A few afternoons roost shooting

[Llanshooter 0]

On a very large local estate there is the usual four Saturdays of roost shooting to try to keep the wood pigeons away from the rape crop. This is a long established program at the estate and usually carried out by estate workers and residents, however for the last could of years Fursty Ferret and I have been able to take part, due to his work that takes him onto the estate regularly and his good relations with the estate staff. I get to scrounge a gun as his mate.

 

We have been in the same wood for the two years so know exactly where to go. It is a small wood of a couple of acres and next to a pond which is hidden by a raised bank.

The teal have a habit of zipping around and catching us unawares which has our guns twitching until we realise that he movement isn’t a pigeon.

 

The prevailing wind is usually from the south west and we usually stand just inside the southern edge of the wood and catch the pigeons as they come in to roost.

 

I am usually there first and can’t resist wandering up the path to the wood, where there are often up to a hundred pigeons sitting and digesting the morning’s rape.

 

These usually flush at the first sight of movement along the path.

 

The first week this February was quite misty and got thicker and thicker as the day went on. At several times we could hear large flocks of birds flying over but we couldn’t see them and they weren’t about to settle so all we got was the rush of their wings as they circled overhead until deciding to go elsewhere.

 

Thanks to a few early birds we got about a dozen between us before packing up.

 

The second week was much more fun. As I had been in the hot corner of the wood the previous week I suggested that Fursty Ferret should try that position for a change. What I hadn’t noticed was that the wing had shifted to the North West and all the birds would be funnelled in directly over just that corner, but as I get the shooting through him I can’t complain too much. There were big enough groups of birds coming over that once he shot I could pick up the leftovers as the flared away. The trees along the edge of the wood are mature and quite tall, whereas the majority of the wood consists of smaller trees about fifteen to twenty feet tall, so as the birds flared away from the taller trees that the had initially intended to settle in, I was able to get them as they came over centre of the wood with clear sky around them. This is where I had the fluke on the century – I shot one bird with a snap shot and saw it tumble, but when I went to pick it there were three pigeons lying in a straight line, all lined up parallel to each other at neat 3 yard intervals and wings folded. Three with one shot! (fixed full and half chokes and 32g No 5s probably explains it) I did try to claim that I meant it, but even Fursty wouldn’t have that.

 

 

 

Last Saturday was a still sunny day and I had bought a few fully body deeks and an old fishing pole to loft them into the branches. This took a good half an hour but from where I was stood they looked convincing. In fact three or four birds came in to them so quickly and confidently that I hadn’t even got my gun loaded. I missed a couple of really easy shots as birds flared off when I raised the gun – probably as I wear glasses and was facing into the sun. Then the birds all seemed to disappear. After a while we could hear hounds baying and realised that the hunt was out. Sure enough the hounds came past about 200 yards away, followed by the riders, who sounded much closer, then by the quad bikes.

They faded into the distance for a while then came back through after about twenty minutes. The only things that we saw after than were a buzzard and a hare, both disturbed by the activity. The pigeons seemed to have been pushed into the next county.

 

After a while we gave it up as a bad job headed home.

 

The highlight was that this week we attended roost shooting dinner, with pan fried pigeon breast on a vegetable cassoulet as the main course and blackberry and apple crumble for dessert. It was rally pleasant to see the other roost shooters for a change and get to know a few of them, as normally we just drive straight to the wood and straight out again. There was a vote to make the dinner an annual event so now there is something else to look forward to at the end of the game season.

[Bushwacker 13]

Sounds as if you had some good afternoons out, nice well written post. I took my 10 yr old son roost shooting several times in Feb, he'd never shot before & on his first outing managed to kill 2 birds for 6 shots with a 410, he was really pleased but wants to come all the time now. Roost shooting can be one of the most enjoyable forms of shooting, especially if it involves a trip to the pub after.

 

ATB B