scolopax

There is great value in having stops, and also sewelling. Once they have been shot once or twice the birds run like hell, not just in the drive, but the next one and one next to that.

step in the right direction but still a bit soft. Big heavy 4x 4's required, and run them over, reverse and do it it again.

A hit to to the head is not a given kill. The brain is small.

I did no to think there were the numbers I have grown used to seeing on the northern Firths last week. There has been a continuing southerly movement south along the Yorkshire coast, Norfolk must be filling up nicely.

It is not a case of picking up your own empties, I am saying we should all pick up all empties we come across. i was on a well used Scottish foreshore last week and yes there were some cases, including three left neatly together, but it was the amount of plas wads in full view on short grass which caught my eye, and no doubt several others had also seen the same but did not bother to pick them up.

PICK THEM UP!! not just your own, but any you see whilst out on the foreshore. i realise that picking up your own empties and especially wads can be near impossible at the time but we should really make the effort to pick up all those we see as we walk to and from our chosen spots. It's not difficult after all.

Very little spoilt game is actually inedible, it just does not meet the high standards required by the game dealer, sometimes it is not even spoilt but 'undersized', small strain pheasants which are not economical to process etc. Looking at a pile of birds discarded in the game larder due to ripped skin, crushed ribs, (I have even been told broken wing at the shoulder is enough to write offa bird) etc. A lot of good meat can be salvaged with a sharp knife and some effort, which is unfortunately what a lot of folk are unwilling to do. Spoilt give some of them a very easy excuse to discard what is now a problem whereas in the past very little would be genuinely spoilt, just unfit for sale as a whole dressed bird.

Got to hand it to those Argentinian pilots, they were incredibly brave pilots and very good at what they did. Fortunately for us I believe that they dropped there munitions from such a low altitude that the fuse did not have time to activate, hence lots of vessels were hit very accurately but by dud bombs.

Association of UK Wildfowling Clubs I have not see much mention of it on here. Are your clubs members or thinking of joining?

I would guess it has the potential to completely screw wildfowling in Wales

Not quite the same but there is a well known deer stalking guide who turns his attention to guided pigeon shooting over the harvest, I believe in the midlands. Up to a week ago his parties had accounted for over 19,000 birds in this short season. going by his regular FB updates he must be doing very nicely out of it depending on the landowners cut of course. teams of mainly Danish guns out and individual bags of three figures an almost daily occurrence, with some BIG bags to some lucky guns. I do not know what he charges but he will not be providing the service for free such shooting providers are the modern day equivalent of the professional shot of yesteryear.

Brilliant account, very well done with getting your beast

My club bought into the whole WHT stamp scheme for many years and it was incorporated into our membership fee from day one, then a combination of feeling let down be BASC over local NE consenting issues and £5 increase in BASC fees, well you can tell what happened. We kept affiliated (just) but ditched the stamp to keep membership fees stable. We never used the scheme, I believe interest rate was not that low, and we were fortunate enough to afford all our marsh acquisitions from core funds. But it does offfer access to money for clubs who would otherwise have difficulty accessing credit.

I always check in online just so I can try and chose a seat I want, this is with KLM.

https://monitoring.wwt.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/GooseNews17.pdf Always interesting reading, still over half a million Pinks but a very low count of migratory Greylags, although they admit it is likely an undercount and most of the birds were still in Iceland at the time of the count. Saying that there is little doubt they are hammered in Iceland and then again on the Orkneys, only their high productivity seems to have stopped a collapse in numbers IMO..