Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2017 i Shooting Gazette

The use of lead shot is once again in jeopardy as the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) considers restricting its use. Before leaving office as DEFRA secretary last year, Elizabeth Truss MP rejected calls for a ban on lead shot by the Lead Ammunition Group, but it is now under threat from Europe. The ECHA has been tasked by the European Commission to find out what it would take to standardise EU rules regarding non-lead shot over wetlands, consider whether peatlands should be added to the current restrictions, if there should be a ban on the possession of lead cartridges on or near to wetlands, and if there should be buffer zones around wetlands in which the restriction will apply. Shooting groups have firmly rejected the proposals. Jack Knott from the…

BASC was the co-sponsor of two awards at the recent joint International Union of Game Biologists (IUGB) and Perdix Congress in France. The IUGB is a scientific conference that focuses on the biology, ecology and human dimensions of game species and hunters. The 33rd IUGB congress, organised by the Office National de la Chasse et de la Faune Sauvage (ONCFS) was themed: “Wildlife under human influence: What can we do?” The awards were presented for the best talks and posters presented by young scientists within three years of graduation. BASC co-sponsored the awards with Tour du Valat, the Mediterranean wetland research organisation. Dr Matt Ellis, BASC’s scientific advisor, said: “We were delighted to be able to sponsor the young scientist awards and recognise the talent and enthusiasm in the next…

When exposed to the pontifications of politicians or the politically correct, a friend in the donkey-walloping fraternity has a pithy expression: let’s sort out the hay from the horse manure. The American astronomer and author Carl Sagan put it rather more elegantly when he said that sceptical scrutiny is the means by which deep thoughts can be winnowed from deep nonsense, but either might be applied to some of the more outrageous claims emanating from those who purport to protect everything from everyone, if it gives them a platform from which to spout unquantified generalisation or build egos or businesses on. I confess that beyond an occasional splash of aftershave to mask more feral odours, I don’t use cosmetics so I don’t often trip over the privately owned Lush or…

Fledgling agents need to be passionate about their craft: To be a successful agent, a deep interest in gamekeeping needs to be mixed with being a bit of a control freak. A good sense of anticipation and an endless interest in people matters too. Why the sense of anticipation? Well, it is essential to have reacted to a situation before any problem occurs on a shoot day. I would suggest to anyone tempted to run commercial shooting parties or an agency to develop their interest in fieldsports and social skills at an agricultural college. Admit your faults and be generous: Shooting is like a corked bottle of wine: a natural product. You have weather related issues as well as predators, disease and flood and mud to contend with, all being…

Q My shotgun certificate has been irreparably damaged following a small fire at our cottage. I’ve got quite a few days’ shooting ahead this season and am concerned about not having my ticket with me when I’m out and about. What does the law say? A First things first. You must notify your local licensing department of the damage. Some forces – like Wiltshire – have a downloadable, non-statutory form to help you with this. There is a small charge for replacing the licence - £4. It’s a very straightforward matter and the police should be able to get a duplicate out to you very quickly – they only have to print it and send it! It might be an idea to take a photocopy or even a digital photograph…

I cannot help but at long last, sit down and put pen to paper, over what I (and I am sure many others) see as a major and very important factor having a significant impact on the countryside that we enjoy and rely on for our sport. In a word: predators. In all my years involved in shooting, I have never known the numbers of these natural born killers as great as today. Not only does this group include what is a lengthy list of raptors, but we also have corvids (I have never known so many magpies – even in suburban areas) and now we have gulls in areas where there once were none, and many of these, like the birds of prey, are totally protected. The list does…

I’m very lucky to be offered a brace of birds when I visit shoots up and down the land. I have a confession that I am proud to make. I love our sport. I love food. I love the fact that as a result of our sport there is a tasty, healthy and abundant supply of meat that all of us, wherever we are in the country and whether we shoot or not, can enjoy during the season. At this time of year you’ll find me skipping between one of several local butchers in my market town home, asking each aproned fellow behind the counter if there is any game to be had. Sometimes my enquiry is greeted with a nod and then a fresh tray of oven-ready partridges or…

