Unfruitful experimentation has been common in the history of flinging as it has in any other craft and art form that has gradually improved over the years. But much to the delight of the researcher, there is a large body of documentation on these failures. It should be pointed out here that it is in the field of cat flinging alone that one finds a vastly larger volume of literature on failures than on successes.
High on the list of sources is Gilbert Dillcoote's renowned Flingists Notebook of 1758. Here, even his earliest ventures are scrupulously recorded. His novel use of chicken feathers and lard, though thoroughly lacking any common sense, did clearly exhibit some of the imaginative thinking which was to characterize his failures later in life, failures which would win him world fame as a flingist.