Innholdsfortegnelse for 9-Mar-2016 i Shooting Times & Country

IT IS VITAL THAT deer in Scotland are treated with the respect they deserve and that such an awe-inspiring part of our native wildlife is recognised as having a special place in the Scottish landscape. Deer management north of the border has been the subject of much debate in recent months, with calls to reduce the population of red and roe dramatically in the Highlands. There is a real risk that this has everything to do with political prejudice and conservation fads and nothing to do with animal welfare, a balanced ecology and local community. Those who understand these animals best are the people who live and work with them every day, and it is hoped the Scottish Government listens to them. Despite the reluctance on the part of estates…

The key words of a road safety campaign some years ago were “stop, look and listen”, but politicians would do well to do exactly this before rushing to legislate. That the Scottish Government is to consult on changes to its tail docking ban to exempt working dogs is welcome news, but how much better it would have been for all concerned — dogs and owners — if it had stopped, looked and listened before passing the legislation in the first place. Time and again, the scramble to create law appears to ignore the knowledge and views of those to be affected by it: emotion, prejudice and a desire to “do something” take precedence with predictably poor results. Tail docking, pistol banning, hunting: our community has suffered more than most from…

“Anyone who went outside to the loo had to take the gun, just in case they saw a rat” Our English partridges are now paired up and in good numbers. It is lovely to see them, milling about on the estate in their jolly way, looking for potential nesting sites. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for a successful breeding season. All the important elements are in place, the weather notwithstanding. We have worked hard to create first-rate partridge cover on our ground, complemented by plenty of feed hoppers. Controlling predators is also imperative in sustaining a healthy population of English partridge, and my spring campaign is in full swing. “Vermin, if allowed to get plentiful, will no doubt devastate and destroy an English partridge population, in the shortest of times,”…

I haven’t been down the “heavy is best” road entirely, but I do have a 31in Perazzi choked half and three-quarters that comes out for FITASC Sporting and on driven days where I’m likely to shoot a lot of cartridges, and the birds fly high off valley sides. However, I don’t think I shoot any more pheasants — or kill them any more cleanly — than I did with my old Browning B125. The big decider on which to take are the trigger-pulls, not their chokes: the Perazzi’s trigger is among the crispest you can get, while the other has a noticeable drag.…

“The chances of a genuine working gundog winning the Best in Show are nil” Last year I got into trouble with the Kennel Club because I had the temerity to suggest that the Crufts Best in Show judge, former KC chairman Ronnie Irving, would have been familiar with all the finalists (Gundogs, 25 March). He denied it, which is a bit like a Premier League referee saying that he is unaware of the names of the top players, or a Wimbledon umpire not having heard of Serena Williams and Roger Federer. Though there may be more than 20,000 dogs competing for best in show at Crufts, a title that includes a cheque for £100, there are very few in with a chance of becoming best of breed, let alone best…

Twenty-five species of British and Irish bees have become extinct during recorded history, according to Steven Falk’s Field Guide to the Bees of Great Britain and Ireland, which was published late last year. The first to become extinct were Kirby’s mason bee (Hoplitis leucomelana) and the shiny-gastered furrow bee (Lasioglossum laeve), both last sighted before 1802. The last to become extinct was Andrena lathyri, the Burbage mining bee that favoured open grassland, which was last seen in 1990. But Falk cautions against any claim that extinctions are absolute, because it may just be that certain species thought to be extinct simply haven’t been seen for a long time. For instance, two species — the grey-backed mining bee (Andrena vaga), an early season species that collects pollen from willow, and the…

“I believe that in five years’ time, the only question people will ask is why we didn’t leave the EU sooner” Environment minister Elizabeth Truss and farming minister George Eustice are split over the issue of Brexit. Mr Eustice surprised many in the farming industry when he gave his support last month to the campaign for Britain to leave the European Union (EU), while Ms Truss revealed she is backing the Prime Minister’s campaign to stay in, despite her eurosceptic leanings. Mr Eustice said: “The Prime Minister deserves huge credit for delivering this referendum and we now have an opportunity to debate our future, how we are governed and how our laws are made. I have been an advocate of renegotiation for 15 years but, in the end, despite the…

