POLICE ON THE HUNT FOR VIOLENT POACHING GANG

16 MARCH 2022
1882 2022
1 4 0 TH A N N I V E R S A R Y Y E A R

shooting
s roosting th
the hardest way?

E XT SE ASO

Buy your days

on the chea
PROPER JOB

Are non-working
dogs ever happy?

KIDNAP RISK ON TEST

STALKING IBEX IN TOP GUNS FOR

RURAL PAKISTAN CLAY SHOOTING
 DOG OF THE WEEK

Otto
Otto is training to pick-up and beat on a local shoot. He is progressing well — he sits and waits patiently, stops on the
whistle and has great recall — but at the moment he still thinks a dummy is something to run round and play with.

Owned and photographed by Jon Green

 16.03.22
Issue 6,389
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from time to time
watching Jack’s Game shootingtimessubs.co.uk/A28F
— the 1980s series
produced by Yorkshire Television

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in which Jack Charlton heads Cast aside that flabby
off to get involved in all sorts of chicken and get more
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shooting. I was struck by two
things. The first was that the Guns
shot every bit as well with old
side-by-side boxlocks as most of
us do with our over-and-unders.
But more importantly, I was struck
by the figures Jack Charlton
gave. He noted that “10 million
pheasants are shot in the UK each
year, half of which are wild — in dry
counties such as Norfolk — while Days of the Romany Pick one and stick with it
half are reared and released”.
18 Part of rural England’s rich culture
20 Get the most out of roost shooting
We could spend all day arguing
about the merits or otherwise of
large-scale commercial shooting
but, no matter how you look at it,
our beloved sport has boomed
at an extraordinary pace. I do
wonder what Jack would have to
say on the matter. He was truly
a remarkable man.
Patrick Galbraith, Editor
Are pet dogs miserable? Not your usual stalking trip
Follow Patrick on Twitter
24 Most breeds enjoy having a job
28 On the trail of a buck in Pakistan
@paddycgalbraith

Contents
NEWS & OPINION 36 GUNDOGS
06 NEWS 42 RIFLE TEST
10 LETTERS 46 BLUE ZULU
FEATURES 49 SERIOUS
Taking clay shooting up a notch Days on a shoestring
18 RURAL CULTURE MATTERS
32 The best competition guns on offer
38 How to buy shooting on a budget
20 ROOSTING 50 ON YOUR SHOOT
24 GUNDOGS 52 100 YEARS
28 SPORT ABROAD 57 KEEPER OF
THE MONTH
32 CLAY GUNS
61 GUNROOM
38 BUYING
SHOOTING 62 VINTAGE TIMES
54 RETIREMENT 64 COOKERY
REGULARS 66 SPORTING
ANSWERS
13 COUNTRY DIARY
70 CROSSWORD
14 GAMEKEEPER
71 ALMANAC
16 STALKING DIARY Haenel Jaeger 10 Timber LX The end of the line
74 SHARPSHOOTER 42 When art and function combine
54 When is it time to stop shooting?

4 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE

MA
 NEWS
Although the outbreak
appears to be slowing down,
protocols are still in place
Bird flu eases — but shoot
days could still be affected
What has been the worst ever outbreak of avian influenza appears to
be lifting, but there are still concerns about 2022’s gamebird releases
T
he avian influenza
(bird flu) outbreak
that hit the UK
through the winter
is easing — but it remains a
potential threat to the next
shooting season.
Figures published late last
year showed that, in total, more
than 100 cases of the disease
have been recorded in the UK.
This is almost four times the
total recorded in the previous
worst outbreak. Unlike the
DUNCAN IRELAND; PAUL QUAGLIANA; GETTY IMAGES
figures used to monitor human
diseases, a case relates to an
outbreak not to a single bird,
so each case may involve
multiple birds.
The outbreak began in late
October and rapidly accelerated
through November and December.
After slowing significantly in
January and February, the
6 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
signs are that the outbreak is
continuing to slow through the
first couple of weeks of March.
However, concern remains
around the control measures
introduced by the Government
and their potential effect on
gamebird releases. As well
as the specific ‘control’ and
‘surveillance’ zones around an
individual outbreak, the entire
UK is currently covered by an
Avian Influenza Prevention Zone.
“A teaspoon of infected faeces
can kill thousands of birds”
The rules of the prevention
zone include legally enforceable
requirements to house poultry
and to ensure strict biosecurity.
Sheila Voas, Scotland’s
chief vet, explained the need for
strict measures to curtail the
disease: “Just one teaspoon
of wild bird faeces infected
with avian influenza can kill
tens of thousands of birds, so
it is important that people are
maintaining good practices to
protect their birds.”
Following the 2020-21
season’s less severe outbreak,
the housing requirement was
kept in place until 31 March,
with other measures lasting
into May. This raises a number
of potentially disruptive
scenarios for shooting.
The worst scenario is that
a prolonged outbreak leads
to the nationwide housing
requirements remaining in
place well into the summer,
which would prevent gamebirds
being released. This scenario is
thought to be unlikely.
A second, more likely scenario
is that significant numbers of
‘control’ and ‘surveillance’ zones
remain in place in response to
sporadic outbreaks and these
disrupt distribution of birds from
game farms, release of birds and
even shoot days.
Shooting Times understands
that shooting and gamekeeping
organisations are continuing
to monitor the situation,
with one official saying it was
“certainly a worry”. While the
threat to birds from avian
influenza remains high, experts
agree that it is not a serious
threat to human health.
Matt Cross

Latest news on lead ammo
Two key Government
reviews are set to begin in
April. The Health and Safety
Executive and Environment
Agency will jointly launch
the public consultation
element of their two-year
lead ammunition review.
This consultation will
follow the publication
of a ‘restriction dossier’,
which will set out what
restrictions the agencies
propose to introduce on the
use, sale and manufacture
of lead ammunition.
Shooting Times expects
shooting organisations are
likely to focus on slowing the
introduction of restrictions
to allow for time to build
confidence in alternatives.
They are also expected to
push back on restrictions
on small-bore shotgun
ammunition, small-calibre
Hunt sab attacks fun ride
A hunt saboteur has been
fined after attacking a car
that contained two children
under the age of four. The
woman, who has been
named as Tracey Cox, was
among protesters from
three different animal
rights and hunt saboteur
groups that were trying to
disrupt a fun ride organised
by the Cottesmore hunt in
April last year.
A group of animal rights protesters and sabs disrupted a family ride organised by the Cottesmore
Email your stories / shootingtimes@futurenet.com
Proposed restrictions on lead are to be put forward next month
rifle and ammunition
and air rifle pellets, where
good non-lead alternatives
that are any good are yet
to be developed.
Also in April, firearms
licensing fees are to be
reviewed. The fees for
firearm and shotgun
certificates were last
reviewed in 2014, since
when campaigners and
Cox struck the bonnet of
the vehicle, damaging it and
alarming the children inside.
She was sentenced to a six-
month conditional discharge
and ordered to pay £200 to
the victim, plus a surcharge
of £22 and £85 in costs
in a hearing at Leicester
Magistrates Court.
Polly Portwin, director of
the Countryside Alliance’s
Campaign for Hunting,
some senior police officials
have called for the full cost
of applications to be met
by the applicant, a move
that would mean fees would
increase steeply.
BASC is committed
to oppose increasing fees
until the performance of
licensing departments
improves and more efficient
systems are introduced.
said: “While animal rights
extremist groups such as
this are small in numbers,
they can nevertheless be
violent and abusive.
“Members of the public
out enjoying a day in the
countryside should never
have to feel intimidated.
The perpetrator has been
brought to justice and we
thank the police for handling
this matter professionally.”
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 7
Weekend Twitter poll
Which deer is the trickiest to stalk?
19% Roe
28% Red
31% Muntjac
22% Fallow
follow us @shootingtimes Respondents: 79
To do this week
CROPS
The window
of opportunity
for sowing game crops is rapidly
approaching. If you haven’t done so
already, speak to your seed merchant
about what would suit your plots. Crops
requiring lower inputs may well be
attractive this year, considering that
costs are likely to be high.
Step up crow
BIRDS control. Spring is
peak crow-trapping season and not only
are the crows territorial and therefore
easier to catch, but there are lambs and
chicks that require protection. Laws
have changed significantly in recent
years and vary around the UK, so speak
to a shooting or gamekeeping
organisation if you are unsure about the
law or about what is necessary to
comply with the general licences.
 NEWS
The bill would have banned the keeping of pump-action
firearms in secure storage at certificate holders’ homes

Move to restrict pump

action shotguns fails
A bill that would have banned these firearms from being kept at home,
in response to the shooting in Plymouth last year, will not become law
An attempt to restrict the ownership of pump-
action shotguns has failed at Westminster.
Labour MP Luke Pollard introduced a
private members’ bill in an attempt to restrict
pump actions after the tragic shooting in
his Plymouth constituency last year. The bill
was debated as a ‘10-minute rule’ bill, which
strictly limits the amount of parliamentary
time allotted to a proposed law.
Introducing the bill, Mr Pollard said:
“I want to rid our communities of these
dangerous and unnecessary pump-action
weapons that are currently held in homes
throughout the country.” The proposed bill
would have restricted the storage of pump-
action shotguns so that they could not be
kept in the owner’s home.
RICHARD FAULKS; CALLUM MCINERNEY-RILEY; GETTY IMAGES
coroner’s review and the Independent Office
for Police Conduct report are published.
“BASC has met Luke Pollard following
the Plymouth murders. There is a firm
commitment from both sides that the
correct actions are taken to reduce the
risk of another tragedy happening. There
is also an acceptance that the risk is in
“It is right that no knee-jerk reactions are
made — any response must be evidence led”
the person holding the firearm, not the
firearm itself. Any response to this incident
must be evidence led.”
The protocols for the introduction of
Bills introduced under the 10-minute rule
rarely become law as they are normally
viewed as low-priority legislation and are
often opposed by the Government; this
leads to them running out of time.
In a brief statement the Home Office,
whose support would almost certainly have
been required for the bill to become law,
declined to back it, with a spokesman
saying: “The police have in place robust
processes for issuing and reviewing firearms
and shotgun licences. If there are further

Bill Harriman, BASC director of firearms, 10-minute-rule bills are extremely arcane lessons to be learned from the tragic case,
said: “The Plymouth shooting was a horrific and can involve MPs sleeping outside a we will update the statutory guidance for
tragedy. However, it is only right that no key parliamentary office in order to be the firearms licensing.”
knee-jerk reactions are made before the first to register a bill on a specific day. Matt Cross

THEY
SAID
“Contains graphic fishing scenes”
WHAT Who said it: the University Why: The UHI felt the need to provide a trigger warning to protect the welfare of students reading
of the Highlands and Islands Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea, a book that is well known for its ‘fishing scenes’.

8 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE


Pest control more vital
than ever as prices soar
The importance of effective
pest control has been
highlighted as farmers face
rapidly escalating costs.
Spiralling inflation and
disruption to oil and gas
supplies have meant fuel
and fertiliser costs continue
to rise steeply.
Ammonium nitrate
prices are now approaching
£1,000 a tonne, up from
£650 a tonne last week. In
January last year, typical
prices were around £245 a
tonne. Natural gas is a key
component of fertilisers
and prices have climbed in
anticipation of a restriction
of gas supply from Russia.
Red diesel prices have
also continued to rise as the
oil price hits a record high.
Farmer Christopher
Smiley told Shooting Times:
“Most farms will be looking
to cut their fertiliser use to
reduce costs, but that will
mean lower yields come
harvest. Really tight pest
control is one thing we can
do to try to keep yields up.
“The shooting and
farming communities are
closely linked, so I’m sure
Hare coursers strike again
Police have encouraged a
group of poachers to turn
themselves in before they
find the officers “knocking
on your door (with the big
red key) at 4am for a
chat”. Officers have
also asked for the
public’s help in identifyin
the gang members.
The appeal from
Warwickshire Police
followed yet another
alleged violent assault
on a rural worker by har
coursers. The farmwork
who has not been
named, was attacked aft
discovering the men taking
Email your stories / shootingtimes@futurenet.com
Staying on top of pests will help farmers keep yields up
that pest shooters will be
doing what they can to
get on top of pigeons and
other pests.”
Mr Smiley added:
“Livestock farmers
part in illegal hare coursing
on land where he works near
Henley-in-Arden.
Images of the alleged
attackers were captured
Police have asked for the public’s
help in identifying these men
will also be keen to
see as many lambs
as possible, especially
given that they will be
expecting hefty feed
bills this year.”
by the victim’s dashcam
and police have circulated
these in an effort to trace
the group.
The Warwickshire
ural Crime Team has
sked for anyone who
n identify the men
ctured to get in touch.
The alleged assault
d subsequent appeal
r information follow
call for more to be
ne about coursing
angs, after farmers in
ighboring Leicestershire
id they were “under
ege” from violent and
threatening poachers.
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 9
NEWS IN BRIEF
Stalking
on show
The Stalking
Show is to take
place for the first
time on 9 and 10
April 2022 at the
Staffordshire
County Showground in Stafford.
The show, which is organised by
a small group of stalking enthusiasts,
will feature big-brand displays with
all the latest gear from Swarovski,
Zeiss, Leica, Thomas Jacks, Highland
Outdoors, Viking Arms, Blaser,
Edgar Brothers, Härkila, Raytrade,
Simpson Brothers, Stoney Creek
and others, along with tracking dog
demonstrations, chefs showcasing
field-to-fork ideas, taxidermy,
vehicles, hunting holidays and
Highland ponies.
Tickets are available from
thestalkingshow.co.uk
French highway
closed for boar hunt
The threat to traffic from a booming
wild boar population has led to the
closure of a major French highway in
order for the animals to be driven and
shot. The A31 between Fey and La Croix
d’Hauconcourt in Moselle was closed
for seven hours as a team of 200
hunters, supported by regional hunting
officials and tracking teams, cleared
the animals from land surrounding the
road. More than 90 boar were shot,
along with a number of deer.
FOLLOW US ON INSTAGRAM
@SHOOTINGTIMESUK
 LETTERS
LE T TER OF THE WEEK

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Gough Thomas used to
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020 3148 3710 Dig for Victory campaign RURAL HOMES
Can’t find ST? 020 3148 3300
Back issues 01795 662976
REAL GROWTH in which growing your own
support@mags-uk.com
All the talk of Environmental vegetables was encouraged to A point of information regarding
Land Management Schemes eke out the meagre post-war Rutland County Council and
(ELMS) and Government rations. With our dependency granted planning permissions
Shooting Times is the official weekly journal
of BASC and the CPSA. BASC, Marford Mill, Rossett payments rewarding “farming now on imported wheat, fruit, (Letters, 2 March). Since 1968
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Woking, GU24 0YU, tel 01483 485400 for nature” (We can lead the vegetables and sugar, perhaps we have built around 168 houses
Wereservetherighttoeditletters.Lettersshouldbesentto:
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Terrace, London W2 6JR,orstletters@futurenet.com.
a lot of sense to me, especially foodstuffs before we commit 9,000 in 54 years. Over that time
as during my lifetime I have to large-scale planting of we have had many improvements
We are committed to only using magazine paper which is
witnessed the mass destruction woodlands on any better- to infrastructure. There is a
derived from responsibly managed, certified forestry and
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sourced and produced from sustainable managed forests,
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CALLUM MCINERNEY-RILEY; ALAN WARD; DUNCAN IRELAND

THIS WEEK’S COVER

IMAGE WAS CAPTURED
BY STEVE MAGENNIS
“My father grows potatoes,
although we have won victory”,
which was basically part of a
continuation of the wartime
shooters busy and ultimately are reflected in the provision of
help our UK farmers remain services provided.
competitive, too. The statement of wasted
Graham Lorne, by email millions on incompetent

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10 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE


decisions is, without any
description, rather misleading.
The council makes decisions on
the democratic mandate that
elections give to councillors and
if there are specific concerns
they should always be raised
with the relevant authority or
your ward councillor.
While I can understand the
comment that north Norfolk has
become desirable, I hope local
people will stay and support the
economy in Norfolk and Rutland
and similar desirable places. We
will continue to ensure that we
support future generations who
wish to live in great places as
this keeps the place vibrant.
Oliver Hemsley, Rutland
County Council
STEEL IS SAFE
We should think before
putting out scaremongering
inaccuracies about steel shot
(Letters, 23 February).
Your correspondent should
note the fact that the Danes
have been eating steel-shot
game for more than 20 years,
as have the Americans. And
we’ve been eating steel-shot
wildfowl in the UK since 1999.
Over those decades, there
hasn’t been a single case of
someone who’s eaten steel shot
— actually soft iron — having
the pellets “rip through the body
tissue” during a medical scan.
A University of California,
San Francisco, study in 2012
Rachel Draper’s boxlock piece from 9 March
‘‘The wildlife of today is not ours to dispose of as we please.
We have it in trust. We must account for it to those who
come after.’’ King George VI
Email your letters / stletters@futurenet.com
WHAT A
HEAD
After reading with
interest a previous
article on a multi-
point roebuck
(Sporting Answers,
16 February), I
thought I would share
this unusual buck
taken in autumn 2021
in Morayshire. I was
accompanied by an
aspiring young future
This unusual head was
schoolboy stalker.
taken in Morayshire in
Mike MacDonald, the autumn of 2021
by email
looked at how 32 different
bullets and shot reacted to three
different scanners and found
that only one bullet “moved
and twisted about a bit” — an
armour-piercing military bullet
with a hardened steel core, a
copper-coated jacket, and a lead
tip — which we’re unlikely to find
on a UK shoot.
The study concluded that:
“MRI-induced heating is not
significant regardless of bullet
composition” and “regular
commercially available
bullets are safe in scanners
up to 7-tesla”.
It really is time that we
stop peddling myths about
sustainable ammunition.
Steve Bloomfield, executive
director of operations, BASC
NEXT WEEK IN
CANNY CORVIDS
Shooting crows over cut
maize: fine sport and an
important job.
CLEAN PENS BUDGET BUSTING
Eye-watering – why the
Your to-do item rightly suggests cost of shooting is set
that now is a good time to set to soar.
about release pen repairs (News,
9 March) and that moving them
is rarely a good idea.
However, I did raise my
eyebrow at the suggestion that
pen soil can be “significantly
altered by the bird’s manure”.
If that really is happening,
the pen is almost bound to be
overstocked beyond the Code
of Good Shooting Practice GOING SWIMMINGLY
recommendation of not more How to add a duck pond
than a thousand per hectare. to your shoot — and the
Mike Swan, Shooting Times secret to driving it well.
contributor
GOING STRONG
Rachel Draper’s article on the
boxlock shotgun (Ticking all
the right boxes, 9 March) was
very well written and full of
useful information.
While the sidelock,
especially with a London name, CHANNELLING JFK
is considered by some to be the Ask what you can do for
most glamorous, the good old fieldsports — why we all
‘Brummie’ boxlock can still be need to do our bit.
seen going strong in the field.
My pair of William Powells, circa
1896, can still do a day’s work
when called upon. Many thanks
for a very interesting article.
Kevin Byrne, by email
... AND MUCH MORE!
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 11
 Country Diary
Jamie Blackett

