mudman
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Everything posted by mudman
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Our wildfowling club is going to help in mist netting for teal on one of the marshes this weekend. Will be interesting if the swans come into roost on the flash we are setting upon.
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I use to do three or four trips a summer out of Brid and Whitby. Last time was about 10 years ago though so I guess things have changed since then. Everybody used to fish heavy duty gear with big pirks and strings of muppets or similiar above. Has the techniques changed much now, I hear alot more talk of rubber lures now, are these used much off the yorkshire wrecks?
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advice for wanna-be-gamekeepers
mudman replied to nathgoon's topic in Gamekeeping, Conservation & Shoot Management
Not wanting to put the aspiring young gamekeepers off but I will add all the gamekeepers I know do very little shooting themselves. In general it is more rifle work than anything else, mainly foxing and rabbiting, and often they let a trusted helper do the bulk of that, especially during the summer when most daylight hours are spent on the rearing field. -
Dedicated game crops are great if you have a farmer willing to put ground aside for them. On our shoot the farmer is good to us in general but will not rent us any land for game covers. He does allow us to put mustard onto his over wintered stubble fields though. We either hand cast the seed into standing cereals a week or so before harvest or spin and disc immediatley after harvest. The one advantage over game strips is that you can grow big acreages cheaply. Partridges and pheasants love it, it does not need to be too tall, anything above knee high is enough. But the main thing is do not
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What I have been told is that roe kids although by now not dependent on mum for food are still very much dependent on her for guidance in the big bad world, where to feed, where and what to avoid, where to shelter etc etc. If deprived of mum too early they can suffer during the winter and can fail to make it through to spring. As a guideline I have been told to leave does with kids until after Christmas, shoot just single does before hand or if you can be 100% sure of getting them all, doe then kids.
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Every 7 months FD . Like anything else if they are left alone long enough to build up a solid population then muntjac numbers can rise relatively quickly, but from what I hear it is normally quite a few years from seeing the first animals to having alot on the ground. One young at a time can never lead to a really rapid population increase.
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Send the details into this website, basically just date and location, and you will get a reply telling you where and when it was ringed. I would suspect Nosterfield in North Yorks as they were doing some greylag research there. http://blx1.bto.org/euring/lang/pages/rings.jsp?country=EN
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I would say that reared partridge do not breed well, but reared pheasants can breed well if they survive the shooting season. I attended a Game Conservancy grey partridge day which touched on the subject of pheasants, basically apart from habitat and predator control they need feeding right through until May or June. It was explained that most pheasants are fat right through the season due to plenty of available food in the form of wheat from the feeders, they then suddenly struggle to find food when the shoot stops feeding at the season end. The hens are fit enough to lay a clutch but ar
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I have a pair of grey partridge in an aviary. The hen laid about 18 eggs which I removed each day in the hope of getting a broody bantam. Never got the bantam so as an after thought put the clutch back down on the floor of the aviary, even though I was told they were no good as I had not turned them regularly. About a week later the hen started sitting and is still sitting four weeks later. The eggs contain well formed dead chicks. Now the partridge is still very broody, needs encouraging to leave the nest then flutters about until I leave. I was thinking of getting a dozen day old chicks
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Big, reddy brown 400 lb Sika ? Nice Sika Mr Foxhunter, a bit of manchurian in it maybe? Would hate to have to pay the bill on that one but no doubt worth every penny (assuming money had to change hands).
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I will confess to spending too much time trawling through the various shooting forums. And that is the first time anybody has posted a picture of a kid shot during the summer. What next, are you going out for the Doe, she will be eating far more than any kid.
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Whatever you buy don't expect them to last for ever. I reckon if I get two seasons out of a pair I have done well. Well worth the expense though if you shoot proper foreshore and get down and dirty out on the flats and in the creeks.
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Personally not have 100% confidence in my accuaracy neck shots out to 50 yards (I have taken them further) chest shots out to about 150 yards. If they are further than that I leave them unless I can get closer. 30 yards got to be a high neck everytime everything else being equal. I know what you mean about geeting the shakes when a deer is close, I had one buck browsing 15 yards away but just behind the highseat, I dare not move as he was suspicious and occasionally looked up straight at me before carrying on feeding. Never did get the shot as he moved off feeding as he went but alway
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How will it effect you. From what I understand the DCS want to have overall control of all deer stalking in Scotland. They will do this by only allowing those stalkers who are on an approved list shoot deer, i.e illegal to shoot deer if not on this list. To be on this approved list you will have to possess some form of, as yet undefined, qualification. So no more stalking in Scotland for you unless you are prepared to jump through a few more hoops and I dare say spend more money on this, as yet undefined, qualification to be on the 'list'.
