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comanche

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Everything posted by comanche

  1. comanche
    Used to be in a ferret club (long defunct ) & we did the shows . Ferret racing was the only money spinner we had to pay for the petrol . 10p a ticket ,bet on the collar colour. The guy in charge of the club had all the speil to draw in the punters ... The kids loved it . I remember those days -pipes ,cages , show tent and camping gear strapped to the roof of my old Mk1 Escort . I do mean strapped to the roof too. Did'nt have a roof rack!. My little girls 6th Birthday party ( she's nearing the big 30 now and has savage brats of her own ..... I must stop mis- quoting John W
  2. comanche
    I suppose most serious ferreters have packed up now that the ground is starting to defend itself with tiny but disproportionately acid- tongued nettles and the burrows are running with scuttlers .Another season over. Our last trip was a bit of the proverbial mixed bag. My mate had a family party to attend but still managed a couple of hours on the Downs with myself and his son . The lad had managed to wriggle out of the commitment and quite reasonably argued that as permission to work this bit of land had initially been given to him he could'nt very well leave me on it alone
  3. comanche
    We get quite few of these crosses running round the base of Arundel and various other old castles in Sussex . The technical term for them is ,I believe ,a "moat". I am soooooo sorry !
  4. comanche
    There was quite a debate about this subject last year . For my part I tried em out on my own ground before using them professionally on customers property . I am so glad i did . There used to be a film on the internet showing how great these Nooskis were . Rats would bundle through a laboritory test course ,straight into the Nooski and ,whack ! Ratty would fly about in its' death throws . Point one/. In hindsight I'd warrent that these poor lab rats had been accustomed to feeding from the un-set Nooski for some time before video stardom becomed . On the big day the trap was
  5. comanche
    I think if you had a rats arse in your mouth you would be pulling the same face Some would say that you could'nt tell where the rats arse ended and my face began ... (phew ,got that in before anyone else did !)
  6. comanche
    The whipplington seems to be winking at the camera in the first shot .Sort of "Hi chums . Ratting ? This is how it's done . By the way is this my best side ?" One more of my two rascals . Note how the old fella knows how to relax at the end of the day but the young one is still looking for trouble .
  7. comanche
    The handsome Bedlington cross belongs to a young indoor cricketer who is also a jolly good ferreter . The weedy black bitch is mine ,as is the ancient collie cross . Ugly ,grumpy ,crippled old bugger but just see how his face lights up when he marks a burrow !
  8. comanche
    well i didnt know any of that, but outhers i know have 4oz long nets and havent seen a rabbit in the net thay go over when [acking it up and it's ripped like a bitch. But thanks anny way. Had something bigger than a fox in my net a few years ago . The spiles were nearly all pulled and about 5 yards of net shredded but the "thing" was not only judged to be highly edible but was held long enough to pay the price of its, folly . A bunny in a long-net will often have a go at biting it's way out. I made some purse-nets of really fine but strong kite string years ago thinking I could
  9. comanche
    Mate they are rabbit fleas . They can't live on ferrets ..or people . Might crawl about a bit or get caught in your jumper but they can't survive without a bunny to feed on. They are going to be very active at this time of year because female rabbit fleas can only breed after latching onto a pregnant rabbit & the bunnies are in Spring breeding condition . As everyone has been saying ,hang the bunnies you've caught up and s they cool the fleas will drop off anyway. Incidentally the fleas you do find on ferrets are usually cat or dog fleas that have come-in with hay or other bed
  10. comanche
    When I started out as an impoverished and naive schoolboy I used some very cheap and nasty nets . Some were only 2 feet long but at least as I built up my stock I could actually put something-anything-over the holes rather than see rabbits skip away laughing. Later I went through a phase of making nets that tapered outwards toward the middle and then narrowed back to the bottom ring. Maybe it was because here in Sussex there are a lot of ancient buries on clay and chalk that have gaping mouths I was not as satisfied with them as with full meshed nets . (Blame the tools n all that
  11. comanche
    Quite right . Had the boy been with us from the start we would have been both obliged by tradition and within our rights to have given him a good flogging before sending him into the hedge to set all the nets whilst his father and I sat back admiring the countryside and engaging attractive lady horse-riders in conversation.