As birds fight and chase each other in their spring rituals, it’s great
that at least one charity is doing its best to stop their predation by cats

T
he birds had cottoned on
to spring long before I did.
While I was stumbling about
feeding logs into the ever-
greedy biomass boiler and cursing winter,
they were changing their behaviour, even
while it was still cold and miserable.
Cock pheasants have been fighting
each other for weeks; several times I had
to stop the car as they were quite oblivious
to my approach. And there is one old cock
who attacks John when he drives down
the sawmill road on the quad to fill some
hoppers. The bird did the same last spring
and obviously survived the shooting season.
Quite why he thinks John is a threat to him
and his harem is anyone’s guess.
Meanwhile, small birds chase each other
round, either because they are playing kiss
chase or because they are seeing off rivals,
it’s hard to tell. And they are occupying
territories. A pair of magpies appears to
have staked its claim to the double-hedged
road up to Smithy Brae. That will be a
priority for the Larsen traps.
Cats Protection is working with other agencies to neuter and rehome stray cats, which is a start
Mallard
Then I saw a pair of mallard where I always they won’t breed. My preferred solution of starvation, disease or other forms of
see them, on the edge of the big ditch down sending them to the great cat sanctuary predation. There is evidence that cats
by the calf unit. It’s never been a good place in the sky doesn’t qualify for funding or for tend to take weak or sickly birds.”
to nest, but at least there is now a new pond support from the volunteers. Fair enough, It uses the opportunity to sell anyone
with an island for them and their ducklings they are cat lovers after all. worried about cats killing birds in their
— if they get that far. I pulled up next to At least they are having a go. The charity gardens an electronic cat deterrent for
them and took a photograph for Instagram; has initiated Cat Watch to “keep tabs on £55.99. Ho hum.
the drake all green and shiny in his spring strays” and “work with communities to The birds have been treated to some
wool for their nests this year as, slightly
“Sending cats to the great sanctuary against my better judgement, I have
brought some sheep back on for a couple
in the sky doesn’t qualify for funding” of weeks. The briars around field margins
are now festooned with bits of fleece where
plumage, the duck perfectly camouflaged control cat numbers”. On its website it has they have been caught up. The sheep are
against the reed straw so that you had to listed the other organisations it works with, doing good work eating the grassy arable
look twice to see her. which includes the RSPCA. stubbles down to nothing so we can drill the
We currently have a bird-friendly But the RSPB, the country’s largest spring barley with minimal tillage.
initiative in these parts that will, I hope, and best-known bird charity, which is a But I had forgotten what escape artists
lead to fewer losses this spring. The cat glaring omission from Cats Protection’s list they are and am beginning to dread calls
lovers in our midst have been participating of partners, says on its website: “Despite from neighbours. Pass the mint sauce.
in Cats Protection’s Community Neutering the large numbers of birds killed by cats
Outreach. This entails setting traps that in gardens, there is no clear scientific Jamie Blackett farms in Dumfries &
have been provided by the charity to evidence that such mortality is causing Galloway. His next book, Land of Milk and
catch feral cats and neuter them before bird populations to decline. This may be Honey: Digressions of a Rural Dissident
either rehoming them elsewhere (good), surprising, but many millions of birds will be published by Quiller in June.
or returning them (less good). At least die naturally every year, mainly through
ALAMY

SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 13

 Alan Edwards is conservation manager at Bywell, a Purdey gold-award estate in Northumberland
Gamekeeper
It is critical more land be made nature-friendly, but people need
to be educated to stop disturbing precious conservation margins
M
y phone buzzed on the
kitchen counter and a text
notification popped up. “Are
the lapwings back?” it read.
I paused and wondered who had sent the
message. On closer examination, it was a
local resident who sometimes messaged
me in regard to illegal lampers.
“Yes,” was my reply, “isn’t it wonderful.”
One of the most rewarding things about the
Bywell Estate conservation project is the
interest shown by local residents who have
seen the environment change for the good
— encouraging a greater range of species
to coexist among the wild game.
Lapwing plots were established using
Countryside Stewardship agreements and
have been a great success. These have built
on the work done to hold on to a small and
desperately vulnerable local population that
could be counted as a handful, even by the
most optimistic. Nine years on, the moving
sight of several hundred lapwings gathering
in the area prior to breeding is testament to
the success story that a path to wild game
has gifted the ecosystem on the estate.
Fragile
The fragility of the project cannot be
overstated. The deep-rooted philosophy of
the estate owners and those who manage
for them is not at question, but the need
to balance a viable working agricultural
system with the ability to generate
valuable financial support for the wildlife
can be challenging. The next steps can
potentially be the greatest move we have
made towards even greater diversity
and density of species. However, without
support through a more outward-thinking
agricultural support scheme, it will be all too
easy for farmers to abandon environmental
measures in favour of chasing the golden
bushel and revert the undoubted benefits
to wildlife in favour of greater production.
Throughout the country, wildlife-
enhancing measures are still a low priority
and, in percentage terms, incredibly small.
What we have nationally can be reflected
on a personal scale here on the estate. The
overwhelming percentage of hectares are
still intensive agricultural land that, for
the best part, is severely degraded from
14 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
a wildlife perspective. This makes the area
dedicated to wildlife enhancement and
conservation vitally important. As with most
things in nature, not everything is equal.
Some areas fare better than others for
producing abundant wildlife, so the areas
we have designated are reduced by natural
selection instantly.
How many times have I thought,
“this should be perfect for a pair of grey
partridges”, only to be disappointed when
“All over the UK, wildlife-enhancing
measures are still a low priority”
the partridges did not see it that way.
One of our three-year-old lapwing plots
established the first breeding pair only last
season. So sometimes it takes longer than
we can ever imagine for wildlife to make the
first tentative steps needed to establish the
foothold for sustainability.
My pet concern at the moment is the
percentage of the conservation-selected
area that is degraded by the actions of
humans. All too often, I encounter people
who understandably see conservation
Lapwings are now thriving on the Bywell Estate
thanks to the Countryside Stewardship scheme
margins as the most idyllic passage around
farmers’ fields. The diversity of flowering
species and abundant insect populations
are hard to resist for anyone keen on a
better planet. More often than not, these
people are accompanied by the most
unruly and poorly trained dogs, oblivious
to the dogs hunting in these rare and
precious environments.
When challenged, invariably the first
line of defence is that they are keeping out
of the growing crops so as not to upset the
farmer. This is swiftly followed by, “I’m not
doing any harm, I’m only going for a walk”.
Sadly, I see first-hand the damage that
continual and persistent access has on the
conservation status of these minute areas
of our landscape.
I find the attitude of a high percentage
to be so removed from the needs of nature
or conservation that I despair for our
futures. These selfish acts are taking a toll
on the overall percentage of area available
to wildlife and conservation within our
beautiful countryside.
Negative
These encounters frequently end with
negative feelings. I worry they will only
reflect badly on conservation managers,
because no matter how diplomatically
the encounter is handled, the ‘no’ word is
spoken. No, you can’t walk there because
you’re on a conservation margin. No, you
can’t let your dog run, it’s disturbing the
wildlife. All the body language is negative.
They see me, and everyone like me, as
someone who is only protecting the game.
This couldn’t be further from the truth.
I care passionately about the plight
of wildlife in this country. Game is a
secondary consideration.
Perhaps some of the high-profile
celebrity television presenters who claim
to care so much for wildlife could champion
a greater understanding of negative
human disturbance, or is this just hoping
for too much?
GETTY IMAGES
 Davy Thomas is a professional deerstalker and estate manager in the Highlands
Stalking Diary
There are several different ways to monitor deer populations and the
latest drone technology looks set to revolutionise the whole process
In many upland areas, the worst of the
winter’s weather can happen in March
W
hen it comes to deer
managment, an intimate
knowledge of the deer
population, as well as
their habits, is a must. The best way to
achieve this in-depth knowledge is by a
combination of good record-keeping and
regular population monitoring.
Year on year, numbers of red deer can
fluctuate slightly. This is due to a variety
of factors, from the calving rates in the
summer to the cull figure itself. A level
of natural mortality in poor winters will
also have a bearing.
Some places are in favour of counting
in February, just as the hind cull has been
completed. However, in many upland areas,
it is often cruelly ironic that the worst of
the winter’s toll can happen in March when
spring is so close. Each to their own, but it is
for that reason I prefer to count a little later
in order to gain a true understanding of the
population, before we even start thinking
about setting cull plans.
Working together
With the help of stalkers from neighbouring
estates, we are able to count the entire
estate in a single day by working together
and performing a visual count. In the
morning, each stalker is issued a map with
a shaded area on which they are to count,
taking obvious geographical features as
16 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
boundaries. When a group of deer
is counted, this is recorded by writing
“group 1” on the map, to keep it simple.
Then, on a separate count sheet, the
breakdown is documented as “group
1: 6 hinds, 2 calves, 1 stag”.
If a stalker has to disturb a particular
hillside before moving on, they write on the
map “7 stags”, with an arrow and a time
that the deer moved over into the next
count area, so as to avoid counting them
twice. This method may seem primitive but
a map, compass, pen and paper require
no batteries and is filed for millennia,
regardless of updating technologies.
Geography, of course, matters greatly
when adopting a method that works for
“An intimate knowledge of the deer,
their habits and movements is a must”
you. Some years past, in a forestry role, we
performed dung counts through the thick
spruce forests. The theory was that it was
estimated that a deer of any sex or species
excreted its fumets (droppings) 25 times
daily. A compass bearing was taken from
a specific point each year. Then a distance
of 200m, 400mor 800m was observed.
A 50m measuring tape was laid out in
sections of the overall distance, and a 1m
swathe observed of the amount of separate
piles of dung was then performed, taking
the decay rate into account of the dung.
What was pretty crucial was consistency.
You literally had to cross whatever obstacle
lay in the path along the said bearing.
In times gone by, estate stalkers
worked with the now disbanded Red Deer
Commission to perform foot counts of large
areas. On Islay, for example, practically the
entire island could be counted in only two or
three days.
NatureScot, as it is now called, use
helicopters and a method that is pretty
effective in the effort to count large areas.
A pilot, navigator, camera operator and
visual counter/recorder can corral groups
of deer with the aircraft. They can take
a photograph and then record it by plotting,
for example, “group 2” on a map, which can
then be counted at a later date in an office
on a laptop.
While this must be a lucrative contract
for the helicopter companies employed for
weeks at a time in the spring, it must be
hugely costly. As technology progresses,
in the US, they are beginning to adopt
thermal-imaging drones for this task, which
is undoubtedly where the future lies.
ALAMY
 Rural culture
England’s nomads
Romany people arrived in England in the late Middle Ages, but they
have now been legislated out of existence, laments Julian Schmechel
N
ot so long ago, a nomadic
people with a rich culture
and heritage wandered
the lanes and heaths
of England, as they had for nearly
500 years. These were no New-Age
Travellers, but the Romany, a people
who arrived on these shores some
time in the late Middle Ages, and who
picked up the label ‘gypsy’ from the
misguided belief that their origins
lay in Egypt.
Skilled metalworkers and farriers,
it is far more likely that the Romany
originated in India; first reaching the
borders of Eastern Europe, perhaps,
with the horde of Genghis Khan,
whose horses they shod. The Romany
language shares many linguistic
similarities with Hindi, giving further
credence to this theory. There is even
a racist legend that the Romany forged
the nails that fixed Christ to the cross;
an act that cursed them to wander the
earth forever.
As a boy, laden with ferret box and
purse-nets, I cycled the high-hedged
lanes of Lancashire’s Fylde district
GETTY IMAGES; ALAMY
and, at certain seasons of the year,
would pass brightly painted wagons
and bow tops, pulled up on the
wide verge or the edge of mossland.
18 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
These highly decorated horse-drawn
vehicles were always accompanied by
chain-tethered piebald cobs; stocky
horses that rarely raised their heads
from grazing as I went past.
Between the wagon axles rested
sharp-eyed lurchers, while a cooking
pot straddled a glowing campfire
of crackling gorse and hawthorn
cuttings. My nod was reciprocated
as I pedalled by, but I little realised
that this everyday scene would soon
be consigned to history; few, if any,
Romany now live a horse-drawn,
nomadic life.
That the Romany had a reputation
for poaching cannot be denied,
as foraging and living off the land
was something at which they
“A lurcher could be sent through a hedge
to snap up a rabbit, retrieved to hand”
excelled, and few loved coursing
and running dogs quite as they did.
The exact origins of the lurcher may
be shrouded in mystery but, as the
word ‘lurcher’ springs from the
Romany language, meaning ‘thief’,
these people surely had a hand in
its creation. The concept that a man
could own wild game was one that
the Romany never easily accepted;
for how could anyone own a rabbit
or a hare? Sadly, this philosophy
often brought them into conflict with
gamekeepers and landowners.
Regardless, few Romanies ever
suffered the embarrassment of having
an empty cooking pot, as a lurcher
trotting alongside the wagon could,
with a whistle or gesture, easily be
directed through the hedge and into
a field in a matter of seconds, to snap
up a hapless rabbit that was then
retrieved to hand.
Plover, coot and moorhen eggs
were never overlooked and some
travellers were also deadly shots with
a catapult — a weapon formed from
an ash fork cut from the hedgerow,
with inner-tube rubber as elastic. This
simple pot-filler, along with a handful
of round pebbles, could be stowed in a
jacket pocket, ready to take whatever
game might present itself.
Because of their immersion in
nature, the Romany also had a vast

knowledge of wild herbs and their
use in treating ailments. In addition,
fat hen, wild mushrooms, sorrel
and Jack-by-the-hedge might all be
picked in season to add flavour to
the simmering cooking pot.
Much has been written and spoken
about Romany cooking and eating
hedgehogs — ‘hotchi-witchi’ — and
opinions vary as to whether this is
true or simply a rural myth. I knew
a man, however, who had eaten
hedgehog, because he traded horses
with the gypsies in the years following
World War II. Once found and
despatched, the creature was rolled
in a ball of clay, then baked in the
embers of a campfire. When cooked,
the clay ball was broken open, taking
the hedgehog’s prickles with it.
My friend described the meat of the
hotchi as being quite dark and strong
in flavour, but not unpleasant.
With a good terrier, hedgehogs
could easily be found and provided
a ready source of protein when food
was scarce. It is a little-known fact
that the fat of the hedgehog, when
rendered down, is the best of all salves
for harness leather. Applied sparingly,
this oil would keep a harness supple
and free from cracks for many years.
Enlightened
Due to the Romanies’ foraging
lifestyle, it is perhaps unsurprising
that gamekeepers’ attitudes toward
them weren’t always charitable.
Some, however, were remarkably
enlightened. I know of one headkeeper
who, on hearing that gypsies had set up
camp close to his coverts, immediately
sought them out. Striding into camp
An elderly Romany working with scrap metal
Left: a traditional bow-top Romany wagon
in full tweeds, he asked to speak to the
leader among the gathering, and was
duly presented to the head man.
Trouble was expected but, instead
of a confrontation, the keeper handed
the patriarch a fine pair of freshly shot
hares and asked for a word in private.
What passed between them no one
knew but, though poaching occurred
on other estates in the area during
the gypsies’ stay, this keeper’s woods
remained quite untouched.
Sadly, such enlightened thinking
was rare, with most gorgios (non-
Romany) viewing gypsies with a
mixture of fear and suspicion. In
light of such prejudice, it is perhaps
unsurprising that the English Romany
became rather insular and associated
little with a society whose hand was
firmly turned against them. In spite
of this, and perhaps remarkably,
modern colloquial English is
peppered with words of Romany
origin; chav, cushty, wonga, mullered
Romany Percy Bennett
with a Harris hawk used
for catching rabbits
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 19
Rural culture
and mush are just a few examples of
this cross-cultural, linguistic traffic.
My own memories of these
travelling people are rich and began
at a very early age, as I went to school
with several Romany children, whose
family had settled in the village. Dark-
eyed and handsome, these youngsters
had an exotic, otherly feel about
them. This might have made them
the target of playground bullies, had
they not fought like cornered tigers
when challenged.
Sadly, these youngsters did not
grow up to travel the byways as had
their forebears, for the tide of public
opinion and ensuing legislation did
not favour England’s last nomads.
Stopping places
As the post-war population of
England boomed, land which for
generations had been Romany
stopping places — or ‘atchin tans’
— was swallowed up by roads and
housing developments, while an
increasingly urban and affluent
society viewed Romanies as an
inconvenient nuisance, having
little understanding of these
nomadic people.
The Caravan Sites and Control
of Development Act 1960 gave local
authorities the power to close the
remaining commons to gypsies
and travellers and this they duly
did. Section 24 of the same act gave
authorities the power to open caravan
sites to compensate for this loss
of access to the commons, but
this was largely resisted until 1968,
when legislation made it a power
of duty to do so.
A nomadic way of life, during
which Romanies carried out seasonal
work, such as hop picking, potato
harvesting, ditching and hedging, as
well as farriery, was simply legislated
out of existence. A people who had
wandered across several continents,
over hundreds of years, were finally
‘settled’ on caravan sites, or took
to living in bricks and mortar like
gorgios. Carved stone horse heads
— mounted on top of gateposts
— became the only trace of a once-
nomadic lifestyle.
That legislators and local authorities
got their way cannot be denied, but I
believe that the countryside has lost
a little of its colour and richness and
texture, with the passing of the horse-
drawn Romany way of life. I, for one,
dream of its return.
Roost shooting

