THE SHOOTING SEASON.

Otago Witness, Issue 3765, 11 May 1926, Page 55

THE SHOOTING SEASON.

GOOD BAGS AT CLUTHA. Wet and misty weather, with an absence ez w iprevailed It the opening of the siiooli.ig season in the Ciutha district. This kind of weather have been favourable to the sportsmen, judging by the weight of stnre of the Grey duck, pukaki, and black swan were the favourite quarry in these parts. Shooting on Tuakitoto Lake on opening day, Mr Wilson Elliott, of Ualclutlia, unit a friend each secured the limit ba; of 2o birds, the bulk of these being ducks, and a few swans. In the same locality Mr James Smith, sen., and Mr James Smith, jun., of Barnego each got the limit bae of 25 duck 9 on both the opening and following day. Shooters were present in greater numbers than on any previous occasion at the Tuakitoto and Kaitangata Lnkes, and the duek3 were more plentiful than usual. Shooting in the Waitepeka district on Saturday, Messrs W. Keen and D. Fletcher secured 17 ducks and i 9 swans between them. SOUTH CANTERBURY DISTRICT. TEMUKA, May 4. Large numbers of sportsmen from Te* muka and Geraldine were out on the Downs on the opening day of the shooting season, but reports state that the game was not as plentiful as in previous years. The best bags so far recorded were 73 grey ducks for one party and 40 ducks for another. Mr Main, the South Canterbury Acclimatisation Society’s ranger, returned to Teinuka yesterday from a tour of the Mackenzie Country, and he reported that grey duck were very plentiful on Lake Tekapo. Paradise ducks, however, were very scarce. The grey duck, said Mr Main, were there in thousands, and on one stretch he counted over 400, but the weather was not good for shooting, Saturday being like a summer’s day. SPPRT IN THE WAIRARAPA. WELLINGTON, May 4. Wairarapa Lake is the locality most frequented at the beginning of the season by Wellington sportsmen in search of duck and swan. On the opening day there were large numbers of these birds on the water, but owing to the lake being 6ft above its normal height it was difficult to get at them, the natural cover along the lake shore being for the most part submerged. Therefore the sport was poor. , It has been an exceptionally favourable breeding season, as many as three hatches having been noted in some cases, and there are even now “ flappers'” too young to leave the nest. The best bag of 54 fell to a motoring party which numbered several guns. The majority of the sportsmen had to be content with two or three ducks, and some got none at all. One man who spent four days at the lake T-?unm.?.l to Wellington with an empty game bag.