One of the many thorns that pierce the keeper's side is driven home
at the time of the cutting of the underwood. Once in every span of
ten or twelve years this time must come. Now and again the felling of
part of a covert before shooting improves matters from a sportsman's
view--the beats are simplified, or are more easily commanded with the
regulation number of from five to nine guns. But the keeper knows to
his cost that more often than not cutting the underwood is ruination
to sport. Birds and rabbits are alarmed by the sound of the woodman's
chopping, and half the hares fly before the smoke of the greenwood
fires. Many complications arise through wood-cutting, as when the
shooting is in other than the landlord's hands. When he wishes to cut
certain portions of his woods, and the cutting may interfere seriously
with sport or the showing of game, unpleasantness must arise among all
parties--landlord, gamekeepers, shooting men, and copse-workers. Those
responsible for the shooting should find out as early as possible which
parts are to be cut, and arrange in good time with the landlord to make
it a condition of sale that no cutting takes place before a convenient
date. When several acres of underwood are felled, and the wood is left
lying in long rows called drifts, a good deal of inconvenience may
arise, unless the underwood is worked up as cut down. On shooting days
half the pheasants in the place may skulk in the drifts, whence it will
be impossible to dislodge them by ordinary beating methods of the most
energetic type. Besides, drifts provide a safe refuge for rabbits. They
increase incredibly, and in the following year they will be by far too
plentiful for the welfare of the young shoots that spring from the
shorn stumps.