20 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE


Pigeons at
their finest
There is something delightfully ‘back
to basics’ about roost shooting and it’s
also a great method of pest control
WRITTEN BY WILL POCKLINGTON
PHOTOGRAPHY BY MATTHEW KIDD
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 21
White woodpigeon droppings are a good
indicator of the best place to stand and wait
T
o put a finger on why
the woodpigeon is such
an arresting quarry is a
difficult thing. But stand
in a busy roosting wood on a blustery
evening as squadrons of the birds
plunge their way towards a swaying
canopy and you’ll soon get the gist.
It’s a paradox that a creature of habit
can be so unpredictable. Yet that
tendency to keep us on our toes
makes the bird special.
I grew up shooting pigeons, so
nostalgia and familiarity no doubt
have something to do with the bird’s
lofty ranking in my mind. But there
is surely no more exhilarating thing
to do with a shotgun between your
hands than stand beneath the boughs
for a lively few hours of roosting.
“Footwork is key;
roosting is a nimble
person’s game”
Roost shooting on a Sunday
evening before having tea at the
grandparents’ was once the highlight
of my weekend. We’d arrive earlier
than we needed to — Dad, my three
brothers and me — then wait for the
place to settle about us. In that quiet
lull as the afternoon wore on, before
the first pigeons cut through the sky,
we’d watch gangs of long-tailed
Roosting is often woodpigeon shooting at
its most testing as the birds defy the rules
Roost shooting
The dog tracks Will’s every move as he
lines up a shot on an incoming pigeon
tits flit among the coppice, barn
owls hunting along the wood edge,
treecreepers and nuthatches going
about their business. It was a time to
slow down before, with a bit of luck,
things sped up.
Sometimes the pigeon shooting
wouldn’t come to much and we’d
take to poking squirrel dreys instead.
Distant volleys of gunshot suggested
someone else was in the thick of it. But
every now and again, it was our turn.
Nowadays it’s different woods with
new people and mostly on Saturdays
Will tries to pick
the best wood
22 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
throughout February and early March
— a collaborative crop protection
effort with a bunch of keen Shots,
most of whom have helped out on the
local shoot throughout the rest of the
year. Spread across the estate, we’d
pray for a bit of rough weather and the
chance to engage with a true master
on the wing. Sometimes it comes
together, often it doesn’t.
Roost shooting is a useful
opportunity to put a dent in numbers
that have been descending on
vulnerable crops, in my case oilseed
rape on the western side of the farm
in question. You could argue that it
barely requires fieldcraft compared
with decoying or flighting — minimal
“You can’t help but smile while the pile
of empty cartridges grows by your feet”
kit, a large reliance on luck, standing
and waiting — and you wouldn’t be
entirely wrong. Working out where
you need to be, which birds to leave
and which to shoot, is a skill. But roost
shooting allows us more than any
other method of pigeon control to
concentrate on the experience and
not second-guess our tactics.
Bonus bounty
Even a slow evening can offer
glimpses of the magic. The gun
needn’t be in your shoulder all that
often to enjoy it. For me it’s the sense
of escapism, the anticipation of
the unknown, the knowledge that
collectively you’re doing a bit of good
by the farmer, and the bonus bounty
for the table at the end. It’s the chance
to steady up a dog with brakes well
worn from a season in the beating
line or behind the Guns; to listen to
pheasants going to roost; to enjoy your
own company, senses heightened.
You might find yourself in a spot
that in the past has emptied cartridge
bags and meant more than one walk
back to the car. Just as likely, you’ll
see a few stragglers arriving at last
knockings and come away with a
couple. Either way, so often it’s about
making the most of chances that
present themselves.
During the time standing watching
and waiting, my mind often drifts
to woods that have lost favour with
the grey masses over the years and
why that is. Cropping patterns on
surrounding farmland seems an
obvious one. Woodland structure
must be up there. Disturbance?
Weather? A surge in grey squirrel
numbers? A friend who knows
much more than me about Columba
palumbus swears that, thanks to non-
native squirrels, greater numbers of
birds are now roosting and nesting in
hedgerows and firs instead of woods.
I often wonder, too, what makes
the perfect roosting wood — the
species, the management, the place
in the landscape? There are woods
in our area with an almost fabled

reputation as firm pigeon favourite es —
well guarded they are, too.
The arrival of birds soon breakss the
reverie. They float and bounce with
wings set, arc wide in great loops,
weave through the treetops — singles,
pairs, groups of a dozen or more. Itt’s
time to pick one and stick with it. T The
safety catch rings and I have the do ogs’
attention. They freeze, with only their
tails shuffling in the deep leaf litter.
r
Often they’ll spot the birds before
me; sometimes they watch me and
work it out.
The pigeons might be looking to
pitch in with landing gear deployed.
They might be heading over high
to another part of the wood — or
a different wood altogether. They
might be circling round to get their
beaks into the wind. Then it’s pure
focus, nothing else matters and that
particular bird is everything.
It’s probably not taking a straight
line, that bird, and you can bet it will
cross paths with at least another. Do
you wait until they circle round again?
Do you take your chances? Whatever,
you need to be fully committed to the
shot and try not to become distracted.
Spooked
The first shot, if you remain unseen,
may be a little more straightforward.
For the second, you invariably have
your work cut out. Pigeons use the
wind like few other birds, especially
when spooked. They flare and flail
and defy the rules. They tie you in
knots. Footwork is key; it’s a nimble
person’s game. You can’t help but
smile while the pile of empties grows
by your feet.
A good dog is a must when roost shooting pigeons, as shot birds can go a very long way if they
catch the wind. Inset: the shot birds’ crops are full of what appears to be vulnerable new growth
This was the case on a recent
outing, as I tucked into an L-shaped
stand of beech, oak and spruce.
A safe bet in the past, it was quiet
this time but for a 10-minute flurry
of activity — 600 thrilling seconds.
Shots rang out in the distance as
pigeons appeared from what seemed
like every direction. Small groups
began pitching in out of shot and
I questioned my choice of position.
Then a lone bird powered over
high. I ripped the gun through its line
and it planed down into the brambles.
The dogs were on it. Birds clattered
from the far side of the wood, then
a dozen bounced into
the wind, over the
spruces and
towards a
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 23
Roost shooting
All is quiet as Will waits
for the next incomers
large oak set in a shallow gully behind
me. One dropped to my first shot
and the others flipped, leaving me to
chase with a second barrel. Beaten.
More followed, well up this time.
Would they swing round? Should
I take my chance? Decisions. I left
them and, just as I thought they
were carrying on, they banked round,
set their wings and stooped. I missed
the first but caught a second on the
slide, quickly reloading. That’s what
it’s all about.
Instinctive
A flock of starlings swirled over and
I flinched. Incoming again, only two
woodies this time, nice and steady.
I measured the first shot too much
and missed. The second was
more instinctive and another
bird flopped down through
the branches.
As quickly as it started,
it stopped. Twilight closed
in and the pastel plumage of
the birds at my feet darkened.
It was time to call it a day, pick
anything yet to be picked and
make for the yard — a rendezvous
point before everyone went their
separate ways. The evening’s bag
was lined out on the cold concrete
floor of the grain store. Who was in
the hotspot? Stories were told, notes
swapped and a final tally recorded
for the farm manager. Fewer birds
mean less damage. But we can’t deny
the adrenaline-spiking nature of the
pursuit. And we can’t deny the nature
of these very special birds.
 Gundogs
Handlers lavish time and money on their chargges
— more so than pet owners, says Ellena Swift
A
study by Guide Dogs
last week concluded that
three-quarters of Britain’s
pet dogs suffer from poor
mental health. The pet industry is
now bigger than the working dog
world — but it seems it’s not as healthy,
mentally or physically.
The Kennel Club lists 38 gundog
breeds, and that is without hound,
working or pastoral groups. Each
group includes serious working dogs
such as the border collie, Alaskan
malamute and beagle. The vast
majority of these breeds are not
trained to behave in the way they do,
but follow instinct alone. It would be
difficult to train an Alaskan malamute
to point like the vizsla, for example, or
a beagle to herd like the border collie.
Nothing is impossible, but these
mental instincts go a long way to
making our lives as working dog
handlers easier. The majority of us
select the breed best suited to the job
we want. Rough shooters often use
spaniels, while counting grouse is
usually done using an HPR.
ANDREW SYDENHAM; SARAH FARNSWORTH; GETTY IMAGES
Doing the job it’s bred for will keep a working breed happy, fulfilled and in top physical condition
24 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
It used to be that dogs were kept for
their single purpose, but now most
are kept as companions. The irony
of this is, when asked, most people
seem concerned if they know a dog is
kept only as a working dog and not a
companion. Someone recently said
to me: “I am so relieved your dogs are
pets and not only working dogs.”
Frustrated
Mine are kept as both. My labradors
are in the house and involved with my
family. My border collie, however, is
kennelled rather than in the house.
Indoors he is agitated, frustrated and
unsettled. He has a wonderful nature
and is amazing with the children.
However, he would rather be working
than lounging in front of the fireplace.
It is what he lives for and thrives on.
As much as my labradors love the
comforts of the house, I am certain if
you put a wounded pheasant running
out the door they would leave their
comfort zone in a matter of seconds
and choose what their instinct
dictates. So why the judgement?

For the majority of dogs, it
doesn’t matter what they do,
as long as they do something
Is living as a pet really so much better
than living as a working dog? And if
given the choice, which would your
dog choose?
As a dog trainer, the majority of
problems I deal with are the same.
Border collies chase cars and are
‘nippy’ with other dogs or
people. Spaniels pull on a
lead, won’t lift their noses
off the ground and show
little to no interest in treats —
particularly when given the
choice of game or food — they
only want to hunt. Labradors
‘steal’ things they should not
have and constantly use their
noses to hunt out things they
shouldn’t. HPRs always want
to be huge distances away
from their handler, hunting
and chasing.
I like to show these dogs
working to their full potential
and how these undesirable traits
are actually instincts in that breed.
When the owners see the ground
these dogs should be covering and
the natural abilities they have, it
helps them understand why they
are having problems. The fact that
these undesirable behaviours are the
underpinning characteristics of the
breeds seems lost on them.
In most cases, I am certain they
could be improved — if not completely
cured — if they were worked as the
breed was intended. Yet working
dog owners are forever criticised for
not treating their dogs as pets. It is
hard to see a well-bred dog walking
down a pavement with all manner
of harnesses on them to stop them
The idea that a working breed is
‘just a pet’ doesn’t remove the
working DNA from its body
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 25
Gundogs
behaving in an undesirable way. You
can see the frustration and pain in
their faces; the dog knows it is meant
for more. When they are offered
any form of freedom, they are out of
control. Look at top-level gundogs and
it is rare to see anything other than a
simple slip-lead — or no lead at all.
Fulfilled
It is no secret that many breeds are
used for something different from
their intended job. Many gundogs are
used for detection work, search and
rescue and even medical detection,
as well as sports such as agility, flyball
or even Canicross. These dogs are
usually content and focused when
doing their alternative job and
certainly seem fulfilled.
This leads me to the conclusion
that, for the vast majority of dogs, they
do not seem to mind what they do, as
long as they do something. This what
I try to get my clients to understand.
One of my pet hates is to hear the
classic statement, “yes, Rover is a
working breed but he’s not a working
dog. Just a pet”. I am always surprised
that I have to highlight the fact that
simply because they have decided not
to work the dog, it does not remove the
working DNA from its body.
So why the stigma from pet
owners? Why are they so much
better than working dog owners?
I believe this can be traced back to
an outdated and very old view of how
the working dog is kept. Traditionally,
it would be kept outside in kennels,
often with no heating and basic
amenities. As anyone who works
dogs now knows, this could
Gundogs
not be further from the truth. All
my kennelled dogs have heating,
automatic water drinkers, soft
matting and then bedding on top
to sleep on and company all of the
time. They are never left alone for
hours like many pets are. Many
kennel systems are, frankly, nicer
than my house.
Time and money
If people could see the money and
care that is spent on these working
dogs, they would have to change their
opinion. I also wonder how many
pet owners spend the same amount
of time and money on their pet as
gundog trainers do? The better the
trainer, the more time they spend
with their dogs.
The kennel systems some working dogs live
in are more luxurious than some houses
26 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
Those at the very top level dedicate
weeks on end throughout the year
to training their dog. They (like
me) travel the width and breadth
of the country to train. The money
involved in this, let alone the time and
dedication, is surely more than any
pure pet owner will ever come close
to. This goes for all dog sports.
The other big problem is the
Disneyfication trend and the
anthropomorphism of animals.
“Anyone who treats a dog like a human
baby shouldn’t be allowed to own one”
This means giving human traits to
other objects and living creatures.
This is a dangerous way to approach
any dog. The notion that they are
humans and should be treated as
such is absurd.
The ‘fur baby’ craze has sadly hit
dogs hard. Having had both puppies
and babies, I can say without doubt
that I treated both very differently
because they were not the same.
Seeing a dog being pushed along
in a pram, wearing clothes or being
carried in a baby carrier makes me
want to scream.
It is clear to me that those who
view their dog as such have the least
understanding of its nature, instincts,
history and requirements of any dog
Those who work their dogs spend
more time with them than many
pet owners do with theirs
owner. In my opinion, anyone who
wishes to treat a dog like this should
not be allowed to own one.
The good news is I am seeing
more pet owners recognise that their
working gundog requires more than
only two walks a day to be content.
Many owners are coming forward
to ask what more they can do to
stimulate their dog to improve their
overall health and welfare. It would
seem the tables are slowly turning.
For trainers across the country,
it is such a relief.
The best thing we can do for
these dogs is to help those who are
misunderstood. Recommend the
right trainers who understand that
particular breed; encourage owners
to use the dog’s instincts instead of
fighting them. If you breed puppies,
ensure they are placed in the right
homes. These don’t need to be
experienced homes but certainly with
people who understand what they are
getting into and how a particular dog
needs to be treated and trained.
All of my dogs are happy when
they are in the home being cuddled by
the family. But they are even happier
when out in the field working.
 Sport abroad
A mighty old goat
in a tough country
Flanked by half a dozen local guides and armed guards, Thomas
Nissen embarks on a remarkable adventure to stalk ibex in Pakistan
S
o far, the drive from Karachi,
Pakistan’s economic capital,
to the hunting area has taken
us four depressing hours.
The airport, with its heavy military
presence, is a long way behind us, but
everything we have seen since leaving
its environs has suggested a place of
great chaos.
As we arrive at our destination, we
look on anxiously as two guards with
machine guns open the gates. What
have we let ourselves in for? Yet inside
there’s another world, a heavenly
realm incongruously planted amid
poverty and suffering. It shouldn’t
have come as a surprise, though — the
accommodation isn’t cheap. Indeed,
the hunting expedition for Sindh ibex
has proven to be a costly affair.
THOMAS NISSEN
28 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
After a good night’s sleep, Jens
Kjaer Knudsen zeroes his rifles at
a 400m range. Then we head out
along dirt roads through the flatland
bush, where locals cultivate the large
onion fields with their bare hands. It’s
back-breaking work, the like of which
hasn’t been seen in western Europe
since World War II. After an hour on
the bumpy trackways, the landscape
“Older ibex hide to avoid being left in the
wake of fitter animals racing from danger”
changes: the onion fields are replaced
by low bare mountains. It’s here that
we are greeted by two armed guards,
assigned to our personal protection,
and six local hunting guides, who
have already spotted a small herd of
ibex with a good buck among them.
Before long, the guides begin
shepherding us through narrow
sun-warmed valleys towards the
goats. We spy a large ibex on a plateau,
but, unfortunately, he spots us too.
The onion fields of Sindh
give way to low, largely bare
mountains — ibex territory
He is approximately 800m out and
disappears quickly into a gorge on
the other side of the plateau. It’s
impossible to stalk the buck.
Instead, the chief guide, Bilal,
suggests that Jens posts himself on a
ridge while he and his fellow guides
try to push the herd towards him and
his gun. Jens later confesses that he is
not a fan of this type of driven hunt,
preferring the thrill of seeking out his
own game in the peaks instead. But
these are the country’s customs, so
he yields to the suggestion.
Full speed
We don’t have to wait long until
several young goats pass Jens’s post.
In the distance, we catch another
glimpse of the powerful buck we’d
spooked earlier, but he quickly slips
away into an even narrower gorge.
We wait a while, then a strong buck
approaches at full speed. It passes
close to us and Jens hopes he can get
a shot away, but Bilal shakes his head
— it is not the old one we saw on the
plateau, he says.
The morning tips over into the
afternoon and the drive is over. The
old goat still hasn’t shown himself.
Jens suspects the guides are correct
in their belief that the wise beast has
chosen to hide, either beneath a patch
of vegetation or in one of the area’s
caves. It’s a cunning tactic
older ibex often employ
to avoid being left in

Jens knows he has to be ready to take a quick shot at the old ibex buck at extremely short range
the wake of younger, fitter animals
as they race away from danger. They
seem to understand that quicker
predators can’t catch them if they
aren’t there in the first place.
Hideout
We decide to see if we can find his
hideout and drop down into the dried-
up gorge below us. Jens seems more
at home as he passes under thorny
bushes and trees, stalking his prey.
The guides point out
a small herd of ibex
The magnification on Jens’s scope
is down to three — he knows the old
male could appear at any moment,
and that he needs to be ready for a
quick shot at extremely short range.
The afternoon heat is building
when one of the guides tugs Jens’s
sleeve and points. A moment later,
we spot it — an animal lying under
the cover of a large, thickly branched
bush. Its light fur confirms that it’s
an old buck. Jens has a shooting
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 29
Sport abroad
C O N S E R VAT I O N
Only a few licences are issued for
Sindh ibex, which means that the
price of hunting them is very high.
The premium paid ensures that the
game and its habitat are held in great
esteem as sources of wealth and are
therefore preserved.
The economic opportunities
provided by the hunt combined
with great conservation efforts in
Pakistan, which are supported by
local villagers, means the region is
a haven for ibex. The standard model
of conservation in Pakistan ensures
that locals benefit financially from
hunting — 80% of the profits from the
sale of hunting licences go directly
to local health and educational
establishments, for instance.
The remaining 20% goes to
game rangers in the Sindh Wildlife
Department, who watch the ibex and
look after its habitat. The animals and
the places they live are valued by local
people, while poachers are deeply
reviled as they threaten funding for
services and jobs.
The big old ibex buck is as
impressive as he is wise
Sport abroad

