The Poetry of Wildfowl, Waders, Fen and 'Fowlers.

Curlew

Man has observed and hunted waterfowl and birds for centuries with observations recorded in ancient literature, not least the Bible:

"The stork in the sky knows the time to migrate, the dove the swift and the wryneck know the season of return." Jeremiah 8vs7.

Wildfowling can be quite romantic in that the actual shooting is such a small part enabling you to soak up the environment as described in the poetry of this wildfowler with the pen-name "Delta":

"A weary waste!

We passed through pools, where muscle, clam and wilk,

Clove to their gravelly beds; o'er slimy rocks,

Ridgy and dark, with dank fresh fuci green,

Where the prawn wriggled, and the tiny crab

Slid sideway from our path, until we gained

The land's extremist point, a sandy jut -

Narrow, and by the weltering waves begirt.

Around; and there we laid us down, and watch'd,

While from the west the pale moon disappear'd,

Pronely, the sea-fowl and the coming dawn."

Kirton Marsh at High Tide

Hunting of birds has been described in various literature, not least childrens' nursery rhymes:

"There was a little man, and he had a little gun,

And his bullets were made of lead, lead, lead;

He saw a little duck, upon a little brook,

And he shot it right through the head, head, head."

Similarly an anonymous Suffolk ditty refers to the large punt guns that wildfowlers often used in the area:

"Come, come! my brave boys!

Though rarely well done,

Show me the way

You fire the great gun!"

Punt Gunning on The Wash depicted by Laurence Thompson

The poet Ted Hughes described the punt-gunner thus:

"Tis now the fowler mans his little bark,

Equipped with gun, and dog of sturdiest strain,

Prepared to weather the relentless blast -

To deal destruction 'mid the feathered train."

"Hear his proud thunder floating on the tide!

Mark the dread fiat of the death-winged shower!"

The more violent nature of wildfowling with a punt gun is considered by Alexander Wilson:

"Quick flashing thunders roar along the flood

And three lie prostrate, vomiting their blood!

The fourth aloft on whistling pinions soar'd;

One fatal glance the fiery thunder's pour'd,

Prone drops the bird amid the dashing waves,

And the clear stream his glossy plumage laves."

The following are from anonymous poems the first dated 1808:

"Majestic swan

Or heavy goose - with many a fowl beside

Of lesser size and note, who, when the world

Has sunk to rest, beneath the moonbeam dash

The sparking tide."

"With fiery burst,

The unexpected death invades the flock;

Tumbling they lie, and beat the flashing waves,

Whilst those remoter from the fatal range

Of the swift shot, mount up on vig'rous wing,

And wake the sleeping echoes as they fly."

Of a less violent nature is the poetical description of capturing duck in a decoy net, and their crafty escape by the wildfowler Henry Coleman Folkard in the 19th century:

"How silly the wild duck and wigeon appear,

To be lured in decoy by the pranks of an ape!

But crafty the pochard, which cunningly dives,

And beats under water a certain escape."

Reference to catching ducks by decoy was used in a seventeenth century treatise on the moral correction of speech by Richard Allestreel "Government of the Tongue" published in 1674:

"The devil would never have such numbers,

had he not used some as decoys to ensnare others."

Describing the Fen men of South Kyme decoys and clap-nets are described by Mr. J.J. Colman around 1780 in "Life of a Fenman"

"Born in a coy, and bred in a mill,

Taught water to grind, and Ducks for to kill;

Seeing Coots clapper claw, lying flat on their backs,

Standing upright to row, and crowning of jacks;

Laying spring nets to catch Ruff and Reeve,

Stretched out in a boat with a shade to deceive.

Taking Geese, Ducks and Coots, with nets upon stakes,

Riding in a calm day for to catch moulted Drakes;

Gathering eggs to the top of one's wish,

Cutting tracks in the flags for decoying of fish.

Seeing Rudds run in shoals 'bout the side of Gill sike,

Being dreadfully venom'd by rolling in slake;

Looking hingles, and sprinks, trammels, hoop-nets, and teamings,

Few persons I think can explain all their meanings."

In a similar strain the decoyman Andrew Williams who died in 1776 aged 84 having served the Lloyds of Aston in Shropshire for sixty years as decoyman has the following on his grave:

"Here lies the Decoyman who live like an otter,

Dividing his time betwixt land and water;

His hide he oft soaked in the waters of Perry

Whilst Aston old beer his spirits kept cheery.

Amphibious his life, Death was puzzled to say

How to dust to reduce such well-moistened clay.

So Death turned Decoyman, and 'coyed him to land,

Where he fixed his abode till quite dried to the hand.

He then found him fitting for crumbling to dust;

And here he lies mouldering as you and I must."

Sticking to the fens Howitt's Year Book in the nineteenth century captures the sound of duck in the fen:

"The wild-fowl cries upon the sedgy mere;

I see it not in motion - yet I hear

Of splashing wings and trailing feet the sound."

Anyone that has observed duck on ponds in low light will recognise the sound described above.

In other literature references to folk lore and legend are made. The following three passages refer to the belief that Barnacle geese were actually hatched from Barnacles and as such were classed as "fish" enabling them to be eaten instead of meat during Lent fasting:

"The Scottish barnacle, if I might choose,

That of a worme doth waxe a winged goose"

Hall's Virgidemiarum

"Like your Scotch barnacle- now a black,

Instantly a worm, and presently a great goose."

Marston

"The barnacles with them, which where soe'er they breed

On trees, or rotten ships - yet to my fens for feed

Continually they come, and chief abode do make,

And very hardly forc'd my plenty to forsake."

Drayton

Other words consider the goose simply for its gastronomic qualities:

"But this I know, that thou art very fine,

Seasoned with sage, with onions and port wine."

Southey's 'Lines to a Goose'

Finally I consider a more modern poem by an anonymous wildfowler in the late 1950's describing shooting a Brent goose in an almost erotic poem titled "A Dream";

He watched her coming through his sights

Oh what a streamlined figure,

But instinct said "Not yet old man,

Just wait until she's bigger."

Time just flew as he stopped and watched,

Enraptured by the creature.

To him it was a lovely dream,

A Natures first lined feature.

She layed there at his booted feet,

His pleasure all quite spent.

And with one hand he grabbed that form,

Of a cold and broody Brent.