SKIPPERS ISLAND PAPERS
61
Season Mallard Teal Wigeon pintail Garganey
1936/7 25 68 16 2 1
1937/8 59 140 28 1
Season Shoveler Seaup Pochard Pheasant Season Total
1936/7 1 1 2 1936/7 116
1937/8 8 14 1937/8 250
He records that on 24 October he got by himself 26 Teal and 1
Wigeon and failed to pick up six more Teal and one Mallard.
There was a very strong W. to N.W. wind. On November 22
three guns had 4 Mallard, 32 Teal and 5 Wigeon, apparently at
evening flight. In February 1937 the sea wall was breached and
not repaired till the water at the N.E. corner had become brackish.
1938/9 Too dry till December 17 when there was a N.E. gale and
"duck anywhere and everywhere". Total bag of 101 fowl
would have been more but for Pemberton having a bad
shoulder.
1939 Shooting ended on 19 October 1939 owing to the War.
Total bag 88 fowl and 13 Pheasants.
There was no more shooting till 1945.
1945/6 My first year and a very poor one. Practically all the
shooting was done at Teal on the two little ponds in and
near the Round Field, which Pemberton says he thought
nothing of. He reckoned the "broken ground" the best
i.e. the area nearest the Heronry. The weather all
winter was much too mild. The total bag was only 4
Mallard, 2 Shoveler, 49 Teal and 6 Wigeon. The two
week-ends in January and February were both blanks.
1946/7 This was a wet year but I missed the best of the shooting
owing to the fire on 25 January 1947. Total bag 20
Teal, 6 Mallard, 2 Woodcock, 1 Wigeon, 1 Pochard.
1947/8 Total bag 34 Teal, 7 Mallard, 1 Shoveler, 2 Partridge and
9 Rabbits. Almost nothing after mid-November owing
to a very mild winter.
The seasons 1948-49 and 1949-50 were almost barren of fowl,
not only on the island but in the district. The flood of 1 March
1949 let sea water into the two ponds on the Round Field but
not into the Heronry Pond.
All this discouraged my winter visits to the island and fowl
shot in 1950-51 were so few as not to be worth record.
The shooting seems to depend on two things, the weather and
the water level. As to the former an easterly or northerly gale
will, I am told, fill the island with fowl, but I have not yet been
there to see it. As to the latter, this has most unpredictable re-
sults and obscure causes. When there is too much water fowl may
be any where and it is difficult to place the guns. When there is
too little they do not come, but if it is so dry on the mainland