IN THE GARDEN If you took our advice about putting up a wooden nest box last week (News, 2 March), then you may also want to make sure the birds are well fed. Blue tits, sparrows and finches will make use of hanging feeders, while ground feeders such as thrushes will prefer it if you drop some food under the bird table — so long as you don’t get many cats in your garden. WATCH The final episode of three-part comedy Stagairs on Saturday, 12 March at 9pm on BBC2. The series follows an obnoxious group of friends whose deerstalking expedition in the Scottish Highlands turns into the stag weekend from hell when someone begins killing them off one at a time. In the finale, the four surviving members of…

LAG report may be ignored, says source The Government is expected to ignore calls to ban the use of lead ammunition, according to The Independent. The paper recently quoted an anonymous DEFRA source, who claims that the Lead Ammunition Group (LAG) report, which calls for a ban, will likely be shelved. Its source said: “We’re struggling to find time to work out when we tell the world what we’re going to do, which is nothing. It will get parked somewhere. No action will be taken.” Ministers are due to meet with LAG chairman John Swift this month to discuss the report’s findings, and an official Government decision could shortly follow. CLA calls for nature replacement schemes The CLA has urged ministers to pass laws requiring developers to replace wildlife and…

What does a typical working week involve? I travel from Wales to London on Mondays to catch up with the CLA team. The week that follows will generally involve meetings with politicians to discuss solutions to some of the issues our members are facing, as well as visits to CLA members across England and Wales, preparing for and delivering speeches, sharing ideas with other organisations, and committee meetings with fellow members and CLA staff. What do you see as the most important function of the CLA? I consider our success in lobbying on behalf of our members and our provision of expert advice to members to be equally important. Our purpose is to ensure that CLA members have the security, certainty and support they need to make investments in their…

“I followed the fox’s tracks for three miles before he vanished into the forest. He could’ve started his journey 10 miles farther back” It was very useful to spend a few hours yesterday watching two foxes in the snow from the windows of my office. Eight hundred yards away, the two distant silhouettes resolved into some semblance of clarity through the binoculars, and I watched them for half an hour as they worked through the drifts. I had a great opportunity to see how they move on open snow and compared it with the usual gait and posture of foxes moving through rushes or grass. So much of successful snaring depends on knowing how the fox will move and anticipating it with a wire loop, and I learned a great…

USE TECHNOLOGY Trailcams are invaluable to detect the times when the deer are moving around the plantations and may give you a good idea of numbers as well. The cameras are best situated along well-established paths, such as the inside of the fence (above), as deer have a tendency to walk alongside certain sections of the wire. Once a mean daylight time is worked out, you can lie in ambush near this path. Added data for deer numbers and movement can also be acquired at night-time with the use of thermal imaging or infrared cameras. LURE THEM IN Feed bins (above) filled with grain are excellent lures in plantations but I have had criticism from landowners that they only encourage the deer. I disagree, especially come late January and into…

The timing of the rut is always a major topic of conversation. While woodland stags in Perthshire seemed reluctant to begin, those in the islands were reported to be roaring and active by 21 September. Farther east on the mainland, the rut was described as sporadic, with a few big stags out in the last week in September. Chris Macrae at Eishken thought that it was a short rut and all over by the beginning of the hind season, though there were reports of a more prolonged affair with mature stags still active well into October.…

Since the introduction of the cartridge-firing shotgun, beginning with the pinfire in the mid-19th century, loaders have sprung up like autumn mushrooms. While Eley-Kynoch dominated the UK market, there have been numerous sizeable manufacturers that have supplied shooters with ammunition to suit every type of sport. Among these was Greenwood & Batley. This firm was founded in 1856 by Thomas Greenwood and John Batley and based at its Albion Works in Leeds. Originally they were engineers, making testing machines for iron-and-steel and bolt-and-nut forging machinery. Then they diversified into producing several types of military ammunition, rifle and revolver cartridges in about 30 different calibres — certainly too numerous to list here. They also made torpedoes for the British Admiralty during World War I, as well as gun carriages and projectiles…

