Page:The Passenger Pigeon - Mershon.djvu/138

 108 In 1874 there were over six hundred professional netters, and when the pigeons nested north, every man and woman was either a catcher or a picker. They used to catch them in different ways. What was known as flight-catching was in the early morning and evening, a spot being cleared of usually twelve to sixteen feet wide and twenty to twenty-four feet long, large enough for a net. This was known as the bed. About fifty feet from the bed a brush house was built and the net was staked down, two spring poles were set to spring the net out straight, but loose enough to fall easy and cover the full size of the bed. The front line of the net was tied to these stakes and they were sprung or set back as if all of the net was in a roll. A short stake with a line attached to the outside edge ran to the bough house, a stick about three feet long was placed under a catch called the hub, and the other end of this stick was placed against another peg driven in the ground. When the short stick was pulled from underneath the crotch, the spring poles forced the net over the bed; the short sticks raised the net about three feet; and of course it was all done very quickly.

Another method was employed later in the season; a place was baited with buckwheat, sometimes with broomcorn seed, or wheat, for a week or two, and, when a large body of birds was collected, the net was set. A much larger net is used now. Then is when we got our live birds for shooting matches. In the spring