I've signed this, you should too

If we are going to fight off unwarranted further restrictions on lead shot, it's important that we comply with the law as it stands.

Too often (even once is too often) shooters can't or won't switch to non-lead cartridges for a duck drive during a pheasant day. In England and Wales, that's illegal. If you're shooting ducks or geese, even miles inland and far away from wetlands, you must use non-lead shot.

The antis can all too easily point to ducks shot with lead and claim we can't be trusted to police ourselves, then call for a total ban on lead shot.

So: keepers, estate owners and shoot managers. Make this the season when you arrive at the duck drive with a box of non-lead cartridges for each Gun and insist the buggers use them, or be thrown off. The future of our sport depends on it.

I've signed this pledge, supported by all the major shooting and gamekeeping organisations. Please do the same, now.

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Interview with Richard Ali, BASC's new chief exec

Sporting Shooter has published my interview with Richard Ali, the new chief executive at BASC. As the headline suggests, I found him full of fighting talk and he has some interesting ideas on how we can promote shooting. I look forward to seeing the results!

You can read my interview on the Sporting Shooter website here.

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Schools Challenge TV - stars of the future

Here's the latest episode of Schools Challenge TV. As always, it was a pleasure working with the youngsters at the Schools Challenge Academy, and I was impressed with their ambition. They're certainly setting their sights high, but they are realistic about the hard work and dedication it will take to achieve their aims.

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Conserving endangered pheasants - my article on the WPA in The Field

I'm thrilled to see my article in this month's issue of The Field on the splendid work done by the World Pheasant Association to conserve endangered species of pheasants in Nepal. It really is a great, positive story of real-world, practical conservation work, done by an unsung group comprised mainly of fieldsports enthusiasts. And The Field have done it proud, giving it four pages with some of the splendid photos taken by the WPA over the years.

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Pigeonshooting on The Shooting Show

Here's the latest episode of The Shooting Show, with my piece on Geoff Garrod shooting pigeons over rape. That was an enjoyable day's filming, and I managed to capture a good few pigeons being hit - always a challenge with video!

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Schools Challenge TV CLA Game Fair preview

Here's the latest episode of Schools Challenge TV, which this week features a preview of the CLA Game Fair. I love filming at Oxford Gun Co with the youngsters in the Schools Challenge Academy, their enthusiasm for shooting is so infectious! I'll be filming at Oxford Gun Co again this Saturday - it's their open day so there's lots going on. If you're there, come and say hello - I'll be the one with a bleedin' great video camera on a tripod!

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Gary Green on The Shooting Show

This week's The Shooting Show features an item I filmed with foxshooter Gary Green. It follows him over a full day and night of trying to get a particularly elusive vixen that had evaded him for over a year. Did he succeed? Watch and find out!

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Video - Merkel & Leica go foxing with Tim Pilbeam

Here's a video I made recently for Merkel, the German gunmaker. It's the story of their visit to top British foxshooter Tim Pilbeam to find out how we Brits go about shooting foxes at night - something that isn't possible in most countries in Europe due to their different laws.

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