An awful lot of feathers BIRDLIFE Q During the past season, I plucked and dressed by hand 20 pheasants, 10 partridges and five mallard. I reckon that means I’ve plucked out at least 40,000 feathers. Am I right? A This is a difficult question to answer for a number of reasons. For a start, I supect that you didn’t pluck the birds’ necks and heads. You might not have plucked the wings, either. I’ve never tried counting the numbers of feathers I’ve pulled out of any single bird, and can’t find any figures from anyone who has done so. However, I have unearthed some interesting figures. The smallest number of feathers counted on a bird was 940 on a ruby-throated hummingbird, and the highest was 25,216 on a whistling swan…

The flash of a white rump, as a wheatear takes off from a wall or is disturbed on a beach, is often the first sign of spring. Early birds are probably British breeders, freshly arrived from the other side of the Sahara, but others will keep coming well into April, as individuals destined for Iceland, Greenland and the Arctic islands of Canada time their migration to coincide with the greening of these northern lands and the emergence of insect food. These robin-sized birds are amazing travellers. At the same time as wheatears from west Africa are heading north and west, birds from east Africa fly north and east, to cross the whole of the eastern Eurasian land-mass and breed in Alaska and western Canada. Whether breeding on an exposed coastal…

The candidates for election to the BASC council in June have been announced. Four members from across the country will compete for a general council seat, while Robin Marshall-Ball stands unopposed and will be elected to the English regional council seat. Competing for the general council seat are shotgun coach Kevin Byrne, a former board director of the Clay Pigeon Shooting Association (CPSA); Michael Alldis, owner of Essex Shooting School and former CPSA deputy director; Langstone wildfowler and retired civil servant Allen Musselwhite, and Cara Richardson, sporting agent and co-founder of the Scottish Ladies Shooting Club. Profiles of those standing will be sent to BASC members in the coming weeks, along with voting forms. Members can also vote online. The results will be announced at the BASC annual general meeting…

1 2 MARCH BASC YOUNG SHOTS FUND-RAISING DINNER The Inn at Whitewell, Forest of Bowland, Lancashire Tel 01200 448181 14 MARCH GWCT RODENTICIDE TRAINING DAY The Allerton Project, Loddington, Leicestershire Tel 01244 573007 17 MARCH HOLT’S AUCTION OF FINE MODERN AND ANTIQUE GUNS Princess Louise House, Hammersmith, London Tel 01485 542822 1 9 -20 MARCH THE WEST OF ENGLAND GAME FAIR 2016 The Royal Bath & West of England Society, The Showground, Shepton Mallet, Somerset Tel 01392 421500 4 APRIL RIVER COTTAGE GARDEN OPEN DAY River Cottage HQ, Axminster, Devon Tel 01297 630300 3 0 APRIL THE 2016 FEMMES FATALES CLAYSHOOTING CUP Royal Berkshire Shooting School, Pangbourne, Berkshire Tel 01491 672900…

The London Shooting Club and West London Shooting School have teamed up to launch a new event — the London Shooting Show — later this year. The inaugural show will be held at the West London Shooting School in Northolt, in north- west London, which is 20 minutes away from the centre of the capital, on Friday, 16 and Saturday, 17 September. Attendance is by invitation only. Visitors will be able shoot both rifles and shotguns on the ranges, while exhibitions and displays will be focused on gameshooting. Clive Hetherington, chief executive of London Shooting Club, commented: “We are very pleased to announce the launch of the London Shooting Show. The show will bring fieldsports to London-based sporting enthusiasts and will provide shooters with access to premiere brands and services…

Organic meats and milk are better for you, because they contain more of the beneficial omega-3 fatty acid, according to new research by Newcastle University. The American Kennel Club has named the Labrador retriever as the US’s most popular dog for the 25th year running. Animal charity Animal Aid has called on the Welsh Government to stop allowing private pheasant shoots for sport on two plots of publicly owned woodland in Powys. The charity says that foxes, stoats, weasels and other mammals are “suffering” due to the use of traps and snares. Motorists entering the National Trust red squirrel reserve in Formby, Merseyside, are being asked to watch their speed after one of the endangered animals was struck and killed by a car.…