Q Any tips for bringing down those fast, curling pheasants that have the wind at their backs? A Curling pheasants can be one of the most difficult shots in the book, particularly if you add wind and height. Often when pheasants have got the wind behind them they can dive or stoop, making them even more challenging. The first thing I like to do is start with a good ready position, muzzle just below an imaginary line drawn between your eye and the bird, that way you can see the muzzle in your peripheral vision and as a result guide it onto the bird without having to glance back to the gun to see where it is. Next, start to slowly mount the gun, making sure the gun speed matches…

BARBOUR SWAINBY JACKET BY BARBOUR £299 barbour.com The Barbour Swainby jacket is lightweight and comfortable, just what you’d expect from anything in the Barbour Sporting range. It has quite a close fit (any jumper you wear underneath won’t need to be too thick as a micro-fleece lining offers extra protection from the elements) but even so, busy guns won’t find their movement impeded by excessive fabrics across the arms or body. If we’re being fussy, left-handed shots might find their stocks occasionally catch the two zips on the chest as they bring the gun up; also, we weren’t really sure why there were so many zips on this jacket (five on the outside, including one on the forearm) but if you like to stay organised you’ll find a…

Q I have spent quite a lot of time reading and learning the sequence and steps around training a dog (which all seem fairly obvious) but progress is really slow. I take two steps forward and one back. A Well that’s OK then, as long as it’s not the other way around! I cannot really comment on how you are getting on without actually being there, but your point does raise an important issue. You are quite correct in that the steps and exercises in training are quite self evident. We all use them to achieve a similar goal and the agenda for all is around steadiness, recall, hunting, retrieving, good manners and so on. Where we can struggle is in the delivery of the exercises and our ability to…

Shoot reports We love driven game shooting large and small here at Shooting Gazette, and in this month’s issue we’re showing off what a shoot with its own castle and another with a huge heart can do in their respective efforts to show the best possible sport to visiting guests. John Walker is at Pentillie Castle in Cornwall, a magical shoot which has to be seen to be believed, while I am in Leicestershire, reporting from The Folly, run by a young man with a lot of ambition. Remember the name, folks... Field trialling There’s more to putting on a field trial than you think, and that’s exactly what Amy Bates found out when she spoke to three key players charged with making sure everything run smoothly, fairly and successfully…

TUI Group — which owns Thomson, First Choice and Thomson Cruises — has told BASC it did not reply to a survey hosted by the Ethical Consumer website and has demanded its logo be taken down from the site. Ethical Consumer’s campaign against grouse shooting received support from high-profile figures in the run-up to the Glorious Twelfth, including TV presenter Chris Packham, as it used social media to bombard leading high-street brands with anti-shooting messages. But TUI has now joined other major companies — including Waitrose, Premier Inn, Costa Coffee, Next, Aldi and Allianz — in telling BASC that their position has been misrepresented. Insurance company Legal & General’s logo has also disappeared from the Ethical Consumer website. “TUI Group is not associated with this campaign,” said a spokesman. “We…

SERVES FOUR PEOPLE Ingredients • 8 boneless pheasant leg thighs • Flour, eggs and breadcrumbs • 100g mayonnaise • 10g smoked chipotle chilli paste • Cornish sea salt • Milled black pepper Method Cut the pheasant leg thighs into four. Season the flour and pass the thighs through the flour to dust them. Break the eggs and whisk together, pass the thighs through the egg mix until covered. Lastly, pass the thighs through the breadcrumbs until covered. Deep fry in hot oil until golden and place onto some kitchen paper. Mix the chipotle paste with the mayonnaise and place into bowls. Serve the pheasant nuggets with chipotle mayonnaise…

We would shoot January pheasants on a crisp, frosty day at Crowcombe Court with the world class hosting abilities of David and Kate Kenyon. The team would firstly consist of Mike Hatton, the chap that really got me into game shooting in the first place. He was an amazing mentor to any young lad and pulled off the highest duck I’d ever seen whilst smoking a cigar and drinking a cup of coffee. Sadly Mike is no longer with us but I think of him on every shoot day. His son and my best mate, Andy Hatton, would be with me. We have shot all over the place together. He’s great company, a real laugh-a-minute and social heavyweight. Then there’s my son Ben Thomas, a tree surgeon and professional hunter…

