Innholdsfortegnelse for 20-Jan-2016 i Shooting Times & Country

WE HAD A more productive day’s shooting on the Saturday after New Year, having found little on the ground on Boxing Day. Dark clouds made way for sunshine as we drove to a place we have permission on, a lovely high point with beautiful views of the Otter Valley. Working it fairly well with the two terriers and the Labrador, we put up several pheasants, despite discovering that the feeders needed a top-up. There were a few failures, such as when spectacular birds were flushed and the Guns had wandered off in the wrong direction, and later when at least 15 birds were pushed out of gorse too early to shouts and curses. The good thing is that there will be plenty for next time. We stopped at the pub…

David Cameron has been asked to step in to save the National Wildlife Crime Unit, which will see its funding run out in March. The appeal came amid fears that the unit could be closed in Government spending cuts — as ministers have so far refused to rule out scrapping it entirely. Labour MP Jim Dowd questioned Mr Cameron about the unit during Prime Minister’s Questions. The PM noted that it did “important work domestically and overseas”, but that a decision was “still to be made about the future”. The unit costs around £427,000 a year to run, with DEFRA and the Home Office providing £136,000 each. In 2015 it seized more than 400 items banned under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, and regularly works with police…

Beretta World returns to Holywell This year’s Beretta World Sporting Championship will once again be held in the grounds of the Holywell estate in Hampshire, shooting sports distributor GMK announced earlier this month. The popular annual competition, which regularly attracts more than 1,000 entries, will run from Thursday, 30 June to Saturday, 2 July and will feature 120 targets shot over 15 stands on two courses. Forestry Commission urged to shoot greys The Forestry Commission must use airguns to cull grey squirrels, said the European Squirrel Initiative earlier this month. But the Forestry Commission retorted that shooting greys, which carry the squirrelpox virus that is deadly to reds, with airguns is not a humane form of control. Peatland can help offset greenhouse gas New research originating from the Cambridge Conservation…

Who are you and what do you do? I am BASC’s director of firearms. I assist the organisation in campaigning for fair and effective firearms law and help the BASC Firearms Team with members’ problems. What does a typical working week involve for you? There is no such thing as a typical working week. One day I could be dealing with a delicate licensing problem on behalf of a BASC member. The next, giving evidence in a Crown Court appeal and the day after that attending a Home Office meeting. What do you see as the most important function of BASC? Protecting the reasonable expectation that in a democracy, law-abiding people can own firearms for legitimate purposes without undue restriction by the state. What has been the biggest challenge to…

It’s Sunday morning, the two yellow Labradors have gone back to bed after their breakfast and, frankly, I wouldn’t mind taking the same option. Three days of shooting and picking-up without a break does tend to run the batteries down, but I shouldn’t complain — other than to whinge about the weather. The unrelenting rain driven by gusts of hurricane-force wind, day after day, has now transformed the south-west countryside, where it is not flooded, into a soggy morass. Fields have become boot-sucking bogs. As I discovered on my first day’s shooting, which was basically an armed walk, the dreadful weather has scattered pheasants into unexpected patches of cover. My host, on this first day, kindly organised a morning’s walking-up round his fields and strips of woodland for three or…

“Registration might be tricky, as what would you put on the pedigree?” Would you pay £67,000 to have your favourite dog cloned? This was the sum paid recently by a British couple, who employed a South Korean laboratory to replicate their boxer, which had died from a brain tumour. If £67,000 sounds rather a lot, it seems that they will get two for the price of one, as two puppies have been produced that are not only genetically identical to each other, but also to the dog that died. Both were born to surrogate mothers using a technique that involves implanting DNA into a blank dog egg with the nucleus removed. I’m not persuaded about the ethics of cloning, but it’s a technique that opens a whole host of possibilities.…

Can I cull cormorants? FISHING Q My local fishing lake has been visited by up to 20 cormorants for much of this winter and numbers of small fish have been decimated. I remember reading about a cormorant cull one year, but are there other ways to control them? A Culling of fish-eating birds is currently regarded as a last resort because there are several other ways in which avian predation of fish can be reduced. Noise and human activity are often cited as effective methods, though I have shared my swim several times with a cormorant that fished away happily because he had learned that the groundbait with which I fed every 10 minutes was of concentrated fish and made for an easy meal. I know of someone who has…

A low January sun casts a wonderful light on male yellowhammers. They’re not quite in their full spring finery yet but the protective, buffy edges to their feathers are already wearing away, revealing the gold beneath. With most, if not all, fields ploughed and sown by now, gamestrips and pheasant feeding stations are really important to farmland birds, such as the “little-bit-of-bread-and-no-cheese” yellowhammer (pictured). The supplementary seed supplies will continue to attract flocks of finches and buntings through to the start of the breeding season, at the end of April, when pairs will set up territories in hedgerows. Until then, look out for yellowhammers as they are disturbed from gamestrips and fly into the security of a nearby hawthorn hedge, and try to leave some weedy open ground for them…

