wids

Does anyone have trouble with making their dogs deaf when so close to you in the hide shooting large quantities of shots regularly? I know a couple of folks who have done this so tend to leave the dog at home as its easy to pick up on stubble, and when the crop is stood the farmer doesn't want me or dog going in looking for birds anyway as it causes more danger than the pigeons!

A few months ago I had a trip upto MAG357's house off here who is mates with Hawkeye off here to pick up a couple of his floaters. I have used them everytime iv been out since (4 times on barley/wheat and last sunday on barley stubble) I am just writing a little review on them as they are worth a mention both the floaters and the guys. The first few outings was on stood cereals and there were many birds fighting accross to woodland, had a watch and decided on 3 trees as my ambush point, putting the two floaters about 80 yards out either side of the flightline, it worked well with majority of birds still sticking to the flightline offering some great shooting, but a few would come off the flightline have a closer look and come into the trees resulting in a few easier shots to build the bag - This tactic was deployed on 4 occasions and evertime the floaters looked great in the breeze and brought some birds off flightlines - bags of 57/64/42/70 were achieved over 4 sunday afternoon sessions (work prevents anymore....!) Last sunday however the barley had been cut in the same field I had shot the 42 and a 70 with just the floaters on a flightline 2 previous sunday afternoons. I took a slab of carts (250) and picked up 175 woodies 2 crows and 2 ferals (179 picked with a few lost in the headland under the woodside which was still to cut) The floaters were used well out to catch the eye of the birds and brought them into see the shell decoys and 10 dead birds on cradles - Floaters worked brilliant again in the wind 1st shot was fired at about 1:50 and ran out of carts at 7:04 with birds just pouring in! Great afternoon great bit of kit and if any doubts about them rest assured they are great, realististic, lightweight and sure catch the eye of passing birds. Top fellas with a passion for pigeon shooting who are helpful Cheers boys Will

Never wore one! I dont feel I need one in fairness, I use a green cap and just follow them with your eyes using the peak to cover you a bit, JUST DONT MOVE QUICKLY OR FLASH YOUR FACE - till its too late! You cant keep still enough! I make a far thicker hide for crows and just always look through little holes etc. Id imagine if you use same hide for crows as pigeon you may want a face mask or whatever but I dont like shooting with something other than skin on the stock.

Its a marmite matter this! People seem to love em or hate em..... I really like em and you have a fair few more pellets which is nice to know B) so placed in front end of birds kill just as well out to 50 yards as a pigeon doesnt need much to kill em compared to pheasants or ducks

O yeh....

Peter theobald in the june 2011 issue of sporting gun mentions people far over estimate the shot a pigeon can take, its due to the birds feathers falling out so easy (How easy is a pigeon to pluck compared to a pheasant or duck!) saying a single pellet across the back of a pigeon can knock loads of feathers out making it look like it was very hard hit, in fact it may not have even hit the body! He says he uses 28g no 7 shot and that is ample enough and he def knows his stuff! People on here saying they dont want to pass up a shot at a bird in fear of small loads need to think that maybe they should not be popping at as many of these birds, and concentrate on pulling the birds in to actually get some shot an crop protection done! Not to mention missing it but spooking other bird. Let 1 land in and majority of the time another will join it before it goes - shoot that then you have a chance of the second leaving the pattern If it leaves before being joined then no loss as you get it as it goes away... 7.5 28g shot is great for decoyed birds and thats what we are on about - not just standing under a flightline where birds tend to be higher or distand crossers when most shots are 40 yard plus then yeh bigger load - but when most shots are 20-35 yards then you need some more practice if birds are walking away after being shot with 7.5 28g shot - esp whoever mentioned birds shot in the head walking off :blink: likely it just had 1 in the head that can cause game to do funny things no matter what shotsize the 1 pellet is.