  12. comanche
    "That bit by the road junction that that no one wants to do ." Young James -my mates lad -gave us our orders before b*ggering -off to play a game of indoor bleedin cricket . Indoor cricket on a Sunday morning when he should have been ripping himself to shreds on blackthorn not mincing about in a village hall dressed like something from Brideshead Revisited .. . Ponce. We told him this of course but apart from promising to come and see how were doing later it made little difference. So it was that two distinguished gentlemen found themselves scrabbling about like a couple of pe
  13. comanche
    Can't tell from the picture if you have an 8ft or 15ft collar there . If it takes two little batteries it is a 15 footer. The 8ft takes a single battery. Sometimes a gentle wipe-over of the circuit board will revive an old box that has been laid-up . Removes the verdi-gris corrosion that can build-up. The old grey box finder will detect a mark 2 or mark 3 collar up to about 10 feet,maybe a tad more with good batteries all-round . A mark2 collar will tick quite fast and thus flatten its batteries quicker than a mark3 collar which ticks at a more leisurly rate. Accuracy is pretty much the
  14. comanche
    Hello P .I've heard of someone feeding the delicate little corpses to his ferrets after he'd denuded them of their sensual, softly yielding ,velveteen coated skins . Er Badgers and owls eat em so Iguess they are not poisonous . They are just reputed to taste foul. Then again ferrets are related to badgers and seem to have survived on some pretty strange diets ranging from breadand milk to bush-meat so maybe try just the one to see what happens . All the best K
  15. comanche
    They do have a scientific name but it's long and I have the memory of a lobotomised prawn for whatever Latin I ever did know. Elf Cups it is then .
  16. comanche
    Thanks are due to john b for turning it into DVd and Moley himself for being so generous with his knowledge . I've never been shown how to trap moles and I've been happier to make my own decisions , develop my own style and make up my own mind about mole-behaviour over the last twenty or more years . I've tended to remain a bit insular but it has'nt stopped me being told been many "factoids" over the years by no doubt ernest and well-meaning folk . Sadly so few of these invaluable tips and gems of ancient rustic wisdom seemed to have relevence to my own mole-catching experiences
  17. comanche
    Seems likely that the odd bunny would have made it here with the Romans as they were a favourite dish of the rich (Caesar himself loved them apparently) but it might well have arrived in a pickled or preserved state rather than as meat on the hoof . The signs of butchery said to be apparent on the rabbit in the BBC article indicate that it is not the remains of an animal that has burrowed to the "Roman archaological level" so it could well be a genuine find ..However, considering the amount of digging done on Romano British sites one would have expected more rabbit remains to have tur
  18. comanche
    Romans certainly knew the rabbit and both types of hare . From the writings of Strabo and the like it is obvious that they kept them in domestication of some sort .Remember though these Roman aritostcratic types could afford to pen and maintain massive areas as hare and rabbit compounds. Don't think of little yards or hutches -wild hares and rabbits are quite nervous and tend to suffer stress in confinement . It would have taken some very selective breeding to create the dopey hutch rabbits we see today. To be considered Native to Britain an animal or plant must show a linage dat
  19. comanche
    none yet ive only had them about 2 weeks Don't worry .Take em back and change em for a box of BBs if you can . They're the sort of thing that were used on big game at close ranges or by check-point gaurds and such to whack into speeding cars to wreck the engine and /or the driver ! We all live and learn .That's what this sort of forum is here for .Good luck .
  20. comanche
    I never cease to be amazed by the capabilities crammed into even the most basic of digital cameras. This shot of fallow deer may not be great but the first one was taken from the van window and shows how far away the deer were (just see em on the edge of the wood ).The other shot was taken on maximum zoom ,the engine was running so everything was vibrating . I know that they are not great pictures but they do credit to a a little pocket camera . Shows that nobody should be worried about the camera they have or be embarassed by the results . Have a go!
  21. comanche
    Oh of course the divorce season finished a day early this year because of the Sunday shooting laws . That must've saved a few marriages . Seriously .Keepers' spouses are a great lot in general. Who else would put up with a succession of smelly dogs & teams of smelly people hogging the fire in a cloud of steam after a day or nightout in the rain . The muddy foot-ware ,irregular mealtimes , the obligatory kettle boiling regardless of the hour, the second-hand stress ,fur ,feathers ,blood,sweat and .......
  22. comanche
    Cool .He was rumoured to have been a bit of a "difficult character" behind the rose-tinteds of LRH but the new project sounds intriguing and well worth a look . Basically my user/nick- name is one that was given to me by various friends years ago . Loads of reasons, insatiable appetite for knowledge about other cultures .The fact that until the ravages of time started taking their toll I tended towards the Neil Young circa 1971 school of hairdressing ,I once cut a hedge a bit short but I've never taken a human scalp . Oh and I suppose the fact that I tended to live in the woods in a
  23. comanche
    Snowing quite nicely and settling . I have a rabbit fence to erect tomorrow but of course if the ground is covered it will ,as everyone knows , be impossible to do any work and I'll have to go ferreting .
  24. comanche
    BB's almost certainly the best compromise between energy and pattern . Anything bigger will be wasted Heavy loads have fewer pellets so although the pellets'll in theory kill at silly ranges the chances of the fox being totally, missed or , worse,maimed is greatly increased. If the foxes are fairly naive and 've not had their flight distances increased by long-range lampers you should be able to squeal em in to less than 40yds . Or try a hide or high seat over some bait (if its not too cold!) Sometimes it is those "out for a walk and poke about with the gun " situations that thro
  25. comanche
    The little snow -star -lovely!
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