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comanche

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Everything posted by comanche

  1. comanche
    These two started as nervous squealing idiots and I just could'nt warm to them but they've turned into the most amenable pigs we've had to date. It won't save them in six weeks time though .
  2. comanche
    i know insects have to be controlled , and as you say its your job, but just as thought , i they not doing any damage to building and not attacking people why kill them .? when i had wasp nest in my garden shed , they needed sorting out as the prats were having go at me when i went in my shed , which is fair enough . if a pest is carrying disease and danger to people like rats etc fair enough .! but got the feeling the Hornet is not .? Wasps and hornets are greatly underestimated as carriers of bacteria that contaminates human food. Everyone knows that flies spread bacteria b
  3. comanche
    I still get it wrong... Though I've become pretty good at dealing with customers who say they definatly have a mouse-nest because they can hear them gnawing at a particular place in the wall or the ceiling . I ask them "Does it sound like this,"and start making funny clicking noises down the phone. If they say "Yes",I tell em to look out of the window and see if they can spot a line of Jaspers going back and forth. It saves me oiking out the mouse-bait when I'm in full-on wasp busting mode. Though one day I'm sure a potential customer is going to call me a weird nutter and sla
  4. comanche
    I do wonder how well Asian hornets will do in this country.For instance whether our summers will be long enough for them to consistently nest with success. I agree with Phil regarding our native hornets;it's usually possible to get in with the lance and retire without doing anything more than confuse the poor things. The worse scenarios are when the nest has already been disturbed . The hornets seem to post guards who stand duty for hours waiting for the next interloper. Strangely nests in houses seem to be calmer than those in more natural surroundings. I had a call
  5. comanche
    I think hornets are my favourite insect. Away from the nest they are so benign. They also seem to display a high degree of intelligence for an insect and are very aware of being watched.. Wind em up at the nest though and they can do a good impersonation of a squadron of Stukas! .
  6. comanche
    I've come across a few calcified rabbit foetuses and always assumed they are similar to the petrified babies that are found in some unfortunate women. In these cases a baby has for some reason died in the woman's body,sometimes having developed outside the womb, and has failed to be expelled. This can lead to dangerous infections but sometimes the mother's defence mechanisms isolate the foreign body by encapsulating it in calcium. As doe rabbits often self-absorb unborn young up three-quarters of the way through gestation rather than abort by early expulsion the mechanics mi
  7. comanche
    Good on you both. I once gave a ferret to lad and offered him a dozen old nylon nest free to get him started. He refused them saying they were crap and he only wanted spun ones. Its good to see someone helping another person out and the recipient being polite and appreciative about it .
  8. comanche
    No.You really do have to be self-employed plumber to fish those places . . Are you thinking of Timsbury? I've fished there. A course fish ticket was thrice what you would pay at a normal fishery but when I first went the place exuded exclusiveness with a lovely atmosphere and some great fish .It was the sort of place you would go as a special treat or for a birthday present. Sadly the last couple of visits weren't so good and I vowed not to return . The fish are still there but the atmosphere had gone down-market. I watched a bailiff chucking out bread and trawling swims
  9. comanche
    On Christmas Eve I was lucky to be invited by a friend to go with him on a trip to a chalk stream famous for its trout and salmon. Obviously due to the trout closed season and the fact neither of us are millionaire oil shieks or plumbers we were not to be in pursuit of such noble Game. My friend had high hopes of contacting some of the big roach the river holds and I quite fancied catching a grayling . As it was my mate failed to find his roach . He was plagued by nuisance trout though that found his mashed-bread groundbait irresistable. Following his instructions I'd tackl
  10. comanche
    £8 or £9 sounds expensive. We were paying not much more than £6 a bag from the local farm supplier and the horse feed shop used by the girls at the stables was pretty much the same even though they ordered it in specially for us. And we were only buying a bag or two at a time
  11. comanche
    One chap I know has charges that start at £65 a mole even for local jobs . If he gets two the customer pays £130. After I'd choked I asked if he was busy. His answer was"No but at my prices I don't need to be." Clearly a chap with a hard head for business.And a better house and car than me! Hearing this spurred me to ease my prices up a little with a clear concience.If someone baulks I have no problem suggesting they phone round for other quotes knowing that its likely they'll come across Mr£65. Actually ,assuming he factors each job at three visits his pricing is probably quite
  12. comanche
    As long as she is trying to retrieve them let her fumble them a bit. A young dog has to work out the best way of getting a good grip on a wriggling rabbit. Don't snatch the rabbit from her when she comes ;pause for her to hold it a few seconds then take it and give lots of praise. Practice retrieving with heavy dummies and dead rabbits so she can get weight distribution worked out . And whatever you do don't let her work with other dogs which may rush-in and steal her rabbit while she is fumbling to get a soft-mouthed grip . A sensitive dog can have its confidence knocked and enthu
  13. comanche