The shoot party at Pentillie Castle, featured on pages 26–34 of this issue: John Hall (left), Digby Flower, Janet Hall, Fiona Flower, Stefan Nicolaidis, Rhod Smart, Dorothy & Chris Strickland, John & Amanda Richards, Tony Kennedy, Geordie & Tony Daltry & Jack Cheatham. The Flass syndicate near the end of last season. The shoot party at The Folly, featured on pages 42–48 of this issue: Nigel Moran (left), Dave Plowman, Mick Smith, Eddie Herrick, Kate Smith, Luke Pulford, Trevor Jones, David Campbell, Sam Grimsdell, Jonathan Martin, Andrew Duncan, Ayesha Bell-Paris & Jack Martin. ‘THE SHOOT’ RAISES £240,000 FOR CHARITIES Auchterhouse Country Sports near Dundee was the venue for The Shoot, an annual clay shoot hosted by CR Smith chairman Gerard Eadie CBE, which this year raised an astonishing £240,000 for…

TRAVEL The estate is on the Cornish side of the Tamar Bridge, on the outskirts of Plymouth. Road links are easy - the nearby A388 leads to the A38 which runs across the top of Plymouth and on to the M5. The mainline railway station is another option, and is within 12 miles. STAY Teams shooting the estate are encouraged to stay at the castle, but other accommodation options include St. Mellion International Resort (st-mellion.co.uk); Whitsand Bay Hotel in Porthwrinkle (whitsandbayhotel.co.uk); Langdon Court Hotel (langdoncourt.com) or the boutique Plantation House at Ermington (plantationhousehotel.co.uk). CATERING The chefs at Pentillie are unlikely to offer a Cornish pasty on their al la carte menu alongside locally sourced lobster, salmon, rabbit or skate. There is, however, a bespoke dinner on arrival, trencherman’s breakfast, a…

TRAVEL The Folly sits to the west of Leicester between Kirkby Mallory and Earl Shilton near the M69, and is therefore within easy reach of visiting parties heading there from the likes of Birmingham, Coventry, Derby, Nottingham or Peterborough. Signs for the famous Mallory Park Racing Circuit will get you near but not to the door, as will the sound of buzzing superbike engines. STAY James recommends the 10-bedroom Kirkby House, a licensed guesthouse situated less than one mile away from the shoot yard in the village of Kirkby Mallory (kirkby-house.com). A little farther afield is the Badgers Mount Hotel in Elmesthorpe, a boutique hotel with uninterrupted views of the countryside (badgersmount.com). Also nearby is the grand Bosworth Hall Hotel in Market Bosworth (britanniahotels.com). CATERING The day begins with refreshments…

Don’t just stick to traditional brown food – go with the seasons and if it’s hot on early grouse or partridge days, serve cold Pimm’s from a large ice-filled flask alongside a Thai-inspired crab salad On sunny days, pour off about 10cm of water from water bottles and put them into the freezer the night before so that you have ice cold water the next day for thirsty guns and dogs To rev up a roast, marinade a leg or shoulder of pork in chilli, lemon, sage, garlic, red chilli flakes and olive oil for 24 hours, then roast until tender and succulent Serve something savoury instead of a pudding on really cold shoot days, such as Welsh rarebit or angels (oysters) and devils (prunes) on horseback Wine seems to…

We can all recall special, heavenly drives we have enjoyed on various days’ game shooting. However, last season for me there was the drive from hell with feelings of pain, frustration and fear. That title would have been appropriate for any of the events but for all three to be experienced on the same drive was extremely unlucky. We were enjoying a great day’s partridge shooting with all the ingredients for the best of sport: plenty of birds, beautifully presented, flying well on a good breeze in October sunshine. The first two drives of the day had been wonderful and I had been lucky with the draw to be in the best of the shooting and the world was a wonderful place. It is not usual on a partridge drive…

