded as to give the poor
creatures all the protection they need.
In the present depleted condition of the birds they should have a close
season from December 15 to September 15, and this would give the
country boys three months to capture the birds when they are fat and in
fine flavor. This would take the business out of the hands of the score
of winter monopolists, and the birds would, in the spring, return to the
country where they belong to breed.
Another cry has been heard against game laws, viz., "They cannot
be enforced ! " This seems to be the watchword along the line of lobster
catchers and dealers. It was quite amusing to witness the ingenuity of
these craftsmen, before a committee, in describing the cunning tricks
practised to get short lobsters into or out of this market. The drift of
the matter seemed to be that a ten and one-half inch law could not be
enforced, but a nine-inch one could. Do the friends of a nine-inch law
think one of eight inches would have no friends? "Can't enforce the
law ! " the cry is again raised. Must the good name of our dear old
Commonwealth be so slandered, and no rebuke offered ? When we hear
it said that a good and wholesome law cannot be enforced, we feel it an
insult to the Executive Department nay, to the whole people of the
Commonwealth. Let a law be passed, as there should be, restricting
the length of lobsters to twelve and one-half inches to be sold, and tfiese
bold people who boast " the law cannot be enforced " would, within
a twelve-month, have a good opportunity to retract. " Can't enforce
the law ! " was the cry of our game dealers for years, but now they are