    Look at it from the seller's point of view. The few quid I might make from flogging a ferret isn't worth the bother or risk of taking a stranger onto my ferreting permission . Anyway its a bit late in the season to be looking for proven workers as having cared for their working stock through the unproductive summer months their owners will be looking forward to putting them to work themselves now winter is here. Requests for ready-made ferrets,dogs ,horses or whatever,tend to indicate that the buyer isn't prepared to put the work-in with a young animal and wants a short-cut to
  14. comanche
    The 71lb carp in question is now the biggest rod-caught carp to date and that makes it a record . Perhaps one with out much merit but still a record. As someone pointed-out ,carp are a non-native species hence all are decendants of foreign imports .Recent trends have seen this taken this further with the rearing of fast-growing ,ever-hungry fish from commercial strains developed for the table being released at "specimen" weights and due to their genetic programming to live-to-eat they end-up being caught so many times they literally are on first name terms with their captors. The ob
  15. comanche
    Sighthounds make very good pets. Thank goodness they do, considering the number that find their way into rescue centres or have to be retired through injury .. They love comfort and respond to affection. They don't need to be run on live prey any more than my friend's jack-russel needs to be stuffed down a fox hole , my brother's staffie needs to be in a fighting pit ,or my neighbour's rescued labrador needs to be taken shooting to have a happy life. How come lurchers chase rabbits but ignore ferrets and livestock ? Or should!.... Coz they know bunnies are fair game . Your job,if you w
  16. comanche
    Victorian naturalist Francis Buckland and his Dad seemingly tried just about everything . They were quite miffed when London zoo buried a dead leopard without giving then first dibs at it. So miffed in fact they insisted it was dug-up and cooked. Apparently despite their cast-iron taste-buds they declared mole to be one of the most disgusting things they ate. Yet according to historians Roman soldiers regularly ate moles. This is based on the remains found in by archaeologists in their camp fires and midden piles. The historians don't seem to consider that the reason Roman soldiers chuc
  17. comanche
    Its great to see the way they enjoy every fish rather than getting all grumpy if they don't get a chosen species or a PB like a lot of grown-ups. Last season Den's Dad and I took him to a day-ticket place and he landed one of the rare carp in the place. At 13lb the owner said he thought it was the biggest that had been caught! And it wasn't luck.He watched that fish hoovering up maggots in his swim,saw his float move countless times, sat motionless like a pro and timed his strike perfectly to add another notch to his Poundland rod. Yet he is still happy to catch tiddlers with me down
  18. comanche
    With my oldest Grand-son Denis not so steathily leading the way we approached our chosen pool on the local mill-stream full of hope. You can imagine our disappointment when we spotted two bedraggled boys perched on the bank peering into the water. They weren't fishing. Apparently they had been in engaged in a bout of bicycle brinkmanship. One had managed to launch his machine off a high bank into the stream and despite wading chest deep had been unable to find the thing let alone retrieve it. So it was off with the shoes, roll my shorts-up and enter the fray . It took about five seconds to lo
  19. comanche
    Paul,I'll be checking out the Red River and Arun when the season starts ,welcome to join me for a couple of hours one evening. Probably just dig some worms though:)
  20. comanche
    One thing this thread had thrown up is that, despite being considered the classic material for a simple bow ,yew doesn't seem to be a first choice for amateur bow-makers on THL. I've never been able to find a bit of English yew that looked like it would be any good for a long-bow.Certainly not one that I would be prepared to desecrate the tree for on the off chance it might be usable. This might explain why many of the famous long-bows of Old England were shaped from imported billets. Though I have read that some longbows were made in two halves and joined in the middle. Anyway
  21. comanche
    No , I'm pretty sure it was the fact that the doughnut was from the reduced counter and, like me, they couldn't resist a bargain.
  22. comanche
    I turned-up for a mole-job and the customer asked me if I could thin-out his squirrels.I told him I would have a little campaign while I had the mole traps out but covered myself by saying I didn't expect to make much of a dent due to the amount of natural food about at this time of year and the fact that he had workmen all over his garden.I also only had three traps in the van. The chap jokingly reminded me of my sage words the next day when I turned up to find two squirrels in the traps. Today was even better. I approached the traps and did a cartoon-style double-take. Three young
  23. comanche
    Not quite ... A bespoke variation of the Aldrich was approved for use by a single person, for a single use, but he's dead now! It is similar but not the same as the production model What was the single use he was approved for? Catching the one thing that MAFF refuse to admit exists ... Ah ,that'll be the large non-indiginous carnivores
  24. comanche
    Hopefully there will be a picture on this post. It'll be the first I've done since getting my computer back from the menders and struggling with new technology. Baby wrens in a creeper against my daughters house.
  25. comanche
    If you do have a small broody available it could be worth setting a few spare eggs under her for a week then finishing them in the incubator. When I was a keeper we found that old eggs or ones of unknown age that would be considered past their best for an incubator would hatch when started under a hen. Then give her another clutch to finish herself.
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