The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1905-10-15
SHOOTING DUCKS.
The Sport Topeka Huntsmen
are Now Enjoying.
Host Exciting Hunting and Re-
quiring the Best Craft.
Snap Shooting Difficult and In
teresting Sport.
SP0RTSMEN MUST BE
Silent as a Deer and Quick as
the Duck.
Speed of Birds RivaIing That OF
Railroad Trains.
Gunners Must Aim Five Feet
Ahead of Birds.
Pleasures Of DeeOy Shooting in
Fresh Waters.
CBy Julius Muller.)

10y q l4tAa 4QAAEEsl
r all bird shooting. by far the
most keenly exciting is duck
hunting Upland shooting
frequently may call for more
~ arts but there is no other
bird not even the grouse,
tnat can bring hunters heart
cleaVing its way through the air with
q burst OF speed so amazing that shoot
ing at it is like shooting at a winged
express.
whoever wants to know the prob
lem that confronts the duck hunter,
need only imagine himself Watching for
a railroad train to fash suddenly past
MIN at nifty miles an hour while he
must pick out and hit mark on 1t
ABOUT as big as mans head in the
brief moment of its passing.
That would be difficult enough even
though the shooter is warned by the
noise OF the train and knows just
where to look for it. The ductr gives
no warning OF its approach. Except
when it wants to make a noise, it is
as silent a creature as there is in all
the World-as silent as a snake as wise
as FOX and as keen OF hearing as a
deer It may appear from any quarter
and at fifty miles an hour it is in and
out Of sight within the one moment
1t is this that makes duck shooting
one Of the finest forms of hunting. The
man. The most silent hunter that ever
was moves through the wilderness like
an elephant compared with the abso-
lutte silence of the wild ducks motions.
The mere rustic Of blade Of wild rice
or punch OF wild celery as the boat
glides past it may startle all the ducks
in the vicinity and send them away in
flight far out OF gunshOt The very
click Of the hammer in cooking a gun
may spoil the shooting in a hole where
the birds Gle up" A momentary flash
Of sunlight on paddle or oar may do
the same.
Great skin Demanded.
Thus the duck hunter has to become
perfect miracle Of skill There is he
himself, fifty times bigger than a duck.
There is his boat, bigger than himself.
II IS as If q mastOdon and a whale
were TO try to creep silently and IN
seen on man who is watching every
point Of the horizon with keen suspi-
cIon-
The mans qualities Of skin and
sagaclty are called into play in every
one OF the many forms OF duck hunt
ing from the western hunting in
wheat fields near sloughs, to the sim
plest form OF shooting from anchored
batteries as practiced on the Atlantic
coast but in none are the conditions
more interesting and exciting than in
the FORM known as snap-shooting,
which IS done by q man who sits in
Ehe bow of the canoe with his gun
while his mate paddles silently through
waterways The shooter must be ready
60 IRE instantly. and his duck appear
MSD1+ sAUQGlAE and without warning
snap shooting is done in ali parts Of
North America. It can be carried on
equally well in inland streams and in
the marshy salt water regions: but its
finest decree is reached in wild rice
country where waterways wind through
thick woods and drowned lands.
There the duck not only lie hiddea
till the last desperate moment, but they
have barely risen before they have
flashed away again behind the dense
cover leaving only the hooking thunder
Of their wings in the disappointed h71nf-
er's ears unless he is as quick as thev
and can shoot almost without looking
and shoot to hit.
A beauty Of snap-shooting is that the
rnan VINO does the padding enjoys some
g che best fun Of the hunt equally with