army646

I know Motty, I have never seen as many young ones in a bag. As a bit of an update, had a bit of a drive round today in the intermittent rain and saw plenty of pigeons where there were non two days ago, so jobs a good un. Possibly they were feeding later to avoid the heat or perhaps they needed a day or two to settle down after the combine had been through. I do wonder if the parents stick to a much shorter feeding range whilst they have squabs on the nest

I am based up in the north and constantly watch the wheat crops in the area as they start to ripen, waiting for the Woodies to start to build as it begins to turn. Now this year, the numbers have not built as they have in past years. Can't help but think that it's all happening a bit soon and the good weather has meant that the birds might be preoccupied with the second or possibly even a third clutch. What makes me think this? Well I went out early the other morning onto one of my permission, after being away fishing for a couple of days to find that pretty much all of the winter wheat had been combined. Speaking with the farmer he reckoned they were at least a month ahead and they had not had to use glyphosate to get it to turn. I had a drive round and a periodic sit and watch to see what was knocking about on the flight lines. Next to nothing with very few birds on the ground feeding. This was between about 9 & 10.00AM. Not even any real amount of corvids! Popped round to see another farmer who I shoot for and whilst we were talking we watched a woody going to and fro from the Sycamore in his yard collecting small twiggy bits, obviously for nest material. Had a look at his acreage of wheat and watched a few woodies knocking about on the summer flight lines. Visited another of my farms and found a number of birds feeding on a patchy bit of winter wheat, which had not done to well due to the wet conditions last autumn/harsh winter. Watched the comings and goings for a while, had a natter with the farmer and decided to have a bash. Ended up with about 90 over two sessions over a couple of days, plus about 20 corvids. What I did notice was that pretty much all the birds that I 'crowned' were all juveniles i.e. they had the light coloured and excessively downy under plumage and underdeveloped neck rings. Next to no adults in the bag. Is this because they are still in the midst of raising young? Anybody else finding anything similar? What do we think?

I had two guys on one of my permissions dump 70+ under a hedge last year. Don't think they really should have been on the land (game keepers consent without farmers). Helped them out by giving them the prime spot, they guy professed to be some sort of expert. I shot 100+ on my own and breasted out the lot on my own and vac packed em, not one went to waste. If the ***** lands back on this year he's gonna get told to do one. If you shoot it and it's edible make sure it gets used out of respect for the animal. Don't give the 'antis' a chance to slate us, if they can find away to stop us, they will.

I bought one of the higher end Foodseala ones a few years back. Wouldn't be without it. All my pigeon breasts are vac packed with it and look exactly the same when the come out of the freezer and are defrosted months later. The Adrew James rolls that I use are a bit dearer but they are good quality and you can make the bags to the sizes you want.

Has anyone had any experience with one of these? Just fitted one to an s400 classic and had some weird results

If you can get some photos posted and the gun is as described I will have it. Could pay and collect in person as I will be heading to London on business next week. I live in North Yorks so will be passing Sheffield.

I have some of the ringers originals and have to agree that in bright sunlight the 'elastane' in the stretchy fabric they are made from does make them fairly shiny in bright conditions. However on the whole I reckon that they work pretty well. I have some good bags using them.

Well that post provoked a response! So basically treat like any wild game bird. Cook em quick, keeping it pink or long and slow with added fat ('barding' as many old recipes call it) and add plenty of liquid, prefferably wine as the fruit acid will help break it down.A touch of balsamic/cider vinegar in the cooking liquid would do the same. So get it wrong and you might as well of cooked an army issue boot! Just wondered whether anyone had experienced one tasting like Wharburtons Extra Thick White Toastie/park boating lake

Has anyone eaten Canada goose and if so what was it like? Seems to get a bit of a bad rap in general. I ask because some of my wheat stubbles are attracting them and I think the farmer wants me to have a go at 'em.