“Hunter wellies only hit mainstream fashion consciousness when Lady Diana wore them” How many of us, I wonder, have felt slightly self-conscious when walking across a garage forecourt dressed in breeks on the drive home from a day’s driven shooting? It’s all a matter of place and context. Where I live, where most who follow hounds do so on quad-bikes, it is notable that the biggest farmers tend to look the scruffiest. Or at least, that’s what I put about, because I am a member of the scruffdom. Out with a hill pack, I like to think I look positively ducal. (In the shires, I would probably be taken aside and offered a bowl of soup by the Salvation Army.) Fashion is a funny thing. Remember waxed cotton coats? How…

SIGN-UP Don’t forget to put your name down for one of the GWCT’s farmland bird ID days, if you want to help out with the 2016 Big Farmland Bird Count. There are only so many spaces and they are filling up fast, with some now entirely sold out. Visit www.gwct.org.uk/BFBC or tel 01425 651000 for more information and to register your interest. CELEBRATE It’s Burns Night on Monday, 25 January, the annual celebration of the life and work of Scottish poet Robert Burns. So make sure that you stock up on haggis, tatties and neeps, as well as a bottle of Scotch whisky, if you’re planning on marking the day. A book of his poetry wouldn’t go amiss, either, as it’s an integral part of the festivities. Visit p.43 for…

Water voles, which had virtually disappeared from the rivers Soch and Geirch, on the Llyn peninsula in Wales, were this month confirmed to be surviving, following a BASC-led campaign to control predatory mink in the region. New Government figures have revealed that the quantity of game meat eaten each year in the UK has more than doubled since 2000. It now stands at an estimated 9,000 tons per annum. Deer in Bradgate Park, Leicestershire, have apparently been eating plastic bags used for collecting dog mess. The bags had been left behind by dog walkers, who have now been ordered to bin their pets’ waste. The UK agricultural industry is “less entrepreneurial” than many other businesses, according to this year’s Oxford Farming Conference report, written by Graham Redman of the Andersons…

THE POLITICS OF SHOOTING WOODCOCK I am concerned about recent articles on the shooting of woodcock and the restraint we should show. I have recently been fortunate enough to shoot on two small shoots here in Lancashire where the instruction at the beginning of the day was “no shooting woodcock because we are trying to conserve them”. This is a very laudable sentiment, but these are moorland shoots that have no breeding woodcock on them. The occasional bird encountered is merely passing through and not resident in any way. I am absolutely positive that both shoot captains were motivated by all the right considerations but I find it disconcerting when I see the shooting world fragmenting itself. I am encouraged to see Mike Swan and the Editor advocating sensible woodcock…

Small DIY shoots are the backbone of gameshooting in the UK. The Newlands Farm Syndicate in Dorset is just such a shoot, where the social aspect of a shoot day is more important than the size of the bag. Despite its modest size it is remarkably well organised, right down to the health and safety briefing given at the start of each day. The shoot is on the coast overlooking Lulworth Cove and Durdle Door and has been in existence for 31 seasons. Sadly, last year they were given notice by the landowner, the Weld estate, which wants to take back the shooting rights. The 500 acres are mainly arable but with some grazing in the valleys. It is farmed by Paul Simpson, who is also giving up the ground…

SAFETY IS PARAMOUNT. On many beaters’ days or clear-up days, it is not always possible to have everyone standing. Most shoots have such a large number of beaters that there may be two beaters’ days or they may operate in teams. There will be one team standing and one team of walking Guns. If you are one of those walking Guns, make sure that you don’t shoot birds going forwards — it could be unsafe but also it is unfair on the standing Guns. Everyone gets their chance. If there are safe birds going back, make the most of them if the keeper has instructed you to do so. TRY TO ENCOURAGE THE LESS EXPERIENCED. Beaters’ days are fantastic chances to encourage any Guns who don’t shoot as much as…

Paul Wedgwood is the chef at Wedgwood, The Restaurant, on Edinburgh’s historic Royal Mile. Paul is a big game fan and currently has venison, rabbit, mallard and pigeon, as well as a foraged salad featuring leaves he has collected himself, on his menu. To find out more, visit www.wedgwoodtherestaurant.co.uk. Scotland’s national dish, haggis, can be somewhat of an acquired taste. But a venison version, available from speciality food stores, is sure to appeal to fans of game. In this recipe, venison loins and diced, fried potatoes (or tattys) are accompanied by venison haggis, which is topped with delicious leeks and chanterelles. Cubed beetroot, basil pesto and a truffle jus adds colour and flavour to the dish. It’s a little fiddly to make, but it makes an impressive — and tasty…

