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hillmouse

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Everything posted by hillmouse

  1. I have just been doing food costing on a ;larger scale. Based on this seasons prices you need to work on about 1-80 to 2-00 per bird. Hopefully this will stay similar in the new year. Poult quotes, while not fixed yet seem to be ranging from 3-50 to 3-85 depending on numbers and suppliers. Don't forget to factor in for pen repairs, capital costs for drinkers and feeders, diesel etc.
  2. If you have no English Partridge at all then releasing some isn't going to hurt. If you have ANY wild ones then releasing game farm sourced Greys is a sure way to wipe them out in about 3 seasons on average. Better to buy him a couple of Larsen traps. Red-legs will not push Greys off, another old wives tale. I was a wild partridge keeper and the two species get along fine but Greys are the more dominant (and more successful) but they will nest within a few feet of each other as my nest marking showed.
  3. The employer has a legal duty of care for all employees so they should be providing you with hearing defenders of some sort. Even a packet of cheap foam plugs will do an excellent job of protecting your hearing. If you want a lifetime of discomfort and inconvenience, problems attending social events and having to repeatedly ask people what they said or have the TV on full blast then shoot without protecting your hearing. One shot can do it and a friend has recently had this experience. Irreversible and extremely painful hearing damage. It is a pain having to miss the chance of an opportune shot sometimes but compared to the unpleasantness hearing damage brings I would poke up with it.
  4. One of the biggest steps forward in skeet is learning the correct visual pick up points, gun hold positions and break zones for each target and stand, especially for the pairs. Fail to break your first target in the correct place and then either waiting for,or slashing towards or after the second target will lead you in to a whole new world of problems which will often show up in your overall technique. A good and free learning aid is simply to watch various squads shoot a round. I would ask their permission first. Few will object. Watch the good shots and see how smooth their transition from 1st to 2nd target is and how small their gun movements are. Spend a bit of time focussing totally on the muzzle movement of successful shots too. Common things to see with less successful shooters are the muzzle moving in the opposite direction to the target, muzzles rising/falling to the line, failing to see second target or attempting to shoot it about 15 yards after it has passed the trap house. None of these will improve your scores.
  5. hillmouse

