Innholdsfortegnelse for 12-Jul-2023 i Shooting Times & Country

When nature writer and occasional ST contributor Mary Colwell tweeted there were no lapwings nesting on Dartmoor this year, it created a major stir. She suggested that the principal reasons are heavy predation, principally by crows, and loss of suitable habitat. Both are undoubtedly serious problems and the shooting community responded by stressing the importance of managing predators. In a blog written for the Natural England website earlier this year, Wes Smythe noted that: “Breeding populations of golden plover, red grouse and ring ouzels have now gone or are on the verge of being lost. The large expanses of upland heathland that once characterised the moor are now in poor ecological condition. Dartmoor’s precious peatlands, its blanket bogs on the highest ground and mires in the valley bottoms are still…

LETTER OF THE WEEK What the hang is going on in Scotland? After reading a recent news article (No more deer closed season?, 28 June), I started to wonder, do the powers that be really think that shooting stags and bucks will get deer numbers under control? It’s the hinds and does that give birth to calves and kids, and it has always been my understanding that to keep deer numbers under control and to a manageable level, you need to cull 30% to 33% of these. Or has NatureScot got some other ulterior motive? John H, Northumberland The Editor responds: “Aye, it’s madness, but it’s all madness these days. I suspect ignorance rather than an ulterior motive. It’s the same thing that got hunting banned and that has just…

Taking the thermal monocular out of its box and removing the lens caps, I turned it on and put it to my eye. I looked out of the kitchen window into the dark morning, expecting to pick a rabbit or other critter out in the garden. To my surprise, all I saw was my own mundane reflection staring back at me. I suppose I’d never really thought about it before, but I didn’t ever consider that the reflection in a glass window would have a heat signature, yet here was the new ZEISS DTI 6/20 picking it up. I’d never seen that in a thermal before; I was impressed. Wanting to put the machine to the test in a more trying environment than my kitchen, I called up my friend…

The incomerA beginner’s diary: roebuck stalking It’s the most profound lesson I’ve learned on my fieldsports voyage of discovery. And yet, now I come to write about it, I wonder how profound it actually is. Perhaps it’s blindingly self-evident; banal, even, in its universal obviousness. But you don’t come to this page for insight, so here it is: you can’t expect an animal to cooperate while you’re trying to kill it. This thought struck me on the M3, as I was driving back to London following an unsuccessful roe stalk in Hampshire. Although I was disappointed it had ended in a blank, I’d still found the experience instructive. I was turning over the events of the morning as I drove and remembered something that Martin Edwards, my unofficial stalking mentor,…

Catlow’s notebook I have always thought of my pheasant time, by which I mean the time for their release at High Park and for the work that belongs to it, as the main feature of late summer and early autumn. For years and years poults came to my pens right at the end of July or very early in August, and for the next six weeks or so their care was the chief focus of my attention. It was a time to which I looked forward eagerly and, except when things went wrong, pheasant time was an absorbing and enjoyable experience. There was a quiet and satisfying rhythm to it and I often found its later stages, when the first signs of autumn were already beginning to touch High Park…

I allowed the cool, clear red wine to trickle down my throat. Life was good. I had been awake for about an hour and was contemplating my next move, if there was to be one before lunchtime. The mid-morning sun blazed down on the cracked paving stones of our patio and one could almost see the vine leaves over the well wilting from the fearful heat. A drop of sweat trickled down my nose and on to my chest. Seated in a deck chair, I scanned the vine terraces that stretched upwards and away into the heat-haze to the right of our villa. Some way up the vine-clad mountainside a glint of white reminded me of my friend, Patrick, who was probably lying up there sleeping off a hangover. Nearer…

NEWS The high-profile investigation into the dumping of five goshawks in a Suffolk car park in January, all of which were found to contain shot, has coincided with a politically turbulent period for the game shooting sector. It recently concluded with the sentencing of a part-time gamekeeper. Francis Addison, 72, pleaded guilty to 19 charges in relation to the investigation, including possession of dead birds, use of an animal trap in non-approved circumstances and 10 counts of failing to comply with the conditions of shotgun and firearms licences. He was sentenced to 12 weeks imprisonment, suspended for 12 months, and was ordered to pay £1,200 in compensation and costs. Addison maintains he did not kill the birds, claiming instead that his dog discovered them on a walk and that he…

Orston Shooting Ground has been placed on the market, prompting questions about the rising costs of running clay shooting businesses. The 53-acre site in Nottingham has been listed for an undisclosed amount but features a range of clay pigeon stands, air rifle range, simulated game arena and grouse butt. Orston has also recently gained planning permission to develop a 24-lane full-bore rifle range. Ian Simpson of Savills, which is marketing the property, said: “Shooting grounds rarely come to the market and development of new sites is challenging due to planning and noise restrictions. Due to the specialist skill set in running the business, the operational market is limited.” Shooting Times contributor Tom Payne added that it was “inevitable” that clay shooting businesses were feeling the pinch. “The cost of living…

New SERIES "A foot on the gauge at Sprouston and it’s pretty much a done deal here,” encouraged Dean Cockburn as I unfurled a Spey cast into the top of the Learmouth Stream. The is the most productive pool on West Learmouth, which in turn is one of the most productive beats on the Tweed. Sadly, it wasn’t a foot on the gauge at Sprouston. In fact, the day after I fished, The Times reported on how historically low the river was. Despite the lack of water, Dean was upbeat. He’s one of the rising stars of the Tweed gillie world. Now in his early twenties, both his parents worked on the nets in that bygone age when there was a significant harvestable surplus of Atlantic salmon. He’d…