I’ve been re-reading the J regs (again!) especially J(A)h, which is about “First Dog Down”. “...If the first dog sent out shows ability by acknowledging the fall and making a workmanlike job of the line or area, it need not automatically be barred from the awards by failing to produce the game, provided the game is not collected by another dog tried by the judges, or by the judges themselves...” Some may say that’s what you have a dog for, and I agree. However, in a competition where judges and the steward of the beat may hesitate or have an eye not to disturb game, the dogs may not be given the best of chances. This is why it is imperative to have a good picker-up at hand. When did…

Lewis Thornley has been appointed as the director of BASC Central England. Derbyshire-born Mr Thornley, a Sparsholt College graduate who has previously worked for the Forestry Commission, first joined the team as a regional officer in February 2015. Mr Thornley, an experienced deer manager with a keen interest in game shooting, had spent the eight months previous to his appointment serving as the acting director of the Tutbury-based team. “I’m chuffed to bits,” said Mr Thornley. “It’s an honour to secure the role and I’m very much looking forward to working with our team of volunteers, supporters and members to build on what we have achieved and taking BASC Central even further forward.” Sarah Turner, a member of BASC council, said: “Throughout his career with BASC, Lewis has always performed…

12kg Amount of Green Shoots wildflower seed mix given away by BASC at The Game Fair and Countryfile Live over the summer. 6,000 The number of square metres of wildflower meadow the seed mix could create. 24,000 Hectares of blanket bog that have undergone restoration work (including revegetation) on grouse moors in England. £280,777 Amount achieved during Gavin Gardiner’s auction at Gleneagles Hotel on August 28. November 16 Date of the Gun Trade Dinner, set to be held at the Victory Service Club, Marble Arch, London. November 29 Date of the GWCT Cymru’s annual dinner and auction, set to be held in Llandudno, North Wales.…

What’s the biggest mistake people make when cooking game? On venison, people might use the loins and then just mince the rest of the fore quarter because traditionally they might think that’s all it was good for. Yes they can be minced but braised shoulder and slow cooked venison breast are fantastic and some of my favourite dishes. People just need to be a bit more adventurous. Game has suffered from some poor recipes over the years, poor because they were written at a time when the quality of game wasn’t particularly that good and at a time when we enjoyed stronger flavours. We also used to use strong marinades to tenderise and mask the flavour of what in many cases was an old stag which the chef had been…

Dear Uncle Giles, My teenage son enjoyed two days at partridge with his formidable grandfather in early September and I’ve noticed my heir has picked up some rather bad habits from their time together. Most notably the way he holds his shotgun between drives (unslipped, breech closed, barrels pointing at the floor). Naturally I’ll speak to my son, but should I speak to his grandfather (my father-in-law) too, and if so, how should I approach the matter? MT, by email Uncle Giles writes It is always a thorny issue when someone who is evidently senior to yourself behaves in a way that makes you uncomfortable. You know that it is wrong to let it pass unchallenged and yet the ramifications of confronting the perpetrator may be considerable and enduring. The…

“I don’t think anyone will get away with prohibiting shooting. It would be a colossal economic shock to the countryside.” Have you aired the guns this season? Not yet, I am getting old and don’t do a lot nowadays but I have a partridge day planned in October and then in January a day of fine, fat Norfolk pheasants. Both days are spent up in Reepham in Norfolk with a great chum of mine, Sir John White. He was much cleverer than me and contrived to be born in a very good bed, inheriting 5,000 acres of Norfolk when his father died. That is managed by a remarkable Danish guy, Poul Hovesen, who has been Farmer of The Year and is also my son-in-law. And what do you use? I…

Don’t pick on ramblers! I read with interest the article by Ben Samuelson on grouse beating in the August issue (The Great Debate). I found it very amusing that he was appalled at the prospect of being thought of as a rambler. I have spent most of my life walking the length and breadth of this wonderful country doing long distance footpaths, walking across many grouse moors and sometimes watched grouse shooting with envy. I've now reached the age of 72 but have been a keen shooting man since the age of 12. So Ben, next time you see a rambler there is just a chance he loves his country pursuits just like you. It doesn’t pay to jump to conclusions. Guy Woolley, by email Ed. Thanks for this, Guy.…