The mighty Sindh ibex

is Jens Kjaer Knudsen’s
30th species of wild goat

30 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE


Armed guards are vital due
to the kidnapping risk
opportunity between the branches,
but he wants to see the ibex’s horns
properly before firing. He’s also
enjoying the rush of adrenaline and
intends to savour the moment.
We slip quietly away and take
up a new position, lying around 275m
from the goat. We plan to wait for
him to come out into the open. It is
now late afternoon and the sun burns
fiercely above our vantage point. We
wait for two hot hours. The ibex rises
three times but he doesn’t leave his
cover. He’s simply shifting his position
before lying down once more.
Sunset
Two hours before sunset, the beast
gets up for a fourth time — but this
time he stays up. Jens is ready with
his rifle when the buck finally leaves
his hiding place, but the hunter
never gets a completely clear line
of fire before the animal settles
down again a few metres higher
up the mountainside, unaware that
he was ever in any danger. However,
this time, the huge animal is entirely
concealed by a dense bush.
An hour before sunset, we decide
it’s time to be bold and we edge closer
to our quarry until there is only 80m
of sparse greenery between us. Bilal,
however, continues, sneaking around
a slight rise ahead of us. But it proves
a ridge too far.
Appearing to sense that something
is amiss, the ibex springs from
cover, takes a few quick steps up the
mountainside, then stops again as
though trying to confirm in which
direction danger lies. Jens has his
“Parts of the animal — including deep-fried
testicles — ended up on the dining table”
finger on the Blaser R8’s trigger, but
the ibex has its rear towards him,
shielding its vital organs.
The animal takes a few more
hesitant steps before stopping
again. This time it turns just far
enough for Jens to take it down with
a 6.5 Creedmoor ELD-X bullet. The
projectile skims the back of the goat’s
lungs before piercing its vital organs.
The mighty beast sprints for a few
metres up the slope before falling
dead at the mountain’s summit.
Our agile guide dashes forward
to slash the ibex’s throat with his
knife. Though it has already been shot
dead by Jens, local custom dictates
that the goat must be killed in a halal
way for the locals to eat the meat.
Hours later, parts of the butchered
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 31
Sport abroad
animal — including its testicles, deep
fried — ended up on the dining table
of our luxury lodge.
We later learn that the ibex was
a 12-year-old buck — exactly what Jens
hoped for. It is a perfect end to an
exhilarating day that has given us the
chance to experience a driven hunt
in the mountains and a stalk through
semi-desert under a burning sun.
In truth, you can hunt Sindh ibex
in plenty of locations around the
world, many of which are far safer.
But the experience of hunting in a
land that has been left behind by time,
where notions of honour and rank
mean that armed bodyguards must
flank you at all times, is unique.
The trip had even greater
significance for Jens, though, as it
secured a trophy he had dreamed of
for many years. The ibex was his 30th
wild species — a tally that includes the
chamois and tahr — and allowed him
to complete the Capra World Slam 30.
He is thought to be the only Dane ever
to have achieved this feat.
If you feel you’re up to hunting Sindh
ibex, you can contact the organiser of
this trip, Artem Veselov, by emailing
jagd@profihunt.com
The guide swiftly cuts the throat of
the shot ibex to satisfy halal rules; the
animal is then gutted and butchered
 Competition guns
Clay guns that’ll have
you moving on up
If you’re thinking about taking your clay shooting to the next level,
why not invest in a proper tool for the job, suggests Simon Reinhold
C
ompetition clay shooting
is about controlled levels
of focus. This is also true
when it comes to choosing
a suitable gun for the task, given the
bewildering range of guns on offer.
Ultimately, it comes down to what
you feel most comfortable shooting.
With that comfort comes confidence
and this is the magic — sometimes
elusive — ingredient in all types of
shotgun shooting, but especially
in competition clay shooting.
However, you must give yourself
time to adapt to a new gun. When
in retail I had a customer who was a
competent Shot but had a peculiar
habit. If he missed a straight driven
target with a gun, he would sell
the gun the next day
another. It was an ex
way of correcting a d
1 Breda
Zenith Black
RRP £2,595
vikingarms.com
The Breda is an
attractive-looking
gun with modernist
engraving. With its l
profile action, lockin The Breda takes
coming through the face inspiration from a better-
of the action, and barrels known Italian cousin
2 Krieghoff K-80
RRP from £13,200
alanrhone.com
No discussion on clay shooting shotguns
would be complete without mention of
a Krieghoff. Favoured by a number of
CALLUM MCINERNEY-RILEY
the best shooters in the world, these are
Marmite guns. What is surprising when
you shoot one is how different they feel
and yet how well they handle.
32 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
in confidence, but it is not advisable
and is beyond the pocket of most.
It is worth giving any new gun at
least a year before deciding whether
to keep it or move on. Only then will
your scores truly show a reflection
of whether it is right for you or not.
What to look for in a shotgun
is intensely personal. Many have
extended multichokes so you can see
at a moment’s notice what is in your
gun and to act if you feel the need to
change chokes for a particular target.
The truth is that there isn’t much on
a Sporting course properly laid out
by a competent designer that cannot
be tackled with half-choke.
Many (but not all) also have an
adjustable comb that reduces the
st being applied to
tively large gripped
There are numerous
inging on replaceable
tub pins in the action
alls, the Breda takes its
spiration from a better-
nown Italian cousin.
It has a seven-position
stable trigger but the
an adjustable comb
t suit all shooters,
though the drop at heel and
comb and general stock shape
The mechanical trigger feels like
nothing else, giving your finger a little
kick as the mechanism switches to the
second barrel. But, despite that, there is
a tangible authority in using one once you
have bonded with it. But it may take time
to get used to the quirks, and it surprises
and disappoints some shooters that
they never gel with one and have to sell it
disillusioned. The shape of the fore-end
options when it comes to rib profiles.
Some believe higher ribs and combs
afford them a visual pick-up more
quickly for Trap-style targets, even
on a Sporting course. Wider ventilated
ribs are designed to dissipate the
rising heat of the barrels after shots,
heat that can distort your vision.
What is universally accepted,
though, is the need for reliability
when you are shooting tens of
thousands of cartridges a year. I will
highlight the differences between
some of the many brands popular
in today’s market and some that are
the titans of the podium on the world
stage. If you want to step up in your
CPSA class and shoot more registered
targets, or some of the larger non-
registered competitions, it may be
time to consider moving on from
your entry-level game gun.
are well thought out for the UK market.
The handling, which is the key difference
in all these guns, is determined but not
perhaps as encouraging as some.
At its price point, this is a solid
contender for those looking for a new gun
at a reasonable price with the peace of mind
of a two-year warranty. The replaceable
block on the underside of the barrel shows
a confidence from the manufacturer in its
longevity and is a great concept in itself.
and the action are an acquired taste; the
barrels are ribless and appear bulged at
the chokes — simply the way they are
built — but they continue to increase in
popularity and frequency on the podium.
They hold their value second-hand.
The model on test is available in Holts’
March auction. Given their reputation for
Teutonic reliability, they are increasingly
the gun of choice for some major players.
 Competition guns

6 2
3
5

SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 33

Competition guns

3 Perazzi High Tech S

RRP £11,880
ruag.co.uk
What the Perazzi lacks in frills it more
than makes up for in other areas. The no-
nonsense exterior is a clue; this gun has a
finesse rarely found in serious competition
over-and-unders.
Finesse does not mean that this gun
is fragile. What it does mean is that the Perazzi’s High Tech S is a perfect blend of the gunmaker’s art and modern manufacturing
Perazzi almost holds your hand and walks
you through the shot. Its smoothness is through the whole gun — this is the perfect if you are considering using it for game
outstanding, separate and distinct from blend of the gunmaker’s art and modern shooting as well as clays. While it is not
some of the heavier contenders. For me manufacturing techniques. cheap, the options to have the gun fitted
it felt very natural to shoot. Part of the Though chambered for 76mm (3in), — now in the UK as well as in the Italian
smoothness will be the fixed choke, but the 2016 model on test is not proofed for factory — and the residual value of the
much of it is the weight evenly distributed high-performance steel shot, so check gun make it a popular choice.

4 Beretta DT11 L Sport

RRP £13,050
gmk.co.uk
For a combination of beauty and serious
intent, this gun is hard to beat. There is
a substantial quality to the DT11 L, rather
like a large luxurious car whose handling
disguises its weight.
Weight is not a bad thing in a
competition gun — it absorbs felt recoil
— but it is a trade-off with fatigue in your
arms over the length of a day’s contest.
The best guns feel far lighter than they
weigh because of their perfect balance.
This DT11 L embodies that equation. More
deliberate than the refined features of the
Perazzi, for those looking for an elegant
certainty, this gun, or one of its less Beautiful to look at, the DT11 L’s
beautifully engraved relatives, may be for weight is disguised by its handling
you if your budget can stretch that far.

5 Beretta 694 Sport

The heritage of Beretta’s
RRP £4,000 successful 680 series is
gmk.co.uk clear in its 694
It doesn’t have the DT11’s handling —
it is flightier and less forgiving — but the
694’s price point appeals to the fans of
the Beretta stablemate. The test version
is also available second-hand at Holts’
auction in March.
You can customise the 694’s handling
to your requirements by a system of
barrel weights, which allows for the fact
that not all competition shooters want
homogeneous handling characteristics
in their guns. The styling and build quality
are more angular, but you can see the
heritage of the 680 series that put Beretta
on the podium repeatedly in the 1980s and
cemented its competitive reputation.

34 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE


6 Blaser F3 Vantage
RRP £5,995
blaser.de
With its stepped rib and Monte Carlo
stock, this configuration of Blaser is so
far removed from what I am used to that
it shocked me how well I got on with it.
Granted, I was not shooting the stiffest
clay targets in the world, but still I was
not expecting to feel as comfortable
with this gun as I did.
The well-figured stock is of a high
grade and the counterbalance system
inside it — as well as one on the mid-rib
of the barrels — allows for all tastes to
be catered for. Add to that the fact
that this is modular and the huge
combination of fore-end shapes, stock
shapes, rib heights and finishes that are
available, and the discerning clay shooter
is allowed to have almost any whim
satisfied on the F3 platform.
Again, the F3 is a no-frills machine;
there is little in the way of embellishment
to distract the shooter from the
silverware on offer at the end of the
competition. And that really is the point
— nobody worries about how pretty
your gun is when you are on the top
of the podium.
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 35
Competition guns
IN CONCLUSION
Clay-breaking guns are simply the
tools of the trade for those people
who like to test themselves in the
heat of competition. What many
who have never experienced it
don’t realise is the fact that you are
not competing against anyone but
yourself. If it is your day and you
have shot well enough to get there,
the only ally in a shoot-off is the
gun in your hands.
The handling you can adjust and
acclimatise to over time, but above
all else comes reliability. Without
it, the fatal flaw of doubt creeping
into your mind may well determine
whether you climb on to the podium
at all, let alone on which step you
get to stand.
The Blaser F3 Vantage is a no-
frills machine, but who cares
how pretty your gun is?
 Gundogs
When walking in the countryside,
ensure your dogs are under close
control at all times
Time to take the lead
Sheep worrying is a growing problem that causes trauma to all
concerned, so make sure you’re in control, urges David Tomlinson
YOU MAY HAVE SEEN
the story in the papers last
month about a 29-year-old
man who was found guilty
in Chesterfield magistrates’ court for
failing to stop after an accident.
Following an evening drinking
in several pubs, he crashed into a
flock of sheep on his way home,
killing 11, leaving behind him what
was described as “a scene of utter
carnage”. He was banned for driving
for six months, told to pay £85 in court
costs and a £95 victim surcharge.
It strikes me that this was an
exceedingly lenient penalty. When
I checked on the Farmers Weekly
website I found that the average price
of a ewe is around £670, so the farmer
lost sheep worth several thousands
“There’s a lack of awareness among owners
about what their pets are capable of”
of pounds as a result of this man’s
dangerous driving. Shouldn’t the
DAVID TOMLINSON
guilty party have been ordered to
compensate the farmer for his loss?
I have a strong suspicion that if your
36 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
dog had strayed and killed 11 ewes, the
penalties would have been far higher.
Sheep worrying is a growing
problem in the UK, no doubt made
worse in the past two years by the
growth in dog ownership due to
the pandemic. Figures are not yet
available for last year but, according
to NFU Mutual, the total cost in 2020
of claims for livestock attacks by
dogs was about £1.3 million, a figure
expected to rise substantially in 2021.
According to Rebecca Davidson,
rural affairs specialist at NFU Mutual,
there’s a lack of awareness among
dog owners about what their pets are
capable of. “Our latest figures confirm
the harrowing reports coming in from
across the UK of livestock horrifically
injured and killed by out-of-control
dogs,” she said. “The suffering to
animals and the anxiety for farmers
could be prevented easily if people
kept their dogs on a lead when out
in the countryside.”
I admit I don’t always keep my
dogs on leads when walking in the
countryside, but they are under
close control all the time and I live
in a predominately arable area,
so encounters with livestock are
relatively few. They are always put
on leads when we encounter animals
that could worry. I think many dogs
owners forget that sheep are animals
that are worried easily. Even if a dog
doesn’t actually touch a sheep, it can
still do a great deal of damage. This is
especially true with pregnant ewes.
Curiosity
Outdoor pigs are rather more
numerous than sheep in my area.
On the whole, I don’t think that adult
pigs are too bothered about dogs.
I would be more worried about the
dog than the pig in any face-to-face
encounters. These, however, are
remarkably rare as outdoor pigs
are invariably contained by electric
fences that do just as good a job of
keeping dogs out as pigs in. My most
recent encounter with young porkers
on a shooting day showed they were
curious about what was going on.

DAVID’S VIEWPOINT
DO OUR DOGS
FEEL GRIEF?
Is the study right or are we
being anthropomorphic?
A
recently published study of 426
Italian dogs revealed that 86%
of them showed behavioural
changes after the death of a canine
companion. It prompted newspaper
reports that dogs experience a form of
mourning, while one of the authors of
the report, Dr Federica Pirrone of the
University of Milan, said: “Dogs are highly
emotional animals who develop very close
bonds with the members of the familiar
group. This means that they may be highly
distressed if one of them dies and efforts
should be made to help them cope with
this distress.”
I find this interesting, as many people
have told me how their surviving dog, or
Many dog owners forget that sheep are animals that are worried easily, even if there is no contact
John Houlton’s survey of the
retirement age of gundogs, which I
wrote about last year (Every dog has its
day, 22 December 2021), revealed 14
dogs in his study died due to accidents
in the shooting field, including one
that was trampled to death by cattle.
Cattle, like pigs, are able to defend
themselves, so it’s always sensible
to be cautious when in their vicinity.
They, too, are curious creatures,
so will come to investigate a dog,
which can be a problem. In my
experience, young animals are
dogs, have been distressed by the death
of a companion or kennel mate, which
doesn’t surprise me at all. However, it’s
not something that I’ve noticed. For the
past 40 years, I’ve had a succession of
dogs, always mother and daughter. The
mothers have always died before their
daughters, yet there has been little in the
way of reaction from the latter. Not one
of them has pined, gone off her food or
shown any sign of distress. Perhaps you
can dismiss my dogs as untypical, but
I wonder how unusual they are?
As with humans, not all mothers and
daughters get on, but mine have always
been pretty tolerant of each other. The
few brief arguments have been over food.
The older bitch has been the dominant
member of the pair. I’ve always felt that
when the mother dies, her daughter moves
up to become top dog, so is content not to
be in competition any more.
It’s all too easy to be anthropomorphic
and believe dogs are affected by the death
much more dangerous than mature
cattle, which generally have a more
relaxed approach to dogs.
Danger to dogs
Loose horses can be among the most
dangerous of livestock with dogs.
Because of their greater familiarity
with humans, they are typically much
bolder than cattle, so it’s not so easy
to shoo them off. Many years ago,
my spaniel survived an attack from
a pony. I was walking her to heel on
a public footpath through a paddock
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 37
Gundogs
Some people find their dog is distressed by
the death of a companion, but not all dogs are
of what might well be a lifelong companion
in the same way as we are, but I’m not
convinced. My own observations are
biased because they are based on mother-
daughter relationships.
Is the reaction to death different when
dogs are the same age or not related? I’d
be interested to hear from readers with
any thoughts on this subject.
Email: dhtomlinson@btinternet.com
with grazing horses. One particular
animal came after her in determined
fashion. If she hadn’t escaped through
the hedge, she would have been in
trouble. Later, I discovered this pony
was a known dog killer.
Common sense
Last month the Government revised
The Countryside Code, giving advice
to what it calls ‘countryside visitors’.
There’s not much in the code that
isn’t common sense. If you need to
be warned that “traffic on country
roads can be dangerous to people and
wildlife”, I don’t think you should be
venturing out of town.
However, I expect most of us have
met aggressive cyclists when walking,
so it’s reassuring to know “cyclists
must give way to walkers and horse
riders on bridleways”. Whether many
cyclists are aware of this is doubtful.
I am sure we all know that
“a farmer can shoot a dog that is
attacking or chasing livestock. They
may not be liable to compensate the
dog’s owner.” However, I suspect
there is widespread ignorance of the
fact that, between 1 March and 31 July,
you must have your dog on a lead on
Open Access land, even if there is no
livestock on the land. I walk my dogs
regularly on Open Access land and
this is a law I do obey.
 Buying shooting

Big days on a
tiny budget
These are uncertain times and many may be feeling the
pinch but that doesn’t mean no shooting, says Jamie Tusting

D
riven shooting is not
an inexpensive hobby.
A quick look at shooting
for sale suggests that the
price paid per bird on a commercial
shoot starts at £35 and only heads
one way. So even a small day could be
£350 plus VAT per Gun. If you want a
bigger day out, or more challenging
birds, start with £1,000 and you can’t
go too far wrong.
However, there are plenty of
opportunities out there for those who
don’t want to spend as much but still
are keen for some shooting. While
I greatly enjoy a day out in the field,
my budget doesn’t stretch very far, so
I have worked hard to find shooting on
a shoestring.
My first suggestion is to try to get
involved in a syndicate of some sort.
Not all shoots around the country
are big commercial ones; many
are smaller DIY affairs without a
professional gamekeeper. I am very
fortunate to have access to a few
hundred acres of land and run a small
syndicate with my two brothers. We
having worked hard with your fellow
members through the year, the days
out in the season are more enjoyable
and fulfilling than when you’re
standing next to a stranger in the line.
DIY syndicates will often offer up
either a full gun or a half-gun. A full
gun will be able to have a peg on all the
days’ shooting undertaken, while the
half-gun will be on half the number
of days. Prices vary from syndicate to
syndicate, of course, but your upfront
cost might be in the region of £500 for
a half-gun and £1,000 for a full gun.
Either way, if you’re prepared to do
some work in lieu of a cash payment,
this is a great option.
If, however, you’re unable to
commit the time, or perhaps only
want one or two days’ shooting a year,
keep an eye out for a last-minute deal.
There are plenty of online outlets
selling game days, and commercial
shoots will often post last-minute
sales online to fill any remaining
pegs. If you’re prepared to travel
and book at the last minute, this
could work well.
experience of a driven day in full cry,
but without the mortgage-inducing
price tag that often goes with it.
Striking distance
While it can be a great adventure to
travel the length and breadth of the
country in search of sport, this too
will add to the overall cost of a day
out. If you’re looking for shooting on
a budget, try to stay within striking
distance of home. You might not be
able to enjoy the full hospitality a
driven day offers, or have a drink in
the pub afterwards, but driving home
at the end of the day certainly makes
it less painful on the wallet.
However, if you can find good sport
at a value price, it might pay to travel
further afield. A couple of years ago,
some friends and I arranged a three-
day adventure to the Isle of Lewis,
Being part of a syndicate is
doubly rewarding as you get to
put in as well as take out

“Walked-up days are for fewer Guns so,

while the bag is small, you get lots of sport”
are exceptionally low input and even
lower output, but we each manage
a small day of 50 or so birds for our
friends, which costs us in the region
of £20 a bird.
Satisfying
Being part of a DIY syndicate is a
year-round commitment, but the hard
ANDY HOOK; DUNCAN IRELAND; ALAMY
Also, midweek days are often
better value than weekends,
as the popular Saturday shoots
are far more likely to be booked
up and may come at a premium.
Shooting for me is far more about
a day out in the countryside with
good friends than it is about pulling
the trigger. So I have often enjoyed

work — from pen repairs in the spring,
helping with the arrival of poults
in July and the feeding through the
season — makes the reward of the day’s
shooting at the other end far more
satisfying than a paid-for day. There
is a great sense of teamwork and,
sharing a peg on a driven day with
one of my mates, alternating drives
so that each of you get to shoot evenly
through the day. By sharing a peg, you
may be able to stretch the combined
budget to enable a day out on a
bigger shoot, so you can have the full

38 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE

 Buying shooting

with two days of walked-up grouse

shooting, all for less money than we’d
have spent on a peg on a 200-bird
pheasant day.
Smaller days, or boundary days,
are a great way to pick up good-value
shooting. I went on an early-season
boundary day on the Wirral a couple
of years ago, and shot all the covers
around the edge of a 3,000-acre
block. We didn’t shoot any of the
main drives, but we had a handsome
bag of 60 by the end of the day and it
worked out at just over £15 a bird. The
gamekeeper saw it as an opportunity Small boundary days often offer
to push birds back in from the outer lots of variety for little outlay
edges of the shoot and make some
money. We took our own lunch,
which we had in the field, but the day Shooting can often be facilitated Shooting doesn’t have to be an
out was a cracker — and I didn’t have in exchange for your time. Helping expensive hobby. With the right
to use my overdraft to finance it. out on a shoot as a beater or picker- application of time and effort,
If you’re not particularly fussed up — or perhaps offering some of your shopping around for a decent deal,
about going out on a driven pheasant time to a gamekeeper to help in the or being prepared to shoot birds that
shoot, perhaps a better route to go season — can often ensure you get haven’t been driven to a peg, you can
down is a walked-up day. Without the an invitation to the beaters’ day at enjoy some brilliant days out in the
costs of beaters and pickers-up, some the end of the season. field at a cost that makes them far
shoots can offer smaller walked-up more affordable.
days with an expected bag of a couple Spare cash And if you find that the time is
of dozen at a much better rate than These days are for a gamekeeper still too intensive, and the costs
the driven birds. Generally, though, to thank the hard work of his team are too high, there are some great
walked-up days are for fewer Guns, throughout the shooting season alternatives. Duck flightponds can
perhaps three or four of you, so and if you haven’t got the spare cash be available for wild sport for a few
while the bag is smaller, you can still to spend on a day shooting, getting hundred pounds a year, or perhaps
have plenty of sport. With price tags involved as a beater is a good way to try to find some pigeon shooting.
often in the £100 to £200 per Gun be a part of a shoot. It’s also a great day There are plenty of farmers out there
range, this can be a more palatable out in the fresh air and you’ll have £30 who will happily let you protect their
alternative for a day out in the field. in your pocket at the end of the day. crops and won’t charge you a penny.

SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 39

 RIFLE TEST

Haenel Jaeger 10
Timber LX Monte
Carlo £1,710
This rifle’s covetable Grade 4 walnut stock, superb handling and
instinctive accuracy make Bruce Potts double-check the price

The walnut is exquisite, beautifully

finished and remarkable quality

The double paddle release

lever needs a firm push
OUR VERDICT

T
he German gunmaking firm
Haenel has been producing
rifles for almost 200 years.
Its reputation in Britain is
now on the rise, thanks to its attention
to detail and its importer, Viking
Arms. The Jaeger — or Hunter — range
certainly lives up to its name; a bolt-
action rifle built in the traditional
style using old-world gunsmithing
quality but with technology that is
bang up to date.
This particular rifle comprises a
slim lightweight Sporter with correct
bedding for consistent accuracy, a
Picatinny rail for universal scope
JAKE POTTS
to pop out the
magazine
The Jaeger is
coated with Ilaflon,
which prevents corrosion, so
this well-made rifle is unfazed by
a long stalk through fields
and crawling along
drainage
ditches
Add to this the precision barrel The Jaeger series is available in
threaded muzzle for sound moderator, calibres from .243, .308, 6.5x55, .270
super-slick low-lift bolt handle, and .30-06 and, though I have tested
corrosion-resistant Ilaflon coating the synthetic models, this time I am

mounting, a detachable magazine and a and superb walnut stock, and this is lucky enough to have my hands on
safety with bolt-open facility to unload. an attractive proposition at £1,710. the gorgeous Timber LX model with

42 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE

 Buy with confidence

The rifle’s great handling makes shots

taken off sticks easy and accurate

The six-lug bolt system locks directly into

the back of the barrel for total integrity

The barrel is free-floating and its

Ilaflon coating complements the stock

a Monte Carlo stock configuration. What

immediately stands out is the overall
fit and finish of the rifle. It represents
such good value for money that I had
to recheck the price.

NEED TO KNOW

Manufacturer Haenel
Model Jaeger 10 Timber LX
Type Sporter
Calibre .308 Win
Action Bolt action
Magazine Three-shot, detachable
Finish Ilaflon-coated
Barrel 22in, threaded 15mm/1 pitch
Overall length 42.75in
The trigger has Weight 6.95lb
a set option and Sights High-visibility open sights and
the safety has full-length Picatinny scope rail
a smaller bolt Stock Grade 4 walnut, Monte Carlo style
release for Trigger Direct, set option supplied
quick ejection Price £1,710
Importer Viking Arms, 01423 780810

SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 43


RIFLE TEST
IN DEPTH
S
tarting with the stock — what
a beauty. The Grade 4 walnut
possesses lovely depth of colour,
with highly figured grain running
through the whole stock, and it’s finished off
with a warm oil finish of great lustre. Gone are
the fixed sling swivels, replaced with three
more convenient quick-detachable mounting
studs as well as two cross bolts through the
stock to dissipate recoil more evenly.
With a schnabel fore-end and small cast
to rear stock, this Jaeger 10 has a typical
Sporter profile, and the raised Monte Carlo
cheekpiece (European option) helps to
maintain good eye-to-scope alignment. The
whole rifle points and handles so naturally.
The aim is really instinctive.
The action is bedded to the stock via
a separate large forward recoil lug, which
ensures consistent accuracy in adverse
conditions. The totally free-floated barrel
also aids accuracy. The barrel, as with
the action, wears a highly polished Ilaflon
coating. It’s very traditional and perfectly
complements the walnut stock.
You also have some good open sights
with this model, including a sliding windage-
adjustable hi-vis rearsight and red bead
foresight that can be removed for sound
moderator fitment via the larger 15mm/1
thread. There’s also a full-length Picatinny
rail so you can mount your own scope.
The barrel is 22in long with a 0.676in
muzzle diameter that contributes to the
Haenel’s impressive handling. At less than
7lb, it’s the ideal weight for a Sporter rifle.
A bolt-to-barrel locking system provides
extra rigidity and strength, as well as
ensuring safety. The bolt locks via three
large lugs plus three smaller safety lugs,
facilitating a very low bolt lift. That, in turn,
CONCLUSION
Some rifles just have the correct weight and balance and this Jaeger 10 Timber is
one of them — with a combined smooth bolt action and great accuracy. I really like the
walnut stock. It’s very well proportioned for comfortable shooting from any position.
18 /20
18 /20
Accuracy Handling
Good accuracy, Instinctive and
consistent with highly pointable
factory or reloads in all conditions
44 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
FIELD TEST
Viking supplied a Leupold VX-6HD scope
and I chose to shoot in a traditional
way, without a moderator. This rifle’s
handling brought a genuine smile to my
face. I know some may say synthetic or
Cerakote finishing is more practical, but
this Jaeger is for people who still like
stalking the old-fashioned way.
The best .308 Win factory ammunition
was the Sako 123-gr Gamehead with
lovely sub-1in groups at 100 yards and
a velocity of 2,881fps for 2,268ft/lb
energy. It’s a great all-rounder if you don’t
homeload. A nice 150-gr load was the
Hornady SST Superformance with 0.85in
groups and 2,848fps and 2,702ft/lb —
almost the same as the lighter Sakos.
The best lead-free option was the
Federal with Barnes TSX 165-gr heads
allows a swift cycling that easily clears
any mounted scope.
A small claw extractor and plunger-
type ejector handle function reliably,
while the classy, rounded walnut bolt
knob is a nice touch.
The direct trigger mechanism has a
set option. By pushing the trigger-blade
forward, it lightens the trigger-pull to 1.5lb
from its normal 2.65lb setting. Both options
had no creep at all, breaking cleanly and
predictably. Haenel’s two-lever safety
system is all the rage and allows the larger
outer lever to disengage the sear and
locks the bolt solid in the rear position.
This exposes a smaller lever which, when
depressed, allows the bolt to move
freely to extract a round while
still having the rifle on safe.
18 /20
18 /20
Trigger Stock
Reliable, predictable Gorgeous walnut
and crisp adjustable and nicely profiled
trigger with no creep Sporter stock
Buy with confidence
at 2,643fps and 2,560ft/lb. These would
be ideal for big Scottish reds.
I was also testing some new lead-
free reloads and the Haenel responded
well to the 136-gr Peregrine, loaded
with 48 grains of Ramshot TAC powder,
for 2,779fps and 2,333ft/lb and just
over 1in groups.
We had the last of the Chinese water
deer to cull before the end of the season
and stalking through the long fields and
crawling along drainage ditches did not
faze the Jaeger. A small buck was spotted
slowly walking across a wide kale field
and, from the sticks, the Jaeger Timber
tracked him until he stopped at 125
yards. A perfect combination of handling,
accuracy and a Peregrine bullet concluded
the proceedings without any fuss.
Reloading is via a detachable three-
shot magazine with a very secure locking
mechanism; an ambidextrous paddle-type
release lever set into the trigger-guard needs
to be pushed in one stroke so the magazine
pops out cleanly.
The final cull of Chinese water deer offers an
ideal chance to put the Jaeger Timber through
its paces and it does the job without any fuss
18 90
/20 /100
Value Overall score
Excellent, given An attractive
the quality of fit proposition, visually
and finish and financially
 Blue Zulu
Truth in tall stories
Most of us have had plenty of time on the peg, but we’re never too
old to learn, especially when it comes to high birds, says Blue Zulu
W
hen we reach a certain
age, there should be
a degree of acquired
wisdom. Go easy on
tequila slammers, shun double denim
and never comb over the bald bits, for
example. And if we shoot, we should
know which loads, shot size and
chokes we should use for different
quarry. Goodness knows, we’ve all
had enough experience to inform
our choices, quite apart from the
thousands of words we’ve devoured
on these topics.
Yet I’m having a serious ponder
about what to put up the barrels and
how to swing them after some pretty
dismal performances last season.
Up to now, I’ve followed the
mantra of a long-dead and loved
friend who was a guru in the shooting
world in the 1970s. “Tight chokes are
the enemy of good shooting,” was his
verdict, a view backed up by so many
giants of the Edwardian shooting
era. Anything more than half-choke
was for the handful of truly expert
Shots, they opined. And if I still had
any doubts on the subject, well, there
was my other friend, the technical
director of a great London gunmaker,
who invariably told customers to have
their guns bored quarter-choke in
each barrel then forget about it.
The collective knowledge of these
men was vast, so when looking at
my neat little rows of mobile chokes,
I’ve nearly always given them a little
“Smaller pellets will do the job if the
pattern is put on the beak of the bird”
pat, put them away and kept on using
improved cylinder in my bottom
barrel and a quarter in the top. Nearly,
but not always. As for shot load, the
old ounce and a 16th (30g) has served
thousands of game shooters well over
the centuries and I nearly always use
that. Nearly, but not always.
And shot size? No 6 has been my
KEITH REYNOLDS
favourite and again, I nearly always
use that. Nearly, but not always. So
what makes me change my usual
46 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
cartridge recipe, one that serves me
well for 95% of my shooting? It’s that
infrequent, wonderful but daunting
invitation to shoot high birds.
I’m not good at these. I’m more
a hedgerow moocher, an ambusher,
a creeper among mere and marsh.
Present me with a quarry species
within 40 yards — and that includes
driven grouse — and I’m reasonably
confident of filling the bag. But
present me with those truly tall
birds, be it partridge or pheasant,
and my bam is completely boozled.
Shoulder thumping
Like most chaps, I’ve reasoned the
failing cannot be mine. It has to be
down to the cartridges and chokes.
So I’ve stepped up the load to 32g
of No 5s and put in the tight chokes
that mostly sit happily at home. All
of which makes perfect sense if you
read the ballistics tables and adhere to
the ‘never take a knife to a gun fight’
school of thought. And for lots of my
friends, this formula works brilliantly.
But not for me. I still miss the tall
birds, the only difference being I get
more of a shoulder thumping.
That’s not to say that my heavy-
artillery mates are wrong. I can see
the wisdom of larger shot and tighter
patterns at long range. But as ever,
it depends where you put it.
This was brought home at the
end of last season by two incidents.
The first involved dressing out half
a dozen greylags for the freezer, shot
with 34g of steel No 3s. There was
hardly a pellet in the breasts, which
I presumed — probably rightly — was
because I’d remembered to ignore the
body and focus on the front. “Shoot
the head as if it were a snipe,” as my
old mentor said and down they came.
But as I unzipped the geese, I was
conscious of just how thick goose
skin is — almost like leather — and
of the thickness of the breast meat.
At longish range, any pellet smaller
than No 1 would have difficulty
penetrating that lot, whereas a
decently close pattern of smaller
pellets on the head or neck would
affect a clean kill reasonably easily,
as I proved with those geese.
The lesson was easily
demonstrated on those greylags but
it applies also, I think, to the high
gamebirds, especially late-season
cock pheasants. That dauntless
experimenter with tall birds, Sir
Ralph Payne-Gallwey, wrote in his
seminal High Pheasants in Theory
and Practice (1913): “Even for birds
of exceptional heights, or from 38
to near 40 yards, I should pin my
faith to 1oz of No 7.”
Would many Shots advocate that
today? I’m not sure, as so many are
now wedded to 32g of No 5s, even
through 20-bores, for all game, even
partridges, throughout the season.
So why did Sir Ralph and his
cohorts find the smaller loads of
smaller shot so effective? While
accepting that his ‘high’ bird wasn’t
as high as those that modern Shots
consider in range, his were measured

and an awful lot of those so-called
60-yarders are not.
I believe it lies in how the birds
were shot. Big shot sizes are necessary
if you need the pellets to punch
through the feathers, skin and body;
smaller pellets will do the job if the
pattern’s put on the beak.
And that, really, is where I go
wrong with high birds. I don’t get
much practice on them and you won’t
find high driven clays at most clay
shoots. When I am faced with them
I dither, waiting to see if they are truly
mine or my neighbour’s — and that’s
not easy with the modern practice
of crowding pegs together.
So I’ve adopted the bad habit of
waiting until the birds are pretty
much above me, then flinging the gun
up, whooshing the barrels through
and hoping for the best. Sometimes
it works, often it doesn’t, because the
necessary arc of swing is now so great
and the matching of gun speed to bird
speed so tricky.
Tight chokes
By contrast, in mid-January I watched
a local high-bird expert show exactly
how it should be done. He had a 2½in-
chambered Holland & Holland and
effortlessly killed stone dead the sort
of birds that would have lesser Shots
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 47
Blue Zulu
reaching for 34g of No 4s and screwing
in the tight chokes.
His secret? He took them way in
front, at an angle that meant he hardly
had to move his barrels — just a slight
upwards flip, which delivered the
pattern directly into the path of the
incoming bird. No trying to kill them
through the body, it was a head shot
every time. Which meant he could
use ‘normal’ game loads.
I can’t claim I never knew this,
but it was this stellar performance
that demonstrated how wrongly
I’d approached my earlier high bird
shoots last season. My problem was
all down to poor shooting technique,
using a method that’s perfectly good
— and pretty much the only way
— when flighting moderately high
pigeons and fowl that will flare the
moment you move. But that approach
really doesn’t work well on those
classic, truly tall driven partridges
and pheasants — especially because
you run out of time for the second
shot if you wait until the first bird’s
directly overhead.
It was too late to put this renewed
learning into practice in the season
just gone, but the lesson has joined
the other in the senior Shot’s mental
library. Don’t wear double denim.
’ ’
No longer will Blue Zulu wait until the birds
are directly above him before he shoots —
taking them in front is the way ahead

F
rom whether a man ought to
wear a tie in the field to whether
all Guns should take a brace of
birds home, the sporting world is
full of great debates. In the first of my new
series on tackling the big issues, I thought
I’d bravely focus on lunching. Let me say
at the outset that I am acutely aware that
there are rational arguments marshalled
on either side of this vexed question.
Nonetheless, here goes. There are
certainly circumstances where shooting
through might — perhaps should — be the
preferred option. If a party is assembled
for the purpose of shooting and all involved
are staying at someone’s home or at an
agreeable inn before and after the main
event, then by all means let’s shoot all day.
We can make the best of the light and the
weather then repair to the house or hotel
for a slap-up feed and all the roistering and
sluicing that implies. Count me in.
But if some or all — by which I mean
mainly me — have to leave after lunch,
then shooting through becomes more
Drinking should be in moderation, but a cold glass of wine during a shoot lunch is a very fine thing
Giles Catchpole is a freelance journalist as well as a keen Shot and angler, and he has written several humorous sporting books
GEORGE GUNN
Serious
matters
Our new writer tackles the big lunch question
complicated. I am no advocate of drinking
to excess by any means, but if I am
confronted by a hearty meal after a day’s
shooting with some fine wines alongside, it
seems a shame to have to forego the latter
on account of the forthcoming drive home.
And I find that abstinence is the only
answer, not just because of the drink-
driving laws but also the risk of drowsiness
after a long day in the fresh air.
This is of scant concern to those who
have only to crawl into the back seat of the
Bentley and mutter “Home please” to the
coachman before passing out, but it’s a
serious issue for the 99.9%.
“A few mouthfuls of scrumptious things
then back on pegs in under an hour”
This is not to imply that I would be
bashing the bottles large if lunch was in the
middle of the day, but I do like a glass with
my meal and I’m confident that modest
consumption — followed by more fresh air
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 49
Giles Catchpole
and exercise — will leave me fit enough for
the journey later.
Nor let us forget that some of us might
have to go on to dinner elsewhere after
a day’s shooting. Who has not found
themselves setting out for a sumptuous
meal of an evening with the waistband still
straining from the lunch that finished less
than a couple of hours prior?
Bare minimum
Obviously, my decision would be different
if we were walking-up grouse. The last thing
I need during a day on the hill is stew and
tatties, and crumble and custard before
heading back out into the heather. For such
an expedition I tend towards a short length
of cured saucisson, perhaps a couple of
apples and a drink from the burn; not least
because on the hill you carry what you need
and I don’t need to be carrying any more
than the bare minimum. That’s me done
and I’ll make up for it at supper.
As a matter of fact, even at a winter
shoot, while I prefer a midday lunch, I’m
no great fan of huge meals. I think the
cleverest shoot lunches are those that are
light — so as not to undermine the swing in
the afternoon — and quick, because time
is of the essence in the deep heart of the
game season.
Only recently I enjoyed one of the
cleverest lunches I’ve ever had. Every
course was as small as it was delicious:
game soup, sea trout mousse, smoked
venison salad and poached pears. Each
element was scarcely bigger than a serving
spoon. A few mouthfuls of scrumptious
things and a glass of exquisite wine and
back on pegs in under an hour. Not easy to
pull off, I grant you, but just about ideal.
Do you agree with Giles? Let us know
via STletters@futurenet.com
 On your shoot
Don’t rest on your
laurels with woods
A good wood offers birds a warm place to tuck in and forms the basis
of a fine drive, so do ensure you look after them, urges Liam Bell
Every woodland needs sunlight
to encourage new growth
I
am continually surprised by the
lack of ground cover in some
of the woods I see when I am
shooting or beating away from
home. The poorer ones are usually
relatively newly planted hardwood
plantations, or mature woods made
up of only one or two species that
have shaded out the undergrowth.
Sycamore, beech and ash are
the main culprits, though with ash
CHRIS WARREN; BRIAN PHIPPS; DANNY MOORE; ALAMY
dieback spreading across the country
at an alarming rate, ash trees are
going to be less of a problem in the
future. I feel that for now we should
probably leave them alone unless they
are obviously dangerous, in the hope
that some of them will have a genetic
resistance to the disease.
In many places, all it takes to
encourage the bramble that will
50 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
warm the wood up, and the natural
regeneration of many species of
tree, is the felling of a few of the more
mature ones to let in the light. It
doesn’t have to be a standard thinning
as per most woodland management
manuals, but more the creation of a
series of small glades and rides that
will let the sun in, encourage new
growth and generally improve the
biodiversity of the wood.
Insurance
It goes without saying that the person
doing the chainsaw work should
be fully qualified and insured, and
they shouldn’t be allowed to work
alone. These are things that are easily
forgotten when you are keen to get on
with the work and there are plenty of Many shoots are driving birds out of privet
offers of help. The members of a work that was planted between the two world wars