Gun licensing On 12 August 2021, a very troubled young man shot five people dead and then killed himself with a licensed shotgun at Keyham, near Plymouth. After the inquest into these deaths in March this year, calls for changes to firearms licensing law were made by the coroner and the Independent Office for Police Conduct, the IOPC. The main thrust of their recommendations was that shotguns should be licensed in the same way as sporting rifles. On 29 June, the Home Office policing minister, Chris Philp MP, made a written statement to the Commons responding to these recommendations. In his statement, the minister said: “Public safety is our priority, but the measures to manage the risk to public safety must be proportionate and balanced with the fact that the…

Buy with confidenceOPTICS TEST Using a trail cam to see what’s going on around your shoot when you’re not there can be a real revelation. While any form of observation can provide useful information, it can be very surprising to see what quarry species get up to when left to their own devices. Of course, trail cams can also provide a valuable insight into the activities of unauthorised and unwelcome human visitors who don’t realise they’re being watched. A lot of my shooting time is devoted to the control of grey squirrels, and I often use trail cams to monitor activity around my bait stations. Information gleaned from these cameras helps me to make sure the hours I spend in the hide with my air rifle coincide with the times…

Aidan Hartley is a farmer, keen Shot and fisherman Until only a few years ago, there was not a single fence between us and the distant Ethiopian frontier 300 miles north of us. It was a free and wild space, a territory for nomads, cattle rustlers and brigands. “Stolen!” yelled Lopeyok. “Bandits!” It took a few seconds for me to understand what was happening. Lopeyok, now leaning on his knees, panted. “Samburu! Rustled! Guns! Steers!” I looked where Lopeyok pointed and saw a great plume of dust in the distance. Raiders were rushing our cattle away across the plains. On the VHF radio I tried to reach the police. Silence. Fortunately, Tom on the neighbouring ranch of Loisaba did hear me. The farm askari (ranger) Ekuwam and other workers, roused…

US sales of shotguns from English gunmakers continue to soar. James Purdey & Sons Ltd, whose shotguns can easily exceed £150,000, do much of their business overseas, with most of this in the USA. Dan Jago, chairman and CEO of Purdey, said: “We have been making sporting guns for the US market for over 100 years and are very proud that it still represents over half of all orders. Texas leads the way, but many of the southern states, along with California, are increasingly important to Purdey in the US.” Dr Nicholas Harlow, Purdey’s Mayfair gunroom manager, emphasised: “America is still the biggest single geographic market that we operate in.” This trend is not limited to ultra-prestige heritage brands and is even more pronounced in a relatively recent newcomer to…

NEWS A story last week in The Guardian alleges crimes against wildlife on the royal Sandringham Estate. The article contains details collected after a Freedom of Information Act request and has found a total of 18 cases since 2003, “including the poisoning, shooting and disappearance of some of the UK’s rarest birds of prey”. Some of the most recent incidents reported by the paper concern the tragic disappearance of two very rare montagu harriers on farmland owned by the estate in 2014 and 2017. These cases were investigated by the police with no further action taken, and Sandringham has always denied any knowledge of the fate of these birds. Other cases highlighted include the alleged unlawful killing of 40 woodpigeons in 2016 and an occasion where staff burned the body…

Beset by mounting controversy, grouse moor management often seems boxed into a corner by a range of hostile forces. Over the past few years, it has become fashionable for rewilders to present an alternative model for land use in the uplands. They argue that if grousekeepers could only slacken their grip on the hills, nature would rebound in full and splendid glory. This idea gets a surprising amount of traction, particularly since the benefits are almost entirely speculative and imagined. Rewilders can guess at what that transition might look like, but these guesses are often based on models borrowed from Scandinavia and Finland. It’s fun to realise that while British ecologists hold the Nordic countries in high esteem as an exemplar for the UK, many Nordic ecologists have a very…

Sporting club A knot spotlighted the precise moment I realised my son had morphed from boy to embryonic man. For the past seven years, our angling adventures have always been conducted on a pupil and teacher basis. During that period he’s learned to cast, to be patient, to handle fish and return them with care or bash them accurately on the head. For those unfortunates in the latter category, Charlie had mastered the art of gutting, filleting and smoking. He knew how to flick a dry fly and sink a spider, he could ledger and he could trot. Yet for all of that acquired proficiency, the seemingly straightforward act of tying a blood knot had evaded him. Last week, we stood on the reed-ridden banks of the Waveney, with demoiselles…

I spent a very enjoyable day in Somerset a couple of weeks ago, judging the Mendip Farmers’ Hunt puppy show. My former boss when I was whipper-in at the Monmouthshire is now a huntsman at the Mendip, so the whole thing felt quite special. As I mentioned last month, a great deal of work goes into preparing not only the young hounds for the day but also all the arrangements, so the judging should be taken equally as seriously. Much time has been spent by both the puppy walkers and hunt staff to get the young hounds to this stage, so there is a certain responsibility on the part of the judges to get it right. There are two judges invited for the day, sometimes either the master or huntsman…

THOUGHTS FROM THE FIELD Many country people shun the scientific names given to plants, preferring more meaningful monikers. The practicality of these traditional old English names is seen in many medicinal plants. Sage, for example, was believed to improve memory. Interestingly, recent research has investigated whether this bitter herb may slow the progress of Alzheimer’s disease. The wildflower stitchwort was used to heal stomach cramps (stitches); selfheal cured cuts and bruises, and the tannin-rich tormentil (torment heal) was chewed to alleviate the pain of toothache. Arguably the finest example of this naming convention is fleabane (boringly called Pulicaria dysenterica in Latin). Attractive, with yellow flowers and a hairy stem, fleabane is commonly found in wet ditches and water meadows, and is the basis for the natural insecticide pyrethrum. If the…