FISHING IN SCOTLAND In your piece regarding rod licences (Sporting Answers, 17 February), Chris de Cani refers to a UK licence. Would you please clarify if this is English law and whether a licence is needed by law in Scotland? A. Davidson, by email Chris de Cani responds: In Scotland, you need a fishing rod licence for the Border Esk and its tributaries. You don’t need a rod licence elsewhere in Scotland, but you need permission. On some border rivers you need a Scottish permit on one bank, and an England and Wales rod licence on the other. For more information, visit: po.st/fishing. RAPTORS AND CLUEDO There is widespread condemnation from all parties after there has been more reported raptor persecution in Derbyshire (News, 17 February). But has there? I…

The practice of muirburn — or heather burning, as it’s more commonly known by the practitioners — is extremely old. It was originally done to produce fresh grazing for animals, as it still is over huge swathes of the planet, though not on heather moorland. In Britain, the practice was refined considerably from 1850 onwards, as management for grouse became the norm on many moorland areas. The practice has come under considerable scrutiny and criticism in recent years, with claims that it leads to discolouration of water, as well as increasing the run-off from the moors, contributing to flooding. It was not just the higher altitude moors that were burned; the lowland heaths were also burned on a regular basis for grazing. It is the cessation of this, coupled with…

BILL HARRIMAN BASC’s head of firearms and global authority on guns MAT MANNING Airgunner and journalist from the West Country BRUCE POTTS Shooting Timesrifle reviewer and stalker DAVID TOMLINSON Highly regarded writer and ornithologist LIAM BELL Shropshire gamekeeper and keen wildfowler GRAHAM DOWNING Shooting consultant and sporting author PAUL RAWLINGS Gundog expert and A-panel spaniel judge CHRIS DE CANI Riverkeeper, with specialist knowledge of chalkstreams TONY BUCKWELL Veterinary surgeon with a special interest in gundogs TONY JACKSON A game Shot, keen stalker and former editor of Shooting Times TOM PAYNE Professional shooting instructor and avid pigeon shooter SIMON WHITEHEAD Author, professional ferreter and rabbit controller IAIN WATSON Keen stalker and senior CIC international trophy judge Contact the team Email: stanswers@timeinc.com By post: Shooting Times, Blue Fin Building,…

“Every Labrador is, by genetic disposition, simply a fur-coated, food-seeking missile” Are we really a nation of dog lovers? I was walking down a street in Hexham, in Northumberland, a while ago when I spotted a sign outside a pub, which read: “No dogs allowed inside, except guide dogs.” That’s pretty standard wording throughout the UK. But not in most of the rest of Europe. On the Continent, they take their dogs everywhere. I have recently been skiing in Austria and France. I got to talking about the British attitude towards dogs in a few après ski bars (as you do). What sparked the conversation was the number of friendly dogs accompanying their owners in the bars in question. And in several of the mountain restaurants we frequented, resident dogs…

MARCH 1 12-13 SUFFOLK GAME & COUNTRY FAIR Henham Park, Beccles, Suffolk. (01283) 820548 www.livingheritagecountryshows.co.uk 2 18-20 SHIRE HOUSE SOCIETY NATIONAL SHOW Staffordshire County Showground, Weston Road, Stafford, Staffordshire (01536) 771611 www.shirehorseshow.co.uk 3 19-20 WEST OF ENGLAND GAME FAIR Royal Bath & West Showground, Shepton Mallet, Somerset. (01392) 421500. www.westcountrygamefair.co.uk 4 27-28 KELMARSH COUNTRY FAIR Kelmarsh Hall, Northamptonshire. (01889) 563232, press option 1 for tickets www.countrymanfairs.co.uk 5 27-28 THAME COUNTRY FAIR Thame Showground, Thame, Oxfordshire. (01283) 820548 www.livingheritagecountryshows.co.uk 6 31 COUNTRYTASTIC Three Counties Showground, Malvern, Worcestershire. (01684) 584924 www.threecounties.co.uk/countrytastic APRIL 7 9-10 THORESBY COUNTRY FAIR Thoresby Park, Ollerton, Nottinghamshire. (01283) 820548 www.livingheritagecountryshows.co.uk 8 9-10 DEERSTALKING FAIR Border Union Agricultural Showground, Springwood Park, Kelso, Scotland. (07774) 127467 www.deerstalkingfair.co.uk 9 16-17 BASC GAMEKEEPERS FAIR Catton Park, South Derbyshire. (01283) 810910 www.bascgamekeepersfair.co.uk 10…