Letting light into your woods through the
creation of rides will improve biodiversity
party who aren’t using the saw will
still have plenty to do, though, and
you probably don’t want more than
one person using a saw at any one
time anyway.
The useful timber will need
moving and stacking to one side;
the tracks, rides and open areas
will have to be cleared of brash and
someone needs to be on hand to act
as a banksman, keeping an eye on
both the felling and the faller.
The rest of the offcuts and
brash can be left where
they are, or laid across
the coppiced stools to
protect the regrowth
from browsing and
fraying by deer. Deer
are now more of
a problem than
rabbits in most parts
of the country.
Cull plan
Fencing the deer out of a wood isn’t
really practical unless you have very
deep pockets, or have managed to
tie the fencing in with a grant-aided
scheme of some sort. The only
alternative is a cull and it needs to be
ongoing and done properly. There
must be a proper assessment of
numbers and species of deer first,
a cull plan written as part of the
woodland management plan, and
it needs to be followed to the letter.
There must be no half-measures
and no letting things slip as the
regrowth gets stronger. We all like to
see a few deer but, unless we keep on
top of them, the understorey of our
woods will get thinner and thinner
and eventually disappear. And we
If you nurture woodland and keep it healthy, it will provide great drives for a very long time to come
will run the risk of forgetting what the
understorey of a wood should look
like and start to accept cold, bare,
draughty woodland floors as healthy
and normal.
In new woods where the trees
have reached 20ft or 30ft and the
rows have started to shade the herb
cover out, there is usually little in
the way of hard cover and bramble
underneath. As most of the
old farm woodland grant
schemes didn’t have an
option for the planting
of shrubs — and where
they did there was very
“The cull plan must be followed to
the letter, with no half measures”
little take-up — woods
are likely to get colder at
ground level as they mature.
And it is the cover at ground level
that keeps the wind out, the woods
warm and the pheasants at home.
Planting shrubs is the long-term
answer; many pheasant shoots
are driving birds out of box and
privet that was planted between
the world wars. That is not to say
that we are going to have to wait an
extraordinarily long time for them to
become useful holding and flushing
cover, but they do take time to grow.
We planted some around 20 years
ago that were holding birds eight to
10 years later, and I so wish we had
put more in at the time. To grow well
the shrubs need space and light and
need to be decent plants to start with.
Taking your own cuttings and trying
to grow them on can work, though
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 51
On your shoot
we had only limited success when
we tried it. Transplanting offshoots
from areas where they were already
growing worked a little better, but we
have had our best results when we
have replanted strong, well-grown
potted plants from a local nursery.
Useful cover
Planting small groups of four and five
plants together seems to work best,
as they complement one another and
soon merge into a useful bit of cover
even when planted at 8ft to 10ft apart.
They need light, as all young plants
do, so are best planted in the cleared
areas and along the edges of rides
where they will catch the light.
We tend to plant ours toward
the flushing ends of our drives for
something for the birds to tuck into,
but it does very much depend on the
drive. In a drive where the birds fly
in the right direction regardless of
where they are flushed, the shrubs
can be planted wherever suits.
Species-wise, snowberry,
privet and box seem to work well
though all three are relatively slow
growing. Laurel is quicker but isn’t to
everyone’s taste because, once it gets
going, it can take over and suppress
native woodland plants and flowers.
That said, there is nothing better for
holding birds on a cold, wet, windy
day, or for shelter when there is snow
on the ground. And it can, of course,
be cut back and managed if it ever
becomes a problem.
 Pass it on

WISDOM AND TRADITIONS GATHERED O

W OVER A LIFE
A THE COALFACE, THIS WEEK WITH DAV
AT VID WHITBY

In the past ‘pest control’ was often rather indiscriminate but keepers
of old had a lot of love for their wild enemies, says David Whitby

F
or me it was never just about
the shooting. I have always
had a passion for fieldsports,
but I have an equal passion
for wildlife and birds in particular. In
the nesting season, I would find nests
‘just because’, and yes, of course, as a
boy I had an egg collection.
Weekends on the shoot were
spent looking for pheasant and grey
partridge nests, eggs collected and
placed under a broody hen or in a
glevum incubator. If the first clutch
was collected early, gamebirds would
lay again and often a slightly later
hatch would enjoy better weather.
The gamekeeper’s gibbet contained a
host of predators, including carrion crows
ALAMY; GETTY IMAGES
My father and grandfather shot on
the Hilton Park Estate and in the eyes
of a small boy, the gamekeeper was
a hero who could do no wrong.
In the 1960s and 1970s, wild game
played an important part on every
shoot; modern farming was yet to
have its detrimental impact upon
habitat and food; it was predation and
the weather that were the variable
enemies of a successful season. Not
even the keeper had influence over
the latter, but he did most certainly
control predators.
I remember his gibbet stretching
along a barbed-wire fence almost
out of sight. It was always the first
thing I checked when we arrived
every Saturday morning: hedgehogs,
stoats, rats, weasels, magpies, rooks,
jackdaws and carrion crows.
Voracious
My grandfather and I would spend
long hours sitting for what we called
vermin and high up on that list was
the carrion crow. Intelligent beyond
belief, it had amazing eyesight and a
voracious appetite — it was a ruthless
killer and a fascinating bird. They
were nowhere near as abundant then
as they are today, so getting one was
a real achievement.
We used every tool at our disposal.
Egg traps were favoured, a clutch of
dud pheasant or white bantam eggs
placed at the base of a tree, two lines
of sticks and a buried Fenn trap.
Poison was par for the course and
snares everywhere; tunnel traps were
along every hedge and almost every
gateway. I remember the keeper
saying how effective they were when
the intended mammal had to break
cover to dash across an exposed
entrance — it would run straight

into the nearest dark tunnel.

Like so many boys of that era
I lived with an airgun, and it was put
to good use against some of the many

52 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE


millions of sparrows and starlings
that were found everywhere. It was,
however, my single-barrel Boss .410
hammergun that accompanied me
on Saturdays at the shoot. I don’t
remember what age I was given it,
but no more than six or seven. The
problem with such a gun is that
its effective range was limited and
cartridges precious.
Always keen to add to the keeper’s
gibbet, using that .410 taught me the
art of concealment, sitting still and
using a decoy. To get the prized bag of
a carrion crow, they had to be brought
to you, not you to them.
Crow chick
When I was about eight, I found a
crow’s nest and told the keeper. What
I did not tell him was that I had missed
the parent bird leaving it. He climbed
the tree and threw down a chick that
was to be my great friend for 10 years
or more, Fred the crow.
Fred not only taught me so much
about his species, but also helped to
add many of his cousins to the gibbet.
Concealed in a bush, I would put Fred
on a dead rabbit and, perhaps 15 yards
away, he would happily and quite
naturally eat. Best results were with a
tree well within range; potshots were
not only acceptable but desirable.
What Fred did teach me was just
how much food carrion crows were
capable of eating, particularly as
fledglings. One chick will eat almost
as much as a spaniel
p — eight
g or 10
pheasant chicks or a tin of dog food
will be consumed daily — it really does
go in at one end and out the other.
The old keepers would insist that
you could not house a single pair
on a wild bird shoot; feeding
three or four youngsters, the
impact upon wild game
Using a gun taught the
young David about the art of
concealment and sitting still
Corvids can cause a lot of damage, but their
control must be carried out humanely
and songbirds is enormous. The best
results were achieved when decoying
within a pair’s territory, especially
if in place before dawn. This is also
applicable when placing Larsen traps.
The main predator of the crow’s
nest is other carrion crows. They
defend a nest site vigorously, though
occasionally allow what is known as
a ‘third bird’ to be present, perhaps
“To bag a prized carrion crow, they had
to be brought to you, not you to them”
because of another set of watchful
eyes. I find it incredible that on its
website’s description of the carrion
crow the RSPB lists its food as
“carrion, insects, worms, seedss,
eggs, fruit and any scraps”. Not a
mention of song and gamebird cchicks,
amphibians, reptiles, small mam mmals
— indeed, anything that their
keen sight spots, their
devilish talons can grasp
and powerful beak can
kill. The same goes
for both the m magpie
and powerfull
rraven, which h takes
inttelligence tto a
who ole new le evel.
I havve enjoye ed
the co
ompan ny
of the
em all.
Alll the corvids
are predato
p ors of
other birds, but
thesee three by
far the worstt. We
lose a llarge nu umber
of deer park fa awns
each yearr to rav vens —
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 53
Pass it on
which peck out their eyes — along with
several birthing ewes and their lambs
to a similar fate.
For several years I worked in
County Kerry shooting sika deer,
goats in County Clare and red
squirrels (sadly) wherever I was
asked. The forested mountains of
Kerry can be a bleak place for corvids
in the winter; regular visits to the
same range would soon have ravens
and hooded crows eagerly waiting
for a gralloch. After a while if I found
the ravens in a tree and looked closely
beneath their chosen perch, I would
find the deer — an unusual stalking
accessory, but a very effective one.
Just about all our corvids have
exploded in numbers since the 1960s;
most species have not only adapted
but positively benefited from our
throw-away society.
Important lessons
Over the years I have enjoyed the
company of many wild animals; they
have enhanced my life and that of my
family and friends. They have taught
me so much and I steadfastly believe
that the two most important lessons
I take from the creatures I have kept
and been close to are as follows.
Despite my closeness to
individuals, I have never doubted
that, where some species are
concerned, we have a duty to control
their numbers. This is particularly
so when our way of life is causing a
population increase that is damaging
to other species under threat.
Secondly, when we do control their
numbers, it must be carried out as
humanely as possible.
Having experienced the sense
of fun, affection and dependency
that these creatures show, we must
attempt a swift and humane despatch
if we take on the responsibility of
population control. You may love the
individual, but it is the dynamics of
the species that is important. If we
carry out control with feelings for
the individual at heart, we will have
learned a valuable lesson.
David Whitby was headkeeper at
Leconfield and once had a pet badger.
Follow him on Instagram at Davidwhitby6
 Blowing for home
It will come to us all
There will be a point when we have to admit that it’s time to put our
guns away for the last time but it’s a bitter pill, says Mark Lorne
L
ike professional sportsmen,
there comes a time when
we pass our physical
prime. While footballers
or cricketers can remain involved
through coaching or management,
it might not be so easy for a rough
shooter, wildfowler or pigeon decoyer
to maintain their interest as old age
approaches. It is heartbreaking to see
a personal hero having to accept that
they have reached the end of their
sporting road.
One keen Shot of my acquaintance
made the sudden decision to surrender
his guns in his mid-seventies. He had
tripped while on a walked-up day and
this small incident suddenly put an
element of doubt in his mind about his
safety with a gun when in company.
However, I think his decision was
eased by the fact that he had received a
Certificate of Merit while competing in
the Retriever Championship, and he
is still training and working his dogs
on local shoots at 90 years old. Dog
men are a different breed who, like
farmers, seem to carry on forever.
My grandfather had once been
lauded as one of the best game Shots
SIMON TRINDER
in the district. Though a tidy shooter
with a .22 rifle, it was with a shotgun
that he really shone. A life of hard
54 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
manual work on the land took its
toll and by his late sixties he’d had
both hips replaced.
He had remained remarkably
positive during the long wait for the
second surgery and the thought of
being able to get back into the field
with his old 12-bore again was a
great incentive. I had just left school
when he joined me for a wander
around his rough shoot and he gave
me instructions on how to hunt-up
a mustard strip. To save him from
“He enjoyed wiping the eye of younger
men as much as making a successful shot”
walking too far, Grandad took up a
position at the top of the cover while
I walked it in from the far end with the
authority to take any pheasants that
curled back.
As it happened, only one pheasant,
a magnificently plumed ring-neck
cock, jumped out of the mustard that
sunny afternoon, barely a yard ahead
of my dog’s questing nose. Usually
I would have snapped the gun to
my shoulder and tried my luck, but
these were no normal circumstances.
So I let the pheasant fly on, his tail
swirling as he lifted high into the blue
October sky and made a beeline for
my grandfather while I waited with
bated breath.
Though ambidextrous and capable
of shooting off either shoulder in
his youth, he now favoured his left
shoulder after an operation on a
herniated disc in his neck. I didn’t
realise it at the time but, upon seeing
grandfather, the cock pheasant
had veered slightly to one side and,
unfortunately for the old boy, it was
to his left. Despite the replacement
hips, old age had robbed him of his
sure-footed nimbleness and by the
time he had altered his footing that
well-presented bird was long gone.
To my grandfather this was the
ultimate humiliation and he never
again shot socially. He did have one
final blaze of glory — shooting a flying
greylag with his knockabout Baikal
single-barrel from the seat of ‘Percy’,
his cab-less Fordson E1A Major
tractor. But retiring from his beloved
sport was a bitter pill to swallow.
My grandfather’s pal, AJ,
managed to keep shooting into his
late seventies, though by this time
osteoarthritis was restricting his
mobility. He wouldn’t admit defeat
and never publicly acknowledged
that he was getting past it. On the
occasions that luck had him correctly
positioned, he could still pull off some
astounding shots with his Purdey
bar-in-wood hammergun. I think he
enjoyed wiping the eye of younger
men as much as the exhilaration of
making a successful shot.
So came the January afternoon
when he picked himself a peg on
the meadow behind a tall hedge
while my friend, Allan, stood on the
ploughed field 40 yards to his right.
My role was to dog-out the hedgerow
leading to the meadow and I was
The bird had veered to one side and, sadly
for Mark’s grandfather, it was to the left
 Blowing for home

AJ was caught flat-footed and he didn’t even get the Purdey’s

butt remotely near his shoulder as the pheasant sailed away

pleased when my spaniel flushed
a cock bird that flew forward. It
climbed rapidly and I yelled “Over!”
twice to let my friends know the bird
was heading their way.
Flat-footed
Etiquette and sheer good manners
dictated that Allan allowed his host
the chance to shoot the approaching
bird but, when the cock suddenly
loomed into view over the hedge, AJ
was caught flat-footed and he didn’t
get the Purdey’s butt even remotely
near his shoulder. By the time Allan
realised AJ wasn’t going to shoot, the
chance had evaporated and I reached
the meadow to find AJ fuming about
the wasted opportunity.
“Did that owd bud lift near you,
bor?” were the first words he said
to me when we met up. When I said
“Yes” AJ looked flummoxed and told
me to hang on while he fiddled with
his hearing aid. “I said, did that owd
cock lift near you?”
“Yes it did,” I replied. “I hollered
twice to let you know it was coming.”
The elder statesman sneered,
obviously upset at the loss of a plump
bird. “You know I turn my hearing aid
orf when I’m shootin’ so you know I
wouldn’t hev heard you holler; I didn’t
know he was a-comin’ until that owd
bud topped the hedge and then I was
a-facing the wrong way. One of you
two should hev thumped him when
you had the chance; I thought I’d
taught you better than that.”
Scolding over, we carried on,
but I could tell that AJ’s heart wasn’t
really in it on the remaining two
drives. Allan put a brace of cock birds
in the bag, but when I suggested we
finish the afternoon roost-shooting
pigeons AJ declined. Instead, he asked
me to drop him at his house on the
way to the woodland.
As he wearily clambered out
of my jalopy — AJ’s less-than-flattering
name for my van — the old gent made
a sudden unexpected declaration.
“Well, thass my lot, the job hev got on
top of me. I’ll sell the Purdey because
I’m too old to be out shootin’ in
company,” he said.
I had a lump in my throat after
this sad announcement, but I had
to smile at his mischievous parting
shot. “I’ll keep my old BSA single-
barrel, mind. I might be near 80
but I reckon I can still knock down
a pigeon or two what’s coming to
roost the trees in my spinney.”
And so he did, continuing to
safely enjoy roost shooting while
predictably always giving the
occasional cock pheasant that might
venture his way precedence, on
his own terms, for nigh on another
decade, before finally relinquishing
his shotgun certificate.

SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 55


Keeper of the month
Love or hate social media, Max Hickling is proof
that it can be a useful tool, says Will Pocklington
A
sk a dozen gamekeepers what
they think of social media and
I imagine half would denounce
it as the devil and the
remainder would point to its benefits when
used correctly. Max Hickling falls firmly into
the latter camp. For a while, I’ve wanted
to interview a gamekeeper who is active
on social media and has built a reasonable
following; to discuss their motives, the
approach they take, the feedback they
receive and glean their views on the topic
as a whole.
More than 14,000 people follow Max’s
Instagram page (@gamekeeper_max).
He seemed like a suitable person to get in
touch with. But at first he was unsure.
“I don’t want to come across as blowing
my own trumpet,” he said. Speaking to
him at greater length, it became clear that
he has the same reservations about his
presence online.
“I created an Instagram account when
I went to college,” he says. “Most of my
mates didn’t have a clue what keepering
was, nor why I was moving away to study
something they hadn’t heard of. It was
about staying in touch with them, and giving
them an insight into what I was up to.”
The college was Newton Rigg in Penrith,
where Max spent two years studying game
and wildlife management. Fast forward
five years and he’s heading towards his
fourth season on a grouse moor in the
Peak District, where he has worked his
way up to the position of beatkeeper.
If you have a gamekeeper you would like to nominate for Keeper of the Month please send details to shootingtimes@futurenet.com
Celebrating the custodians of our countryside
Max Hickling
is the best kind
of ‘influencer’
Growing up, Max was,
by his own admission, “a
proper townie”. At the age
of 12, he started helping his
uncle on a small DIY shoot in
the Ribble Valley in Lancashire.
“That’s where it started for me,” he
said. “From then on, I read every book
and watched every video possible about
shooting. I spoke to everyone I could.”
Today Max tends to write posts on his
Instagram account that he believes will be
of interest to both people who shoot and
people who have no idea what a grouse
even is. As more people started engaging
“If I can teach one person a little more
about gamekeeping, that’s me happy”
with his posts, he saw the value in including
detailed captions alongside images.
Far from putting up countless photos
of feed rides covered with birds or dead
animals and no context, Max prefers to
post about the hows and whys of his day-
to-day; the effects of controlled heather
burning, the importance of strongyle
worm counts and the need for predator
control, for example.
It’s an on-the-ground account of what
actually happens, from the good — think
hatching curlews, rare bird of prey sightings
and dressing game — to the bad, such as
the devastation caused by reckless summer
barbecues and littering on the moors.
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 57
“It is a good thing when used right.
It’s a great tool to educate people,” he said
when I pushed him for his opinion on social
media as a whole. “Just look at the great
work of the regional moorland groups,”
he pointed out. “But then it only takes one
person posting something stupid to undo
what 100 good posts have done.
“We get a lot of members of the public
using the moor where I work [in 10 days last
spring, he moved 77 illegal campers from
just one piece of ground on his beat].
We’re also in one of the worst parts of the
country for anti-shooting saboteurs and
monitors; they hammer us. But if I can
teach just one person a little more about
gamekeeping and what we’re trying to
achieve, that’s me happy.
“I’ve had numerous encounters with
people on the Fell. Many question what
I’m doing and why. Most of the time, they
appreciate somebody taking the time to
explain. They’ve no axe to grind.
“I’ve seen how social media provides
similar opportunities to engage with non-
shooters, in a positive way. That can only
be a good thing.”
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Gunroom
Having fallen in love with Bowie knives in the 1980s, it is not exactly
hardship to be unable to sell a Bowie-style Arnachellum from India
T
he Bowie (pronounced boo-ee)
knife is an American icon.
Although its true origins have
been obscured by myth and
legend, it became associated with the
hellraising frontiersman and soldier James
Bowie (circa 1796-1836). Bowie used a
large knife to great effect in the celebrated
Vidalia Sandbar Fight of 1827,which left
two men dead and two more badly injured.
Thereafter, Bowie always carried a large
sheath knife, which became his trademark.
The exact form of a Bowie knife blade
has always been disputed, but the term
‘Bowie knife’ is generally understood to
refer to a large, single-edged knife with
a broad blade and a false edge along its
top. It also has a cross-guard to protect
the user’s fingers.
Whether Bowie ever designed his
eponymous knife is debatable. Some
sources suggest it was his brother Rezin.
But its designer is immaterial because,
within a few months of the Sandbar Fight,
many men in America routinely wore
large knives.
This popularity couldn’t be properly
exploited by domestic cutlery firms because
America was not sufficiently industrialised.
Consequently, the British cutlery trade
began supplying huge volumes of knives.
It is safe to say that more Bowie knives
were made in Sheffield than in the US.
Unlike America or the
Mediterranean, Britain did
not have a culture of knife
CHRIS LARGE OF WILSON 55 AUCTIONEERS
fighting. That notwithstanding, many
recognised that the Bowie knife was handy
as a large hunting or utility knife.
Its use spread throughout the Empire,
particularly in India. While many goods were
imported, some Indian enterprises also
sought to supply the vast market that the
Raj offered.
“Arnachellum’s knives are as good
as anything that came out of Sheffield”
India had a long history of excellence
in metalwork and it was inevitable that its
cutlers should start to produce knives in
an Anglo-American style. It made sense to
do this economically as labour was much
cheaper and transport costs did not involve
a sea voyage of several months.
One firm that started to make these
knives was Arnachellum of Salem in Tamil
Nadu. Judging from surviving examples,
A distinctive Bowie-style hunting
knife by Arnachellum of Salem
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 61
Bill Harriman
Arnachellum must have made many Bowie-
style knives. I have found no evidence to
point to them being described as such; in all
probability they would have been marketed
as hunting knives.
The firm was sufficiently well
established by 1851 to take space at the
Great Exhibition at the Crystal Palace.
Arnachellum’s knives are as good as
anything that ever came out of Sheffield
and, while they appear European, they have
distinctive features. Many have staghorn
hilts, invariably topped with iron pommels.
Their sheaths are covered with fine brown
leather, embossed with a diamond pattern.
The most distinctive feature is the
small steel catch that holds the blade in the
sheath to prevent loss. As the user draws
the knife, his thumb pushes the catch to
release the blade.
Quality
Writing in The Art Journal in 1875,
Alexander Hunter said, “For the last 30
years Arnachellum, of Salem, has perhaps
acquired the greatest and the most
deserved reputation for the fine quality,
as well as the finish, of his knives, hunting-
spears, daggers and table-cutlery. One
point in which these have surpassed almost
all similar steel-manufacturers in Europe,
has been their tough hardness, without
being brittle; the hunting-knives and
spear-heads being found to resist blows
on granite without being chipped.
“Fine Indian tools and cutlery are not
liable to rust, and if the surface does
oxidise, it is to such a trifling depth that
it can be easily removed by friction.”
I have been lucky enough to own
an Arnachellum hunting knife for many
years after falling in love with it in the
1980s. It’s a deluxe model with ivory grips,
which means I can never sell it because the
ivory component is more than 10% of the
whole item. It’s a truly international knife
with a fusion of Oriental, New and Old
World influences.

C EL
Young, wild and free
While it may be possible to produce red grouse artificially, isn’t the
wildness of this quarry the main draw for sportsmen, asks David Imrie
“It is true that grouse in captivity thrive better if their pens are shifted on to fresh heather often”
S
everal years ago, I had a talk
with a keen young keeper
who was on an estate where
partridges were hand-reared.
Being moorland bred, he assured me
that if ever he took a job on his native
heath, he would use the experience
that he had gained among partridges
to produce grouse artificially.
He pointed out that there are
certain similarities between the two
species. For instance, they both have
to be subjected to a pairing technique
before breeding can commence. He
assumed that if this delicate operation
could be tackled with skill, an
adequate supply of eggs could be got in
pens. After that important preliminary
GETTY IMAGES; ALAMY
had been achieved, the actual rearing
could be tackled with confidence.
Since then, I have had some
conversation with an older moorland
62 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
E B R ATING OUR BEST WRITE
RS
keeper, who has hand-reared grouse
on a small scale using eggs from wild
birds and hatched under foster-
mothers. He said the chicks flourished
at first but, despite the closest
attention, they began to dwindle, until
he was left with three birds.
They survived to reach maturity,
then died like the others. It is probable
that they might have lived indefinitely
if they had been given their liberty at
the age of, say, 10 or 12 weeks, but the
keeper wanted them for breeding stock
and was therefore left with nothing.
I did not get a detailed account
of the food given to those grouse
chicks during the first week or two;
nevertheless, I imagine that hard-
boiled egg formed a large part of
their diet, perhaps augmented by
ants’ eggs. At an early age, however,
they were pecking avidly at lettuce
and they had fresh heather daily. In
addition, they had a supply of clean
water — an absolute necessity — and
suitable quartz grit. It is not generally
known by laymen that grouse need
grit practically from the beginning.
When we consider the care that
was bestowed on that penned brood,
we wonder why they should fade
away so disappointingly. But this is a
reminder to us that we have not yet
mastered the secret of hand-rearing
grouse, no matter how clever we may
be with other gamebirds.
Almost certainly the earliest
fatalities were caused by coccidiosis,
which is the scourge of Lagopus
scoticus at that age, when conditions
are favourable for it. And it is virulent
among wild-bred birds, though they
do have the advantage of mobility not
enjoyed by their tame brethren.
Barndoor hens
This moorland keeper whom I have
mentioned was lucky insofar as he
was able to hatch the eggs under
barndoor hens. Other grouse-rearers
have found that they were able to
get worthwhile results only if they
allowed the mother grouse to sit on
their own eggs and to ensure this,
they had to enclose the pairs in quite
big pens. Even so, they had to keep a
strict eye on the cocks because they
had an inclination to interfere with
their mates at a critical time. And
they had to look out for vermin.

But despite the most stringent
attention to the construction and
siting of the pens, they could never
guarantee to protect the grouse
from disastrous frights, because the
rearing had to be undertaken among
the heather, which is generally some
distance from the keeper’s house.
That being so, there was always a
danger that inquisitive foxes, dogs,
cats and certain winged predators
might scare the sitting birds from
their nests and either ruin the lot or
seriously reduce the ultimate broods.
Fresh heather
It is true that grouse in captivity thrive
better if their pens are shifted on to
fresh heather often, but this cannot
be done, of course, if the pens contain
nests. Therefore the birds must be
provided daily with heather from
outside, so that food is at least assured
if cleanliness has perforce to be
temporarily neglected.
The supply of cut calluna may be
simply thrown down inside the pens,
“We’ve not yet mastered the secret of hand-
rearing grouse, unlike other gamebirds”
but it will be taken more readily when
it is hung head downwards within easy
reach of the birds. Former rearers have
persuaded grouse to peck up grain
such as dari seed and chicken rice, but
heather remains the staple food.
In passing, I must point out that if
grouse could be increasingly reared in
captivity to accept grain, the present
shadow of strongylosis might be lifted
from our moors; for, assuming that this
virulent disease is primarily the result
of malnutrition, the keeper could
hand-feed his birds when the heather
appeared to be lacking in the elements
necessary to sustain health. But we
must admit that this ideal state is not
likely to be achieved in the near future.
It is one thing to hand-rear an odd
brood of grouse and quite another
to hand-rear a number sufficient to
stock a moor. The work of attending
to, say, 100 pens on heather would be
tremendous, but it is doubtful whether
in normal circumstances you would
release enough well-grown grouse to
justify the effort and the expense. This
business of rearing au naturel in pens
is fraught with unsuspected anxieties,
and any keeper who attempts it on a
large scale is likely to discover that the
“If we could hand-rear them, and thereby
master strongylosis, would the Glorious
Twelfth have the same allure?”
greatest care and industry may not
suffice to stave off catastrophe.
From 1906 to 1910, the hand-
rearing of grouse on a comparatively
small scale was practised with some
success by the Committee of Inquiry
on Grouse Disease. An account of
this experiment is given at the end
of its book The Grouse in Health and
in Disease, and it ought to serve as a
caution to moor owners and keepers.
There were losses from all sorts
of causes. Eggs were spoiled by
thundery downpours; chicks died
from disease or exposure; foster-
mothers killed their broods when
this method was tried, and when hen
grouse did the brooding, they were
harried by the cocks. It does appear,
however, that within their limitations,
hen grouse made the best mothers,
though a suggestion is offered that
bantams might be worth a trial.
But it is clear that ordinary
barndoor fowls were a perpetual
source of worry. The scientists who
“It does appear that, within their limitations,
hen grouse do make the best mothers”
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 63
Vintage Times
conducted that inquiry discovered
a great deal about the red grouse.
It was the periodical disastrous
losses among the golden birds of the
Highlands that brought the grouse
committee into being. Its exhaustive
researches from 1904 until 1911
pinned the blame firmly on the
strongyle worm.
Previously, moor owners and
keepers held all sorts of theories to
account for their troubles — excessive
wet, excessive drought, severe frost
and overcrowding. And though they
probably identified the origin of an
epidemic correctly in many instances,
it needed the skill of scientists to prove
that the killer was a parasite of the
intestines that managed to multiply
far beyond normal limits.
Capricious fate
The only unsatisfactory part of this
inquiry was its inability to suggest
a cure for strongylosis, or ‘grouse
disease’ as it was familiarly known.
Nearly half a century has elapsed since
the report was published, but Lagopus
scoticus is still at the mercy of capricious
fate. A second investigation into the life
history of grouse is being conducted on
Glen Esk moors under the sponsorship,
I believe, of the Nature Conservancy.
No doubt, a lot of excellent work
has been done, but will it ultimately
benefit the grouse (and the lairds)
in a material fashion? I have my
doubts. Grouse are highly specialised
creatures and are really wild. Therein
lies the greater part of their charm
for the sportsman. So if we could
hand-rear them, and thereby master
strongylosis, would the Glorious
Twelfth have the same allure?
This article was first published in the
17 March 1961 issue of Shooting Times.
64 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
 Game Cookery
Venison

It may have taken a revolution to put venison into local supermarket

chillers, but its current popularity is heartening, says Rose Prince

Y
ou would never have seen
a venison sausage in a
supermarket 20 years ago.
Game was a luxury. While
grouse will always be expensive, a deer
yields lots of cheap cuts. It took a revolution
to put venison into supermarket chillers.
My theory is that the BSE/vCJD —
known as mad cow disease with a variant
that passed into humans — scandal started
it. The disease in cattle was a tragedy and
expensive to taxpayers, but it did highlight
the problems in the meat industry. Meat
eaters who shunned intensively farmed
meat began seeking out prime cuts with
provenance in their local butcher shops,
so developed more diverse tastes.
You probably do not need this history
lesson, but for me it is interesting how
some producers responded. You can
buy British-made venison sausages, a
cheap source of meat, at £3 for 300g (six
sausages) in Morrisons. They are made
by Highland Game, a company started in
“The UK was exporting an astonishing
95% of wild deer meat in those days”
1997 by the Danish entrepreneur Christian
Nissen. At the time Nissen simply wanted
to popularise wild venison — the UK was
exporting an astonishing 95% of deer meat
in those days. He could not have foreseen
the explosion of interest in alternative
meats as a result of the later food scandals,
but he was certainly on to something.
Irrespective of the need for beef
alternatives in those years, venison
has always had the distinction of being
a healthy, natural food. The popularity
of venison sausages, their present status
as a supermarket standard, is a positive
outcome. This recipe is based on one given
to me by my aunt, which I used to make
with garlicky pork sausages. The warm
potato salad is especially comforting in the
still-chilly months.

Ingredients
VENISON SAUSAGES WITH WARM POTATO
PREP TIME 20 MINUTES SALAD AND PICKLED CARROT
COOK TIME 30 MINUTES
750G SALAD POTATOES, THE METHOD Serves 4
CHARLOTTE, JERSEY ROYAL
OR OTHER SMALL VARIETY
8 VENISON SAUSAGES 1 For the pickle, slice the carrot into
thin rounds with a mandolin. Put
them in a small saucepan with the
to let the mixture boil or it will become
greasy and separated. Set aside in a
warm place.
1 TBSP DIJON MUSTARD shallot, vinegar, sugar and spices. Place
1 TBSP WHITE WINE OR CIDER
VINEGAR
over a low heat and bring slowly to the
boil. Simmer fast for about 5 minutes
or until the liquid becomes syrupy.
4 Keep an eye on the potatoes.
Ideally, they should be waxy in the
centre, so check them after 8 minutes
PINCH OF SEA SALT Remove from the heat and set aside. by pricking with a small knife. There
PINCH OF GROUND BLACK You can make the pick me resistance in the
PEPPER advance if you wish. of the potato. Drain,
ach one in half and

2
100G MELTED BUTTER Put the potatoes ess with the mustard
75MLEXTRAVIRGINOLIVEOIL on to boil with a auce. Add the sliced
little salt. Preheat the spring onion.
2 SPRING ONIONS, GREEN PART
oven to 180°C. Brush

ONLY, SLICED THINLY
the venison sausages
FORTHEPICKLES: with oil, put them
1 MEDIUM-SIZED CARROT in a roasting pan
and bake for about
1 SHALLOT, SLICED 20-30 minutes until
150ML RICE WINE VINEGAR well browned.
5
Cut the sausages
in half, then mix
in with the warm
otato salad. Use a
ted spoon to remove
Venison sausage are now pickled carrot slices
rom the vinegar syrup

3
a supermarket standard
75GLIGHTBROWNSUGAR Meanwhile, make the and scatter over the
2GREENCARDAMOM PODS warm dressing. Beat the surface. Serve while still warm. A salad
mustard with the vinegar, salt and made with blanched green kale, sliced
1 STAR ANISE pepper in a small pan. Add the butter apple and toasted walnuts goes well
and oil, then heat. It is important not with this dish.
ANDREW SYDENHAM

SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 65

 SPORTING ANSWERS
The experts Luring a fox out to feed is the best
way to pick it off safely, making
THE ULTIMATE SHOOTING QUIZ TEAM sure you have a good backstop
BILL HARRIMAN
BASC’s head of firearms and
global authority on guns
MAT MANNING
Airgunner and journalist from
the West Country
DIGGORY HADOKE
Vintage gun expert, firearms
dealer, author and journalist
BRUCE POTTS
Shooting Times rifle reviewer
and stalker
MIKE SWAN
Conservation expert and head
of education for the GWCT
DAVID TOMLINSON
Highly regarded writer
and ornithologist
LIAM BELL
Shropshire gamekeeper, keen
wildfowlerandamateurnaturalist

How to catch a crafty fox

GRAHAM DOWNING
Shooting consultant and
sporting author
TONY BUCKWELL
Veterinary surgeon with a
special interest in gundogs
TOM PAYNE
Professional shooting instructor
and avid pigeon shooter
ELLENA SWIFT
Award-winning gundog trainer
and canine behaviour specialist
TIMMADDAMS
Former head chef at River
CottageandrunsashootinDevon
SIMON WHITEHEAD
Author, professional ferreter
and rabbit controller
MAT MANNING; DANIEL GOULD; CALLUM MCINERNEY-RILEY; CRAIG MCCANN; ALAMY
FOXING
I have a fox that regularly
appears in roughly the same
area — but being close to farm
cottages it’s not somewhere I can
safely shoot with a centrefire. Noise
is also an issue, as the tenants have
a young baby. If I can get it close
enough, I could probably shoot it
with a .22 rimfire. Do you have any
advice on doing this humanely?
The .22 LR is the perfect tool
for these sorts of jobs as long
as shot placement is good and ranges
are kept short. As you are so close
to some other properties, I’d advise
using a number of sandbags to create
a safe backstop and ideally try to shoot
from a downward angle, such as
an upstairs window of one of the
properties. If this isn’t an option,
a high seat would also work.
Patience is key but with regular
baiting in front of the sandbags your
fox will soon find it and feed there. Be
sure to put bait out just after dark so it
doesn’t get eaten by birds. If you have
a trail cam, it will be useful to ascertain
the time the fox is likely to visit so you
can better time your ambush. MR

IAIN WATSON GUN CASE OF THE WEEK

Keen stalker and senior CIC
international trophy judge
STENSBY
CHRIS DALTON
Stensby was a gunmaking name
Professional stalker and regular
familiar to sportsmen in Manchester
presenter on The Shooting Show
from 1810 until 1982. The name is now
MARK RIPLEY
owned by the Cheshire Gun Room. This
Well-known fox controller and simple leather label with gold lettering is
long-range shooting expert styled ‘T Stensby & Co’ — the ‘T’ stands
for Thomas, who took the reins in 1883.
Contact the team The address, 6 Withy Grove, places from the lid of a case containing a lower
Email: ollie.harvey@futurenet.com it between 1905 and 1955. It comes medium-grade boxlock. DH
Post: Shooting Times, Future, 121-141
Westbourne Terrace, London W2 6JR