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Red legged partridge X English partridge
mudman replied to deadlock's topic in Gamekeeping, Conservation & Shoot Management
Should be perfectly possible with a caged pair. It has even been recorded occsionally in wild birds. A few years ago I was driving across the new stubble and found a cock grey paired with a redleg and five poults. Called someone at the game conservancy who said that the poults would be redlegs with a hen redleg who had lost her mate. Like wise the grey would have lost his mate, but they have such strong parenting instinct that he 'adopted' the redlegs as his own. Got to be my favourite gamebird by a long way the grey partridge, just such a shame modern farming has just about done for them. -
Three quarters of my stalks are from dawn onwards. Even with the very early sun rise I think the majority of my animals have been taken between 6.30 and 7.30.
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We put ten down two seasons ago. Only cost £3 each as well grown poults. Real characters, took them most of the season to get proper wild, lost two to a pigeon shooter who shot them on the deck in the neighbours wood, two were killed by foxes under the roosting trees, we shot just one ourselves, three just disappeared and two ended up in the nearest village about a mile away. Last one was seen in the April following an August release. We had them more as a novelty than a shootable bird, they always got a comment but we did not have the land to show them at their best. On flat land they will f
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Ugly as sin, seriously, I think they are grotesque. Whats wrong with nice big symetrical 12, 14, 16 even 18 pointers. Its like peoples fascination with malforms, bizarre to me.
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I have shot the north bank for a few years now. Like all wildfowling it can be good on its day but overall the Humber is pretty much third division compared to other estuaries in Lancashire, Norfolk/Suffolk, the south east etc. Don't get me wrong its not bad but then its not the Ribble or Brancaster either. Goose numbers are very healthy, numbers of pinks have steadily increased in recent years but the bag is mainly greylag with some canada's. Duck numbers have declined on the upper humber but are holding their own on the outer humber. Main species are mallard, wigeon and teal, other s
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The main problem is the speed at which they cut the silage, they really do fly up and down. I was watching them cut last evening and they did a fifiteen acre field in next to no time. I was up there at four this morning to see what was about (only just got back out of bed!), found a cock pheasant and a rabbit or two sliced up. I did think one solution (non serious) was to hammer a number of angle iron stakes around the field about 18 inches high, big enough for the tractor driver to see, if he goes slowly .
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If you want to bow hunt dangerous game such as bear, lion, buffalo, elephant even, then fair enough.. But do it without the protection of someone stood behind your shoulder with a rifle. See how much of a good idea it seems like then.
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I missed a 15 yard shot at a roe buck last trip north of the border!!! Chest shot as well!!! Don't quite know what went wrong but I think it was a combination of rushing the shot and the 'anywhere in the chest will do' theory. It ran off about forty yards and stood broadside looking at me, only for me to have a mis-fire. It then ran another 50 yards and looked back, after giving myself a bit of a talking to I composed myself, calmed down, and shot it off sticks, dropping it on the spot . If someone had been videoing it it would have been worth watching as a 'how not to stalk roe buck' lesson
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They are a pointing dog so are bred to cast very wide when hunting, particularly when on open ground. When in cover they will hunt closer by nature and they can be controlled to work close, but they do not really like it and it is constant work to keep them in although manageable. In normal woodland mine is working probably thirty to forty either side, on fields it can easily be 100 yards on either side. Can't beat it though when he slams on the anchors and goes into a solid point, then when instructed flushes a big covey of wild partridge from almost underneath his nose.
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My wirehaired viszla seems to be a bit, well, more wirehaired than some. But he's a true allrounder. Posing Stalking dog Goose dog Wildfowling dog
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£5 a cartridge! Thats a bit steep, okay I suppose if you are only expecting occasional shots at geese and you need the 'best of the best' and are prepared to pay for it. But one decent duck flight back could set you back over a ton. Suppose its all to do with what you have confidence in. I'll stick to steel for most of my ducks and hevi for the geese. Although I do have a few hevi 32grm #5 loads if I am expecting high flighting mallard/wigeon/pintail.