The work of a number of this country’s most highly regarded sporting artists is now available in the Countryside Learning 16th annual art auction. Place the highest bid and any one of them could be yours – an item sure to take pride of place in your home. Countryside Learning, now in its 31st year as a national registered charity, reaches up to 20,000 children with a programme of events while the members of its Farms for Schools programme reach a further 300,000 children. The charity organises visits for a single class or events where up to 4,000 inner-city children get the chance, often for the first time, to experience the countryside surrounding where they live. They will learn about where their food comes from, how we affect our rural…

Serves 12-14 people INGREDIENTS Pastry 300g plain flour 125g cold unsalted butter, chopped 1 large egg Pinch of salt Filling 540g golden syrup The zest and juice of ½ lemon Pinch of ground ginger 125g soft white breadcrumbs 70g ground almonds 4 egg yolks 225ml double cream METHOD Put the flour, butter and a pinch of salt into a food processor and process until the mix resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the egg and 1-2 tbsp ice-cold water. Using the pulse button, process until the mixture comes together. Flatten to a round shape, wrap in cling film and refrigerate for an hour. Roll out pastry and line a 24cm round tart tin. Line pastry with greaseproof paper and baking beans. Blind-bake pastry in a pre-heated 180ºc oven for 10-12 minutes. Remove…

When good breeding years provide a sufficient number of grouse, we often try driving. Impromptu butts are easily made up from pallets and netting, and I’ve been on many walked-up days which ended up dabbling in a drive or two. Teams of guns take it in turns to “walk one, drive one” and the effect can sometimes be quite successful. You don’t need many birds over your butt to imagine how it might feel on a full day at Gunnerside or Wemmergill, and many smaller moors often play down their potential for driving because they don’t feel that they can compete with the big names. In reality, some of the best and most exciting driven grouse I have ever seen has been on improvised days on moors which are usually…

“The gun’s round action is noted for its slim wrist and the lack of chequering seems to emphasise this svelte silhouette.” Because I examine many firearms, I can sometimes get a little blasé, even though I’m handling top-quality sporting guns produced by very famous makers. Something needs to stand out to grab my attention. Two of the most important elements a gun must have to catch my eye are patina and something a little bit quirky. Patina really applies to antique and vintage guns and is the lovely finish built over decades in time to create a warm antique glow that is impossible to re-create. Such untouched guns are termed “sleepers” and like a good bottle of whisky, they have aged to perfection over the years, but, unlike the whisky,…

According to the latest research from Savills, confidence in the Scottish estate market is continuing to build in 2017 following the most active market in a decade last year. The market for estates in 2016 saw a total of 26 estate sales at a combined total asking price of £90m: this included some significant and notable deals. We believe terms have been agreed on seven estates so far this year, amounting to 37,000 acres and an accumulated asking price of around £45m, including three sporting estates. We are seeing overseas interest being spurred on by favourable interest rates following the Brexit vote, as Scottish estates stand out as exceptionally good value. This interest is complemented by an upturn in interest from English buyers (in 2016, 62 per cent of buyers…

“One of the best parts of being field trial secretary is ringing someone up late at night and offering them a run.” Recently I was chatting to a gamekeeper who said no one ever writes about what it takes to hold a field trial from a “behind the scenes” point of view. I thought he had a point and that it would be interesting to talk to the people who are integral to them. I talked to a field trial secretary, a headkeeper and an A Panel retriever judge. Working on the basis that the club already has Kennel Club permission to hold open trials, the first place to start is the club’s committee meeting... The field trial secretary “We plan our trials at the committee meeting before the AGM.…

HOW TO WIN For your chance to win either a Pintail Explorer smock (top) or a Seasons jacket (right), email high-resolution pictures to: katemaxim@outlook.com. Please put “Gundog Picture of the Month” in the subject line. The winner will be chosen by the Shooting Gazette judging panel. Good luck! The prize will only be posted to winners with a fixed UK postal address.…