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,…

Though the unusually mild winter may have induced many species of plants to flower much earlier than usual, it is unlikely to have a major impact on bird or animal behaviour, because it’s the increasing length of day that triggers a hormonal response in both birds and mammals, and not the average daytime temperature. In the south-west of Britain it’s not unusual for daffodils to flower in mid-winter, but it is exceptional for them to do so elsewhere. This year daffodils have appeared in East Anglia seven or eight weeks ahead of their usual flowering date. Even more remarkable is the widespread appearance of fresh green leaves on hedgerow hawthorns, three months earlier than normal. The young leaves of hawthorn are edible, and were once known as “bread and cheese”.…

21-23 JANUARY ENGLISH SPRINGER SPANIEL CHAMPIONSHIP Stowell Park estate, Northleach, Gloucestershire Tel 01216 089523 28 JANUARY LEICA SPORT OPTICS AKADEMIE LAUNCH (STALKING EVENT) Leica Store City, London Tel 02072 830700 12-14 FEBRUARY THE BRITISH SHOOTING SHOW Stoneleigh Park, Warwickshire Tel 01258 857700 20 -21 FEBRUARY DEERSTALKING CERTIFICATE 1 COURSE Englefield estate, Daintylands, Berkshire Tel 01833 660869 2 MARCH GWCT SUSSEX ANNUAL SHOOTING EVENING AND AUCTION Claire Hall, Haywards Heath, Sussex Tel 07702 768829 12 MARCH BASC 2016 WILDFOWLING CONFERENCE Ramada Hotel, Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, West Midlands Tel 01244 573007…

Having received my first air rifle at the age of 10 my passion for shooting and the outdoors has grown ever since. From shooting rats and squirrels for the local gamekeeper to rearing pheasants in the summer and beating in the winter, most of my childhood and teen years were spent in wellies and a somewhat oversized waxed jacket. I remember standing at the farm on those cold, frosty shoot mornings admiring the 4x4s, making a fuss of the dogs and longing for the day when I would stand there with my shiny shotgun and a dog to call my own. Twenty-eight years later and I am that man with my 4x4, Charlie the spaniel and a gun over my arm. What’s more, my 10-year-old son, Tyler, has had his…

“The only solace for our poor hill partridges is that some have found a pheasant feeder” Lindsay Waddell is headkeeper on the Raby estate in County Durham, managing 30,000 acres of grouse moor We may have captured some of Mother Nature’s power at times with hydroelectric dams and wind turbines, but we will never tame her. During the recent wicked spell of weather that we up north have had to endure, some people demonstrated just how detached our society has become from most things natural. There have been calls for heads to roll because we have not controlled water levels. Thankfully I heard one person realistic and honest enough to say in an interview: “You cannot blame anyone for this — it’s nature.” It has happened before, albeit a very…

My fascination with shooting began when I was about four years old. This was during the latter years of World War II and, with hindsight, I could not have had a better introduction to the sport. My father rented a small rough-shoot near our family home, and every Saturday afternoon he set out in search of something with which to supplement our meagre meat ration. We always had rabbit or pigeon pie once a week and game on Sundays. I would wait in anticipation for whatever he might bring home. Nothing was wasted, as my mother always made soup from the bones. I am astounded by today’s national food wastage. I was brought up to eat everything that was put in front of me. If I didn’t, I went hungry…

ONE OF THE extraordinary things about dogs is that they may be able to mark a falling bird 200 yards away, but they will run straight past a dead bird lying in the open without seeing it. It’s a reminder that a dog’s eyesight is very different from our own. Despite being near-sighted, dogs can completely miss spotting a dummy or a dead bird just a few feet from them, unless they scent it first. On the other hand, their eyes have large pupils and a wide field of view, which means they are good at following moving objects, such as a running hare or a falling pheasant, even if it is a long way away. Perhaps the commonest misconception about dogs is that they are colour-blind. They’re not, but…

There are three major shingle landforms in the UK, but the only one that combines a shingle spit and a cuspate foreland — a triangular-shaped geographical formation that juts from the coastline into the water — is at Orford Ness in Suffolk. Measuring 10 miles in length from Aldeburgh to Shingle Street and covering around 2,230 acres, this landform is also the longest vegetated shingle spit in Europe. Regarded as an internationally important site for nature conservation, it is designated as a National Nature Reserve under protection by the National Trust. The Trust says that the spit comprises a “complex sequence of shingle ridges and valleys deposited over centuries” and is “one of the most dynamic landforms on the UK coastline and is subject to change through sediment erosion and…

The turn-bolt would not seem to be the obvious sort of action on which to build a shotgun. It brings to mind something clumsy and awkward such as the Belgian conversions of old military rifles. It was, however, a choice of action sometimes favoured for budget shotguns built around the smaller vermin control cartridges. The most popular, and in production for many years, was the Webley & Scott, chambered for the .410 and 9mm No.3 cartridges. The .410 and 9mm The .410 is the better known and more common of the two, and proved to be a popular “knockabout” gun. Its main competitor was the Belgian folding.410, which would fold down to the length of the barrel — usually around 26in — while the Webley & Scott measures a leggy…