66 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE


Attaching an infrared illuminator
AIRGUNNING
I want to buy an external
illuminator to boost the image
quality of the infrared sight I use
when I go out ratting after dark
with my airgun. How should
I attach it to my set-up?
Mounts for attaching infrared
illuminators either to a gun or
sight usually need to be purchased
separately and it is likely that the shop
you buy your lamp from will also sell
them. The most important thing is to
make sure that they have the correct
fixture to attach to your gun or sight.
Lots of night-vision sights have integral
Picatinny rails, as do a lot of airguns,
or you may need to buy and fit an
additional attachment.
Ensure that the mount you choose is
angle-adjustable, both horizontally and
vertically, as it will enable you to get the
illuminator’s beam exactly aligned with
your sighting device. MM
How to stay civil over spent birdshot
BOUNDARIES
Our shoot’s boundary is next
to a rural property that has
several barns with corrugated iron
roofs. Sometimes shot falls on these
roofs, which has caused the owner
to become very abusive to the point
of saying that he will report us to
the police if it happens again. How
do we stand legally if he does this?
Spent birdshot falling under
the influence of gravity is not
If spent shot is likely to land on or near your
neighbour’s property, a little courtesy will
go a long way to smoothing things over
An external illuminator
is an effective way to
extend the runtime and
range of an infrared
night-vision unit
dangerous. Years ago, I did an
experiment which proved that a No
6 shot falling under the influence of
gravity had less kinetic energy than
a large hailstone.
In fact, the only way that people
know there is spent shot falling on them
at all is when it rattles on a hard surface
or rustles through dead leaves on a tree.
Legally speaking, allowing spent shot to
fall on someone else’s property is at best
a constructive trespass. As any trespass
is a civil matter, it is not something for
the police to become involved with.
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 67
Expert tips and advice
That said, you don’t want the police
being called whenever your neighbour
complains about falling shot because
such involvement seldom leads to a
happy ending.
Look at the drives and try to arrange
them so that spent shot does not fall on
this person’s property. That is simply
being a good neighbour. A phone
call or visit would be a good idea too.
That would give you an opportunity
to establish diplomatic relations
and assure your neighbour he is in
no danger. It would be courteous to
tell him when you are shooting and
ascertain if he has anything sensitive
on his land such as a valuable pregnant
broodmare that might be frightened
into abortion by shot rattling on her
stable roof.
Conduct a charm offensive and
build some bridges. Don’t let your
neighbour think that shooting people
are a bunch of entitled yahoos who
don’t give a damn for anyone else’s
quiet enjoyment of their property.
A present of dressed game would serve
your cause well too — but only after you
have ascertained there are no vegan
cookery books on your neighbour’s
kitchen bookshelves. BH
 SPORTING ANSWERS
Sad loss of
francolins
NATIVESPECIES

I live in Cyprus, where the

call of the black francolin
is a familiar sound in the spring,
though the birds themselves are
shy and difficult to see. I believe
these attractive gamebirds were
once to be found in Greece: can
they still be found there?

Historically, black francolins EIC appears to be more common in retriever types, but any breed can suffer from hypoglycaemia
bred in eastern Spain and the

EIC or low blood sugar?

Balearics, Sicily, Sardinia and parts
of mainland Italy, along with much
of mainland Greece and some of the
Greek islands. They had become
extinct in Spain by 1840, and
probably died out in Italy at about the
same time. They had certainly been
lost from Greece by the 19th century.
Today a small wild population
survives in southern Turkey, as well
as Georgia and Cyprus.
Attempts have been made to
re-establish these francolins in Italy
(Tuscany), but only with short-term
success. There are introduced
populations in Hawaii, Guam and
the southern US, which suggests that
a serious reintroduction attempt to
parts of the bird’s former range could
be successful, especially where
suitable habitat still exists. DT
Black francolins were
lost from Greece by the
19th century
VETERINARYCARE
Are exercised-induced collapse
and hypoglycaemia one and
the same condition? If not, can you
explain the difference, please?
These are indeed separate
conditions. Exercise-induced
collapse (EIC) is a hereditary disease
seen particularly in retriever breeds
that renders affected dogs unsuitable
as working gundogs. Signs of EIC are,
however, similar to those of the more
common physiological condition
functional hypoglycaemia, where the
dog works to the point of using up its
immediately available energy reserves.
Dogs affected by EIC collapse five to
20 minutes after the onset of strenuous
exercise. You should be concerned if a
young retriever starts panting heavily,
looks wobbly and spaced out or simply
appears weak during a strenuous
training session or soon after being
worked during its first season. EIC is
characterised by profound weakness
in the hindquarters; some dogs
progress and literally fall over.
Hypoglycaemia refers to an
abnormal decrease of glucose
concentration in the blood or, more
simply, low blood sugar levels.
Hypoglycaemia occurs when excessive
glucose consumption — while the dog is
being worked, for instance — depletes
its reserves of glucose in the body.
Functional hypoglycaemia can
occur in any dog, though some
individuals seem more susceptible
than others. Hypoglycaemia can
also be a result of endocrine or liver
disorders, lack of glucose due to fasting,
or toxicity. Signs of hypoglycaemia
will include extreme lethargy, muscle
twitches, trembling, incoordination,
unusual behaviour and ultimately
total unconsciousness.
Now that there is a DNA test
available, EIC has been identified in
many retrievers, but it is an autosomal
recessive gene, meaning both sets
of parents have to carry the disease
to produce a proportion of affected
puppies. Only dogs with the EIC gene
from both parents will be clinically
affected; those that are genetically clear,
or carry only one copy of the gene, will
be clinically unaffected. Carriers won’t
show signs but can pass on the defect to
their offspring if bred to another carrier
or an affected dog. TB

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Top years for Finding homes for kits
medal heads
HEADMEASURING
Is it fair to say that some
years produce more very
large medal-class heads than do
others? Last year in my local area,
heads of any size and shape seem
to have been in short supply, even
from roebucks that were judged
as mature and whose average age
was certainly above three years.
Records of quality roebuck
heads in the UK date back
to the 1940s and in some cases well
before that. Over that time, the roe
population has expanded and for
many it has become the quarry
of choice to hunt. One fact that
emerges when you look at the
records is that, over the period,
more and more large heads have
been taken. While that may be
attributed to increased stalking
effort and a larger population, it also
is related to the diet of the animals
and their access to nutrition.
Some years do seem to produce
more exceptional specimens than
others; recently the standout one
was 2006, when the overall UK
record was broken twice. In 2021,
the portents seemed good with one
200-point-plus head coming from
Scotland and some exceptional
heads from England. Perhaps in
your area you were unlucky or the
animals you were targeting were not
as mature as you thought? IW
Medal-winning roebucks do seem to be on the
increase and good nutrition is playing a part
FERRETING
My daughter has been
fascinated with my ferrets,
handles them all of the time and,
apart working with them, has
completely taken over their lives.
She rather fancies breeding from
one of the jills. Are ferrets difficult
to sell on, as we would only want
to keep a couple?
During the summer, when
there is an abundance of ferret
kits, selling them and finding good
responsible homes for them is
rarely a problem because they have
increasingly become a popular pet.
Ferret kits are charming, but due to
owner ignorance many end up in rescue
centres by the time they reach maturity
Using humane restraints
GAMEKEEPING
I read about humane cable
restraints and the new break-
away snares in Shooting Times a
few weeks ago (Spring into action
on predator control, 16 February).
Where can I buy them? Our local
feed merchant doesn’t sell them,
nor does my gunshop.
Humane cable restraints (HCRs)
are quite rightly replacing the
old-type snares and I applaud you for
wanting to change. The frustrating
SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 69
Expert tips and advice
However, a lot of would-be owners
require a little education.
Sadly, many first-time ferret owners
get a kit and by the time it reaches
maturity it is in the care of the local
rescue centre. Many get two males and
discover they fight when they come into
season, or do not know how to stop the
young ferrets nipping, so when they are
adults and the jaws are fully developed,
they bite pretty hard.
Though you only want a couple,
you will also have to resist your
daughter’s plea to keep more than
you want. A litter of ferrets takes
some feeding and cleaning up after,
so I would recommend reading up on
breeding a litter before deciding. SW
thing is that, until they are more
commonly used and suppliers such as
your feed merchant and gunshop have
moved their old stock on, you are going
to have to buy from a specialist supplier.
The HCRs are a little more expensive,
and they do need setting differently.
But they are fully repairable and all
parts are easily replaced.
I recommend Perdix Wildlife Supplies
(perdixwildlifesupplies.com), which
specialises in the development and
sale of modern traps. There are other
suppliers out there and, with time, HRCs
will become more readily available. LB
 SPORTING ANSWERS
Can I shoot with a
semi-automatic?
PIGEONSHOOTING
I have always used
a semi-automatic
to shoot pigeons and
have understood that
this is perfectly legal.
However, on looking
online at the Wildlife
and Countryside Act,
it says quite clearly
that to use any
automatic or semi-
automatic firearm
to shoot wild birds
is prohibited. Is this
something new? Can
you please explain.
Section 5 of the
Wildlife and
It is legal to use a semi-automatic firearm to shoot pigeons so
long as the gun’s magazine cannot hold more than two rounds
TO CATCH A FISH
North Country Spiders
have been catching
trout for well over
200 years and more
recently grayling.
Sometimes called soft
hackle flies, they were
designed for fishing
the fast-flowing rivers
of northern England
for trout but wouldn’t
be out of place on
chalkstreams, lakes
or even reservoirs.
70 • SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE
Countryside Act 1981,
which lists prohibited
methods of killing or
taking wild birds, must
be read in conjunction
with Section 27
(Interpretation), which
states that “automatic
weapon” and “semi-
automatic weapon” do
not include any firearm
with a magazine that is
capable of holding more
than two rounds.
Therefore, provided
your semi-automatic is
three-shot capacity — two
rounds in the magazine
and one in the chamber
— it is legal to shoot wild
birds with it. GD
Olive Spider
As trout flies go, spider
fly patterns are some of
the most versatile. Fish
on a floating line as a
point fly or singly when
fish are feeding on a
hatch of large dark
olives just below
the surface. AS
Expert tips and advice
Crossword / Compiled by Eric Linden / 1552
Across 21 Method of payment 12 Secretly following
5 Classic horse race for for a jewellery item with a a target — but not the
acorn growers (4) patterned gun finish (10) leading one (8)
7 A citadel can go to 22 & 3 down Intoxicated on 13 Is the cricketer a bird
pieces if discharge is chairs that keep stalkers on feeder? (7)
unexpected (10) top of their game (4,5) 15 The sadness of parting
with a gun tool (6)
8 Will rain fall down heavily
on a feed container? (6)
Down 17 Mind your manners, say,
9 A pipit leads us to the 1 It’s exactly what on country estates (6)
field (6) makes shooting a hit 18 Give vegetation a
10 It’s scary when Italian or miss affair (8) thorough clean (5)
spinoni are shaggy! (5) 2 A rugby player who puts 19 Get a bit of sympathy
11 The scent is unusual the boot into an ejector on a well-trodden
because of creepy- component! (6) track (4)
crawlies (7) 3 See 22 across
14 Carefully look to erase 4 Sam and Tina are
a field trial retrieve (7) mistaken about an enduring
16 Cast aspersions on quality of gundogs (7)
a dab of gun grease (5) 5 Frequent cause of working
19 Sporting bird on peg gundog retirement around
— I get excited (6) a lodge (3,3)
20 Waterways can also 6 A theatrical performance
be endless (6) at the country event (4)
Solution 1550 / 2 March 2022 12. Crimps 14. Threads 15. Chrome 17. Eggs
Across: 1. Brownie 6. First 8. Loopers 20. Ewe
9. Gape 10. Crossbow 11. Trench 13. Piotti PRIZE WORD: RIFLES
16. Eyesight 18. Grit 19. Overage 21. Hoses WINNER: RAYMOND LASHBROOK,
22. Release
Down: 2. Rook pie 3. Wye 4. Insure 5. Stop
DEVON
whistle 6. Fausti 7. RSPB 8. Lightweight
How to enter
To enter our crossword competition, identify
the word in the shaded squares and you could
win a Hoppe’s Black gun care kit, which includes
Gun Cleaner, Copper Cleaner and Precision Oil.
Due to COVID-19 we are only accepting submissions via email
Please email the solution with the crossword number in the subject line,
and giving your name, address and mystery word answer to:
ollie.harvey@futurenet.com
All prizes will be despatched as soon as possible.
Rules: Entries must be received by 23 March 2022.All usual conditions apply. Solution and
winner will appear in the 30 March 2022 issue.
 The Shooting Times

16 – 23 MARCH
MARCH MOON PHASE 2nd 10th 18th 25th 19th March Sunrise 06:05 GMT Sunset 18:11 GMT Moonrise 19:47 GMT Moonset 06:52 GMT

TIMES SHOWN FOR LONDON

THOUGHTS FROM THE FIELD

Starlings have made a noticeable restricted to caged birds, however.
comeback this year. The return Wild starlings imitate the sounds
of overwinter stubbles, a huge they hear around them.
reduction in pesticide use The local starlings have
and landscape-scale teal whistle and golden
improvement of plover flute in their
farmland habitats repertoire; they’ll readily
has borne fruit. knock out a buzzard
Murmurations are mew and a passable
now a daily spectacle, rendition of a jackdaw’s

LOOK TO
the chortling chatter “chack, chack”. One has
of flocks in hedgerows accurately mastered the

is heard once more.
The starling is a remarkable
mimic. Captive starlings can be
taught to copy human speech.
This ability to impersonate is not
The finer things
Partagas D No 6
RRP £19.99
cgarsltd.co.uk
Cigars from Partagas as a brand
are my go-to. They are consistennt,
they use beautiful tobacco and are
extremely well made. It is rare to have
a dodgy stick and even if you’re unlucky
it’s often how they have been kept
rather than made.
Book club
A Sweet, Wild Note
by Richard Smyth
Published by Elliott
& Thompson, £9.99
As we reach the spring equinox,
the dawn chorus is at its moost
magical. Smyth’s book is a
funny, knowledgeable and
GETTY IMAGES; ALAMY
repetitive ‘bong’ made by
an Isuzu D-Max pickup when the
driver’s door is opened with the keys
left in the ignition.
Richard Negus
The D No 6 is a cracker. It is
short and fat but lasts no more than
30 minutes. Despite its shortness
3 them anywhere in the south-east
ere’s a mixture of flavour, starting
with walnut and transitioning to that
w I wonder why they have
cclassic spicy Partagas note at the
back end of the smoke.
If you’re waders-deep in a river, it’s
a perfect cigar that doesn’t get in the
way or break the bank. Alternatively, it’s
perfect when paired with a crisp white
wine or champagne.
Nathan Little
at times inspiring aid
to und derstanding why
birdsoong means so much to
us. Hee explores the science,
the music, the literature and
the landscapes influenced
by it. I defy you to read
it and not listen just that
little b
bit more closely to the
melod dies from the treetops.
Simon Garnham
THE SKIES
Spotting a pair of Egyptian
geese in a park in Kent last
week, I am reminded just how
successfully they have spread
during my lifetime. I remember
my first sighting in Norfolk in the
late 1970s, but today you can see
or East Anglia.
suddenly got a hold; they have
been a popular ornamental, with
records of presumed escapes from
the late 1700s. Perhaps climate
change has made the difference.
Egyptian geese are on general
licence in England, both for
prevention of serious damage
to crops and for conservation
of other birds because of their
presumed competition over
nesting holes. Shooting one just
to eat it would be illegal, but I do
wonder how good they are. Having
accidentally shot and then tried to
eat a shellfish-eating shelduck, I am
diffident about this close relative,
but Egyptian geese are largely
freshwater birds with a plant-based
diet, so who knows.
Mike Swan

SHOOTING TIMES & COUNTRY MAGAZINE • 71

 Alasdair Mitchell

Sharpshooter
The ‘pitfalls’ for lefties living in the countryside include the horrifying
scenario of meeting people whose opinions may differ from their own

I
once wrote that an anti might regard an escape to the country? Be careful what of private property: “One wintry day in
the taxidermy-strewn grand hall of you wish for”. The writer went on to detail the 1970s, I took my two small children
Cabela’s, the US hunting superstore, the pitfalls of living in the country, where out, intending to walk in the grounds of a
as a vision of hell. Well, hell is what things are different. nearby stately home. But the tall gates were
you make it. Everybody has their own “This is partly a matter of demography locked, with a ‘private — keep out’ sign. We
prejudices and we all find comfort in being and the political choices associated with climbed over them and started our walk.
among like-minded people. Sometimes, the an older, whiter population,” she wrote. “As we came in sight of the house, a
fieldsports community fails to appreciate “In 2020, the most prominent age group in window opened and a voice said: ‘I say,
just how weird we may seem to some other rural areas was 50 to 59; in urban areas the do you know this is private property?’ ‘Oh
parts of society. corresponding figure was 25 to 34. Rural yes,’ I replied, ‘We saw your notice when we
We have to be mindful of this reality if constituencies are much more likely to be climbed over the gates.’ ‘Well, don’t come
we wish to be left alone to pursue our own
cultural identity. We cannot always convert
people into actual support for our way of
“She might have been describing a good
life, but we might be able to persuade them part of the readership of this magazine”
to tolerate it. In a liberal democracy, that
ought to be enough — providing we don’t represented by Conservative MPs. There too near the house,’ the voice said, closing
become a convenient scapegoat, which is less ethnic diversity outside major towns the window. We had a lovely walk.”
is the fate of so many minority groups and cities, and marginally more people You may say that the Guardian has
throughout history. Unfortunately, many voted to leave the EU in rural areas than only a small readership. This is true, but
so-called liberals are hideously intolerant. the national average.” I recall doing some contract work for the
For an idea of what we’re up against, Oh, the horror, the horror! To think, she GWCT a few years ago. I placed stories
look at the Guardian newspaper. I cannot might have been describing a good part of about a research project in several national
resist reminding you that in 2019 this paper the readership of Shooting Times. Lefties newspapers. A few days later, the Guardian
exhorted us to put that Putin apologist, shudder to think anybody might hold deigned to give the item a small mention.
Jeremy Corbyn, into Number 10. How do opinions that differ from their own. “It was only then that the telephones
you think that would have played out? To get an inkling of how this mindset started to ring, as officials in Defra and
Anyway, a recent opinion piece in is inculcated from an early age, look at a Natural England got in touch to ask for
the Guardian was titled “Dreaming of recent letter in the Guardian on the subject more information.

DOG BY KEITH REYNOLDS

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