Same up in Yorkshire. No real movement until well into the afternoon. Still have not built up in any real numbers over the wheat which is still standing

I bought a Camoustreme carp fishing rucksack/Bergen a few years ago. God knows what capacity it is, but it eats 30 shell decoys, 2 or 3 fairly large MOD nets and loads of other bits and pieces in the many pockets provided. It has lasted brilliantly, but Sod's law I have just looked and it appears that they have stopped making it. I don't think that I paid much more than £30 for it off Ebay

Yep! Holmes Chapple area was pretty much the area where I saw this spectacle a couple of weeks ago. I personally don't think they were the migratory bunch. These ******* were flying at normal English, pain in the **** Woody height and were not tightly flocked. They were simply every where in all directions as far as the eye could see. I nearly got as excited as last birthday when the wife said she had a special treat for me! Turned out that a bath, fresh underwear and a splash of smellies was not really needed for the new spade she had bought me to dig over the front garden.

Travelling South on the M6 through Cheshire this morning, just about the time when all the flocks were venturing out from roost. My god! I have never seen as many pigeons in my whole life. The skies were full of them in every direction as far as the eye could see and this continued as we travelled for a good number of miles. There were literally thousands. Whoever has permission to shoot over the blocks of OSR in Cheshire should be on for a good do this winter. It looked to me like they have already started to feed on it.

What bits of Alko/whole crop wheat I have on my permissions I have been watching like a hawk for the last few weeks. Numbers starting to build up nicely in the last week or so. Biding my time waiting till the crops off. Have a look at one bit on Saturday morning, two guns on shooting the standing crop, two out of control labs crashing through the crop. I stand back and watch for a while, I have not been noticed. I was watching the son of the guy who has permission, at first I thought knocking something into the tree, to guy line the poles to stabilise the net in the wind. I then realised what he was doing, he was bashing a woodie's head in against the tree to dispatch it. This smacks to me of a complete lack of respect for the birds and the crop. I will not shoot standing crop due to the risk of damage to the crop but also the risk of rotting corpses left in the crop, which has been linked to Botulism in the animals it is fed to. The only time I do shoot while the crop is still on is when it has been flattened. Any way Sunday morning having a drive round, spot a rotary on one of my other permission on a tiny field right next to the road and very near to the village. I have not shot this field in respect of the disturbance it would cause to the local residents. We are talking a distance of not much over 100 yards. The landowners in question get a card, a home made pigeon pie and a bottle of nice malt every Christmas. Bit cheesed off! I reckon I am being too nice, what do you reckon?

From my experience pigeons are happy to munch on Triticale and generally will start to take interest in it from when it starts to brown or the grains get to the 'milky/cottage cheese' stage. This usually happens around mid July, but depends on the season and where you are in the country. A lot of farmers have had a ago at growing it but quite often go back to winter/spring wheat because it is a quite leggy/tall growing cereal and is a lot more susceptible to getting 'blown' or flattened in heavy weather.

2007 Husaberg FS650e with a Silmoto race exhaust system, carb rejetted, deep sump plug and Boysen Quick Shot fitted, final drive gearing lowered a bit with a smaller front and slightly larger rear sprocket just to make it a bit more interesting to ride. Perfect fueling on the dyno and did 55 BHP with the clutch slipping. Fairly interesting to ride seeing as it weighs about 110 kilo dry. can be a bit hairy to ride, but put some effort into it and it all suddenly works and starts to make sense

Yep! I agree with you Tightchoke. The UN need to back off. They are being provided with humanitarian aid and if they are feeling really badly done by, they can always make their way home! If they are migrants that are fleeing from war or other great hardship, they won't give a carp so long as they are away from it.

Investigated by the UN for saying NO! Oh dear! That leaves us Brits well and truly in the shizo. Our propensity to 'line up and do as we are told' is really part the root cause of the problem. We need to find our back bone. I am not saying turn we should lust after the 'good old days of the Empire' but the lion could do with getting a bit of its good old roar back! A little of that defiance and fortitude that made this country and it's people great would not go amiss. But one thing that I must point out is that the above is in no way a 'bigoted' statement, we are a multicultural entity. Some of the proudest Brits that I know are of ethnic origin.

