The Night Before Boxing Day She pulls up her collar and tugs down her cap Her ruddy cheeks stung by the Eastern winds slap. With rifle on shoulder, and spaniel at side She sets off for a last check of covert and ride. It’s now snowing lightly, the sun lowering red She leaves behind family, … Continue reading The Night Before Boxing Day
November, for the shooter, is the month (due to the clock change) to load the freezer with woodpigeon breasts. You can be out in the roost wood at 3pm, before the incoming birds arrive and shoot through to sundown. Whether you choose a shotgun or an airgun is a matter of personal choice. As someone … Continue reading Wildscribbler’s Diary – November 2019
The early morning air in my SUV was blue with curses as I drew onto the farm. I’d spent the previous evening gathering my decoying kit and studying expected weather and wind for the morning. I woke and loaded the motor with a very definite field in mind which adjoined a small copse that would … Continue reading A Morning On The Stubbles
On the second weekend in August (while the rest of the UK was subjected to a battering, torrential rain, and flooding) here in East Anglia we got off lightly with just warm, gale-force winds. Yet the temperature was about 26C. It reminded me of the tent-tearing ‘scirocco’ I endured on my only ever camping trip … Continue reading When The Wind Blows
I’m long enough in the tooth now not to get too ‘rattled’ by the antics of those opposed to shooting as August 12th approaches. The opening day of grouse shooting, every year, prompts not just salvo’s of lead but also a barrage of verbosity from both sides of the shooting divide. Yesterday saw the usual … Continue reading Gloves Off On The Glorious Twelfth
It’s a sad truth that the older you get, the faster the days fly by. Life seems to be logarithmical. The slow, impatient pace which frustrated your youth becomes the steady progress of mid-life. Before you realise it you’re trying to snatch the essence of every day in later life. You regret the indolent teenage … Continue reading A Strange High Summer Fox Encounter
Crop, Shrub, Tree, Flower and Fruit “Growing crops are often why the landowner gives you, the hunter, the mandate to shoot vermin species on their fields. Spend some time studying crops. Know how to identify them during the various stages of growth. Understand when the seed is likely to be drilled, which creatures will attack … Continue reading An extract from ‘Hunting and Fieldcraft …’
The breaking news this afternoon of DEFRA’s release of three new General Licenses is welcome news indeed. I’d like to be among one of the first to thank not only DEFRA for their intervention but also the aggregated efforts of our representative shooting, farming and conservation organisations for their lobbying and advice. Not to mention … Continue reading General Licenses – A Restoration Of Common Sense
So, tonight we learn that the review on the General License debacle is delayed for another week. The escalation from a Natural England legal capitulation (remember, Scotland and Wales have still refused to bow to the legal challenge) to the anticipated safety of DEFRA and the Secretary of State (SOS) was welcomed by the rural … Continue reading General Licenses – Defra Delay
I met a crow in the wood today. I watched him for a while and he watched me. I could see he was eye-balling the wood margin where a hen pheasant is on eggs in the nettles. He was also watching the nearby hedgerow where the chaffinches were nesting. I raised my shotgun, convinced that … Continue reading I met a crow in the wood today …
