Readers of Hemingway who hunt are likely to have read “The Green Hills of Africa”.  In this book is a wonderful, fun and almost carefree description of a side duck hunting trip with his second wife, Pauline, and encountering snipe as incidental bag:

“A flock of dark ibises, looking, with their dipped bills, like great curlews, flew over from the marsh on the side of the stream where Karl was and circled high above us before they went back into the reeds.  All through the bog were snipe and black and white godwits and finally, not being able to get within range of the ducks, I began to shoot snipe to M’Cola’s great disgust.” 

Apparently, his gunbearer was unimpressed.

But coming around to shooting in general, I love this line quoted from “Winner Take Nothing”:

“When you have shot one bird flying you have shot all birds flying. They are all different and they fly in different ways but the sensation is the same and the last one is as good as the first.”

Wishing you all a happy and successful season.