I was brought up on a council estate, in a very working class, socialist family. My parents and grandparents voted labour all their life. I personally would not urinate on Mr Miliband if he was on fire. Why? Because he is just another faceless career politician. Pretty sad really! I simply cannot cope with David Cameron. If a fight broke out in a pub and he was present, he would go down straight away simply for looking like a self righteous knob, even if he was on my side! Once again another slimy, smarmy career politician who survives by being evasive, wordy and never answering a question directly. Do I look up to him? Do I see him as leader material? Do I respect him? Simply no on all counts and unfortunately we have elected him leader of this fine country. Now the Liberals. Are they honestly contributing anything to the running of this country as part of this supposed coalition government with our friends the Tories? It is debatable. All I see them as is the political equivalent of a subservient gimp, trailing dutifully behind the Tories on a leash, whilst gnawing on a cue ball gag. So where does this leave me? Well to be quite honest looking at good ole Nige Farage and thinking well at least you can answer the questions with conviction. He is more like the normal person on the street and does appear to care about the country and its populace. He drinks, he smokes and he is so far removed from the other faceless, ex public school 'never had to struggle to get by' tossers that I find him believable and in all honesty in my mind, the sort of bloke to be in the driving seat looking after our countries interests! The other parties see this and now are engaging in defamatory 'excrement slinging' to try to to stop the potentially massive swing towards UKIP. What's the biggest and most repulsive **** that can be thrown? Well of course it's racism, the allegation that all politicians fear more than anything. Now getting round to the 'racist' issue. Am I a racist? Definitely not, I have good friends of all creeds. Do I think UKIP are racists? No not really, but what I do see is a political party who are not skirting round the reality that this country and the benefits that we and our ancestors before us have all struggled and paid dearly to create and maintain down the years, makes it look like 'Nirvana' to the less fortunate and also the unscrupulous free loaders from far and wide. We do need to protect ourselves and need to learn how to say NO! If we carry on at the rate that we are going without better border controls in place and measures to ensure that support and benefit is only provided to those that can prove some form of eligibility, this ship is going to sink. The Aussies have got it right. Yes you are all welcome, but only if you can prove that you are going to contribute to the system and have the intention to strive to provide for yourself and stand on your own two feet. I honestly cannot see what is wrong with the above approach. Not bad for the descendants of a bunch of convicts!

The best bit about my successful first outing is that it restocks my empty freezer. Unfortunately the rape shooting was carp this year around Ripon and the only chance I had to get out my Mitsy Pajero head/gasket let go. What I can highly recommend purchasing is one of those vac packer jobbies. They stop freezer burn and Improve the look of the breast fillets, especially if you are passing the meat on to any 'game virgins'. I like challenging the ideals and palate of the 'super market meatites'.

I'm a Speyside man myself, either Deanston or Dalwhinne

Well I have been watching the birds round my neck of the woods for some weeks now and had got to the point where I was beginning to wonder where they were all at. Normally by now they have started to flock up a bit after the main crop of squabs have flown the nest. Odd fields of my permission were maybe showing at times 30-40 birds on power lines over the fields and in sitty trees around them, but they literally could be there one day and gone the next. I have put the leg work in over the past months to gain some more permission. The main of what I have got to shoot over is 'whole crop' or what is referred to as 'alkolage' wheat. I have had bits of 'blown' crop to shoot over, but most of it has been too far off the flight lines and has proved unproductive. Anyhow, I got the call from one of the farmers that I shoot for on Friday afternoon, to inform me that he had got a field of crop off and if I popped over he would have a ride round with me in my truck and show me the access points to the field etc. A nice steady flow of pigeons and crows was showing and a few flight lines identified. So the game was on for Saturday. Landed about 8.30-9.00Am on the field and spent half an hour or so watching the flight lines and what they were upto. I was in the hide and shooting for about 10.00Am ish and knocked off about 5.30Pm after a quiet last hour or so. Not all the birds decoyed in text book fashion and my shooting was a bit ropey at times, but the result was 102 woodies shot, with 96 picked and about a dozen crows/rooks. All in all not a bad start at all to the season. Bring it on.

will it take a semi auto with a 30 inch barrel and also how many guns will it take. I am only over in Skipton and could do with another cabinet

I have some fairly heavy duty Hankooks on my 2.8 Pajero and I reckon that I lost at least 5mpg when I put them on. There was also a distinct increase in road noise but it is worth it for the extra grip in the snot.

Well here is the final update on my original post. Head is now back on with new bolts and a pukka Mitsy 4 notch gasket under it. The bill from my mate who carried out the work was £350. This included collection by trailer, pressure testing and skimming. The gaskets, bolts and new stat I bought, so an additional £110 was spent on bits. So £460 in total spent. I consider that I have got off light this time round. Needless to say I will be keeping it a bit longer to get some return on the outlay.