Hundreds of fields
are so guarded each day in Bontoc by old people and children, who
frequently erect small screens of tall grass to shade and protect
themselves from the sun.
The next simplest method is one followed by the boys. They employ
a hollow section of carabao horn, cut off at both ends and about 8
inches in length; it is called "kong-ok'." This the boys beat when
birds are near, producing an open, resonant sound which may readily
be heard a mile.
The wind tosses about over the growing grain various "scarecrows." The
pa-chek' is one of these. It consists of a single large dry leaf,
or a bunch of small dry leaves, suspended by a cord from a heavy,
coarse grass 6 or 8 feet high; the leaf, the sa-gi-kak', hangs 4 feet
above the fruit heads. It swings about slightly in the breeze, and
probably is some protection against the birds. I believe it the least
effective of the various things devised by the Igorot to protect his
rice from the multitudes of ti-lin' -- the small, brown ricebird[25]
found broadly over the Archipelago.
The most picturesque of these wind-tossed bird scarers is the
ki'-lao. The ki'-lao is a basket-work figure swung from a pole and is
usually the shape and size of the distended wings of a large gull,
though it is also made in other shapes, as that of man, the lizard,
etc.
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