Word: offing
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Dates: during 1970-1970
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His sternest test comes each winter when the great pinkfeet migrate from Iceland to roost in the wheat and potato fields of Lincolnshire. Considered Britain's ranking expert on wild geese, Thorpe has banded the pinkfoot for conservation, painted it on canvas, filmed it, shot 3,800 himself and...
Seven for Eight. The Wild-Goose Man knows all about cover. Until a few years ago he held another unofficial title: prince of the poachers. Son of a gypsy father who migrated south from Yorkshire, Thorpe was raised in Sutton Bridge, a marsh village of flight netters and punt gunners...
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Turning professional at 20, he eluded capture for over a decade by studying the gamekeepers−their habits, their movements, their hours spent in the pubs−as closely as he did the geese. From this intelligence he formed a kind of primer for poachers: "Know your ground, your ditches...
Still, in all his 40 years of poaching Thorpe was fined a total of only $360 and had "four good guns" confiscated−a small penalty, he figures, compared with the yearly bag records he keeps in a blue notebook. In 1942, his best year, he took 48 pheasant, 72...