Driven pheasants and partridges

It was a challenge to film the item on Paul Childerley's Bedfordshire driven shoot for this episode of The Shooting Show. It's never easy filming any type of shotgun shooting, and live birds are much less predictable than clays. I've developed a technique of holding the camera to my right eye and zooming until it matches the picture from my left eye, then keeping both eyes open while locking head/camera/neck so they move together. Well, it helps me!

I cheated a bit, if you want to call it that, by setting up a Sony AS15 behind the gun and leaving it running throughout the drive. In the edit, I always had the fallback of a wide shot to cover what I'd missed with the hand-held camera - and I needed it quite a bit!

It's hard to convey the reality of a driven day on video. The birds either look too close or miles away, depending on the lens, angle, etc. If you stop and think about it too hard, the action is all over and it's too late.

Some of the birds on the video look lower - and easier - than they were in real life, a fact that's clearly lost on the couple of sneering commenters who seem determined to give shooting a bad name. All in all, though, I think it turned out quite well for a demanding day's filming followed by a quick turnaround on the edit.

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Black powder, pointers and pheasants in Norfolk

What a brilliant day this was! I had a great time filming this happy band of muzzleloading enthusiasts on their annual walked-up game day. It was like stepping back in time, walking through the woods and beet fields with a bunch of chaps dressed in period gear and festooned with powder flasks, shot belts and what-have-you. Impressive clouds of smoke too! It made a terrific feature for The Shooting Show - enjoy!

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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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Bracken's first pheasant

 

We took Bracken, the 15 month old lab, to her first proper driven pheasant shoot today - and she behaved impeccably! She sat patiently but attentively at the peg (on her rather girly pink and white rope lead) and didn't pull or whine.

When we got the chance, we sent her for her first pheasant retrieve - this nice cock, which fell in plain view an easy distance away. And she went straight out and brought it back!

OK it wasn't the most demanding task, but that wasn't the point. We wanted her first introduction to driven game to be a calm and positive affair. There will be plenty of time for more adventurous work later.

As it happens, this was also my first pheasant this season too. I know readers like to think I'm constantly swanning around getting shooting invitations left right and centre. The truth is, it doesn't happen like that, and I rarely have the time to spare anyway. Still, it was great to get out and enjoy a modest driven day, courtesy of my mum who gave up her gun for the day. Thanks mum!

For the record, the total bag was 56 pheasants, a pigeon and a rabbit, between 8 guns. I shot just over my share, at 8 pheasants and the pigeon. The weather was dull and chilly, while the company was quite the opposite. It's a small, friendly shoot near Horsham in Sussex - just the sort of shoot I like best.

Watch out, Avery's aiming at pheasants

It pays to keep an eye on the blog of RSPB conservation director Mark Avery. When he innocently muses about some aspect of shooting, it probably means "Oo, I've just thought of another way to attack shooters."

Back in July 2009 he blogged about his rising concern about lead residues in game meat. By October that year, he was stirring up seven shades of you-know-what by writing to Defra, with a particularly weaselly letter - resulting in the formation of the Lead Ammunition Group.

Now he's running a new one up the flagpole: pheasants as a 'non-native' species. "I wonder how much the increase in some predator numbers is fuelled by this meat bonanza?" he asks disingenuously, taking a swipe at "big-shoot days where huge numbers of pheasants are released" while he's at it. (Actually the GWCT already has the answers to most of his questions).

I find the whole native/non-native species argument a ridiculous nonsense anyway. Who's to say which species 'deserve' to be here in the UK, based on whose assessment of which politically-correct moment in history we had the 'perfect' balance of wildlife? And how can this possibly be relevant to a landscape shaped by man since history began? Far too often the definition of 'native' or 'non-native' seems designed to support one organisation's point of view - the latest row over eagle owls is a case in point.

But leaving all that aside, what really bothers me is what devious new attack on shooting Avery is cooking up.

One less fox in the wood

This is one of the cubs raised in the wood next to the release pen. With the birds arriving in about a week, their time is up.

This one wandered out as the light faded tonight, and made an easy shot for the .17HMR. I was using the slightly heavier CCI Gamepoint 20grain ammo, designed to mushroom rather than fragment.

I don't think it would have made any difference on this shot, but I'm finding it a good, solid hitting round.

So, one down, not sure how many to go, but I've seen the vixen, a very dark coloured animal. She'll be harder to get.

Carrots, sticks and conservation

People who profess to be 'green' are dreadful ones for banning stuff. They see a conservation problem and they instantly want to regulate this and ban that. I suppose they mean well but, look around you, does it work?

There is another way. The World Pheasant Association is a fine example of how to get on and do some real conservation, rather than blowing your members' money on marketing hype. Their Pipar Project in the Himalayas has been running 25 years. It's a simple bribe to local people: stop killing stuff and we'll provide schools for your kids. It works.

I was shooting with the WPA on Friday, at their annual clay shoot and fundraising auction (As it happens I was on form, but that's another story). They're the sort of folks your average greenie would despise: rich, middle aged and older white men, public school educated, Tory-voting, pheasant shooting, landowning... One of the auction items was a zebra skin; another a day's trout fishing. I can just see the steam coming out of the trendy ecomentalists' ears.

And yet... they're doing seriously valuable conservation work around the world, at their own expense and for truly altruistic reasons, and not even bothering to promote it, any more than absolutely necessary to raise the funds they need.

Funny old world innit.

Cage fighting

There's a right row brewing between BASC and the other shooting organisations, and no mistake.

It's all over the consultation on DEFRA's draft Code of Practice for the Welfare of Game Birds.

The GFA, NGO, GWCT, CLA, CA and NFU are all backing 'Option 2' which calls for all 'raised units' to be enriched, and would ban barren cages.

BASC is backing 'Option 3' of banning cages full stop - placing it in the same camp as rabid anti-shooting organisations Animal Aid and the League Against Cruel Sports.

It's not the first time I've seen BASC taking a counter-intuitive line like this. I do wonder whether they have some vision of shooting's longer-term future that they haven't got round to sharing with the rest of us?

UPDATE: There's a heated discussion going on at the Pigeon Watch forums here...

Battling pheasants

Driving to see my parents this afternoon, I stopped to let these two run across the lane in front of me. They never noticed the car - just carried on with their squabble until the winner sent his rival packing.


Walking round the place later, I was amazed by the number of berries on the holly trees. Some say it's a sign that a harsh winter is coming. Personally I think it's probably more to do with the summer we've had than the winter we're going to have.


Here's something else I noticed - several pigeon kills, probably by a sparrowhawk. This was the only one where the carcass remained, but I expect foxes etc took away the others. I do hope someone has explained the terms of the general licence to that sparrowhawk, and it's being careful only to kill pigeons that are damaging crops!

Staffs - 500 poults stolen

I've received the following from police based in Uttoxeter, Staffordshire:

Police are appealing for witnesses following the theft of 500 Pheasants from an address in the Dunstall Area of Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire. Also at the time of the theft a large amount of damage was caused to Crops situated in fields near to the premises.

At some time between 1900hrs on Wednesday 29th July 2009 and 0530hrs on Thursday 30th July 2009 a vehicle with off road capabilities was used to drive across crop fields in order to access remotely located Pheasant Pens where they then stole around 500 Poults

Anyone who may have seen anything suspicous, witnessed anything or with any other information is asked to contact PC 0904 Richard Lymer at Uttoxeter Police Station on 0300 123 44 55 or Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.