What area are you talking about? Keen if near me in yorkshire region (Harrogate area)

Agree about if clear pigeon were cheaper then people wouldnt use clay carts, but I do feel that when decoying it is rare for many pigeons to be shot over 40 yards - most people will be surprised how close a target is to what they feel it is and thats why 28g 7.5 shot is more than ample for decoying

I know that we have only had 27 votes as of writing, but I am surprised at how close it is so far and appreciate peoples views. I rate the shot for pigeons and feel most people would agree that a pheasant at 40yards in full flight compared to a pigeon commited to the decoys or even flighting past requires more knock down power from the cart than the pigeon, so its not unreasonable to switch from 30g 6 for pheasant to 28g 7.5 for pigeon? Que people saying that pheasants need more than 30g 6s - but not a 40yard pheasant which is what the vast majority of shoots show and would see as great sporting birds that are killable by the vast majority of game shots. Keep voting

Just interested what the general concensus is here, I personally have never faulted 28g 7.5 shot for pigeon and prefer the low recoil they provide, especially when making a big bag when larger loads may start to kick a bit. I know far more people have become converted once trying them after being priced out of bigger loads. Thoughts?

My dad has a fully white crow stuffed that he shot, and he also managed to get one of its young which was also fully white ! again this is stuffed. All happened about 30yrs ago and not seen one since. Ill try get a photo of both when I get back in england as out in australia till mid april...

I see both sides of the coin here - but iv been brought up to not waste what you have shot and I work on the policy that if my bag is 20 and under ill see to them myself (breast/crown/pluck) and use/give away as it doesnt take that much time. Bags over this ill take to the dealers which is an hours round trip - now this is on no grounds to do with financial gains but simply I dont want to waste them and at least they are put to some good this way and it saves me the hassle of taking ages doing them myself. Iv been caught cold the odd times tho when iv thought it not warm enough for flyblow and forgot some bags to pop them in as I shoot them and had to waste them unfortunatly as just covered... Learnt from this tho! People arguing that crop protection comes 1st well it does yes - but its not alot to ask to drop them at a game dealers if you cant deal with the numbers yourself and I find you dont get that niggle inside that you have wasted some good game by having to dump them (Which just looks and smells awful!)

Not at all I would shoot clays if all I cared about was numbers and ratios - its just I was interested to see what other people are roughly at as its easy to think 'Wow great day he had etc and must be loads of pigeons about what am I doing wrong with my decoying' well in fact it can simply be that they hit a far higher %. 1 man may take 120 shots for a 100 another man 300 so its not often you fire at 300 pigeons in a day for this man to get to his 100 (This would be based on single shots!) Just interested

Today after feeding the pheasants in the morning I saw a fair few crows and pigeon on some wheat stubble - had some time after lunch so had a crack. I did my old trick of setting up crow deeks on one side and pigeon on the other (I had the hide near a bush that was on on a ditch that divided the field up so easy to put crows that side and pigeons other side). Had a great afternoon picking up 106 (49 pigeon 57 crows of which about 20 were rooks/jackdaws but kept trying to pick out the crows!) all for 154 shots including 12 Left and Rights - Most left and rights were achieved when birds commited to the deeks although and odd one where I got a good pigeon on the flightline and then felled the pesky carrion crow as he tried to leave the decoys but not quick enough! Now this is about my usual form sometimes tad better sometimes tad worse depending if the pigeons are decoying of just flighting past. Today was a mixture so thought I shot well with some nice long crossers and high birds taken from the flightline. But if say 90% of the birds were commited to decoys I would expect to do better than todays ratio. What does anyone else think on shot:kill?

Unless the field is HUGE and you really feel being in the middle is a must then I would suggest using the bales against a hedgerow and using your netting (Always chuck some bits of straw into your netting to break it up a bit more in keeping with the straw bales/stubble) Or even better if there is a tree in the field put two or three around this and try decoy from there as pigeons that are not commited to your decoys may come have a look and go to sit in the tree - therefore offering a shot before they get into it! With bales I usually leave gap and drape the netting between the gap and look through that and never bob up to look over the bales as your a dead give away. If you are against a tree or hegderow no need for a roof or top just keep sat down looking through the netting in the gap. Hope this helps