    Rouging

    Rougeing will be hellish this season, wheats are full of barley. Whatever you do, remember to bring a nice spotlessly clean plastic bucket with a lid and a clean hacksaw with you. As you set off on your first field take the top off your head with the hacksaw and pop your brain in the bucket until you are done. You wont need it for a long time.
  6. If it is 2 degrees F and constant you may still be alright. You need to find out why its not running up to temperature. Sometimes it can be simple things like a marginally narrow or thinner wick which does not burn well enough. I has trouble sourcing wicks for my Ruperts in the past. The ones which looked to fit the rack were actually too thin and burnt too cool. Once I found some old ones which were slightly heavier all was well. Make sure there is sufficient air entering the burner (yellow smokey flame is a sign all is not well) and your wick is trimmed and burning across its entire width with a good clean flame. Another problem with modern wicks was they were not as good at drawing up the paraffin as the old ones and that gave a cooler burn too. Make sure the chimney is clean and all the airways are clear. Is the machine level? Is your thermometer in the right place?
  7. I have used Hornady Ballistic Tips in 50grain for my .22-250 for about 18 years. The classic load of 38 grains of H380 pushes them out incredibly accurately and the devestation on arrival is unbelievable. There is no doubting it is very humane but not a round for anything you may want to eat. Try placing a sheet of carboard like an opened packing carton about 6 feet behind your target board when zeroing and see the shotgun type patterns the shards produce.
  8. I use a 28g as well, same make and model as the OP's. I also wonder why people take a small bore shotgun then feed it 12 bore loads like 28 grams all of the time. I found the 19gram Game and Hunting to be a very good cartridge indeed and certainly up to any partridge and most pheasant. The Fiocchi and Eley are in my experience both quite sharp and have a heavier shot load but were a good choice for walked up shooting were you may expect fewer shots and at going away birds. Bonarghi are a very high quality load but again very pokey and costly. The most commonly used load for me these days is Hull 23 gram Fibre. Despite the heavier load they are very comfortable to shoot and extremely effective. I use the Lyalvale Express 14gram in 9's (plastic only) for clay pigeon tuition and it is a very soft yet effective cartridge. If you want non-toxic options I would probably start trying to re mortgage your house now. Stupidly expensive.
  9. I am old enough to remember the days before bitfitter tools. Nimble fingers were a bonus. The big trick was keeping the bits somewhere easily accessible to you and not to the birds. Spent many scorching days on that job. Early morning starts were a good idea.
  10. I think Northumbria Police just like being awkward. They also ask questions which are not part of the official script. Lancashire were worse but then suddenly became more enlightened. Norfolk were very common sense and I knew several people with dedicated night and day set ups on .22LR and .17HMR with no problems whatsoever. I suppose a lot would depend upon your areas force policy and the individual FEO's view on your reason. Not how it should be, something of a postcode lottery rather than a uniform interpretation of the law.
  11. We have over 300 nest boxes out on the estate, all made and monitored by the retired farm steward. He has had to make plates for every single one and the best method is to keep the lids off soup and bean tins, drill a suitable sized hole and then tack them to the wooden box fronts. He burrs the edges of the hole back to avoid sharp edges. Amazing how apparently innocent birds like woodpeckers and moorhens can be so damned evil with the eggs and chicks of other species. Protein comes in many forms.
  12. I have no idea what the outcome of the vote will be. I would personally prefer things to remain as they are. However, if the voters in Scotland (NOT just the Scots) decide to be independent and vote YES, then this should mean total independence. Not a selective version which seems to be what is being viewed at present. I really don't know, but my guess is if there was as much oil left as some seem to believe the Government would have been putting up a lot more fight. Maybe they know more than they are letting on ? If the fields are running low then letting the dregs go with the YES vote meaning Scotland isn't a drain on overall finances when the oil revenue dries up could be a good long term plan ? Now there is something to ponder upon.
  13. I was invited to join one ground recently. If I paid the annual fee and the joining fee I discovered the paltry discount on targets meant it would only pay if you shot 2600 targets per season. The members events are still charged at normal members target rate and I was further shocked to discover a condition of entry to these competition was that you "donated" a prize. Given their charges for members are 3p per clay ahead of other grounds guest rates I didn't think it offered very good value. I think I will stick to "straw balers" where my money covers their costs and perhaps enough profit to re-invest in more traps.
  14. 50% booking deposit, remaining 50% paid before day takes place is pretty common practice for commercial days. Syndicates normally seek a minimum of 50% upfront to ensure a serious commitment from the Guns. Most well run shoots will already be ordering poults to ensure they have the birds when they want them. Game farms run on similar terms, 50% up front. Most established shoots will have been burnt by promises of payment which never materialised. This can either cripple the shoot or place further burden on the members who do pay up.
  15. I think a suspended sentence would be appropriate. 6 foot should do it.
  16. For organised driven shooting I would not generally provide a gun with an individual map as all parties ought to be briefed properly on the day. When it comes to "free range" vermin shooting later in the year I strongly feel a map is absolutely essential and should be provided as a matter of course. Not only do shoots have boundaries, they also have footpaths, roads, sensitive areas and often surround land over which they do not hold the legal right to shoot for many reasons. All of these features need to be highlighted and provided in a map. If this is not forthcoming I would not be happy to proceed. If there is no map provided once the formal shooting has ended and vermin shooting begins I would be asking questions as to why.
  17. Given that it will be rare for any two birds to follow the same line, height and speed you cannot expect to achieve a lot. I agree with Mr. Potter , (Keep It Simple Stupid) and on his first two points. Safety. Goes without saying, this comes first. Stance. Relative to where the main flow of birds comes from. (Hope there are plenty) Establish the zone most birds arrive from and pick a gun hold and kill zone. I find I get best results with novice game shots by restricting their attention to a limited zone. This is both safer and in the main, more successful. If he is moving all over trying for birds at all heights and angles, not only can it all get a bit hectic but success is harder to achieve. I use the "window" description. Describe an imaginary window frame with a horizontal bar half way up. Gun hold is on the window sill, he should have addressed the bird and judged line and speed by the horizontal and applied lead and fired at it by the top of the frame. Anything outside the window is ignored. If/when he starts getting on target with straighter birds you can broaden the window. Lead is very subjective and ones mans foot is another mans yard. If bum, belly, beak bang works stick with it. Suggest he increases or decreases lead by saying "add half of what you gave it, double what you gave it" etc. Watch for him rushing the mount and mis-mounting, lifting his head or stopping the gun. They tend to be the more common and immediately sortable ones. Good luck. It's harder than people think.
  18. Good Lord. Cold and snowing?? In winter Shock horror. Whatever next ?? Most forecasters these days cannot get yesterdays weather right today never mind tommorows weather today.
  19. Top Gun every time. Very good quality, nice features that all work and nothing that isn't needed. 2" expander zip for when the pies are nice or the weather isn't and you need an extra skin or two on. Pockets in the right places, leather gun facings that are long enough and good quality zippers unlike some. Price is very reasonable for the quality. Had mine for years with no issues.
  20. Shoot what you are comfortable with. The best cartridge is normally the one which gives you confidence. It is difficult to buy a "bad " cartridge these days. More clays are missed by human error, bad technique, poor gun mount and failure to read the target than by the "wrong" cartridge. I use as light a load as will do the job, typically a 24g in 12 bore, 19 or 21 g in 20 bore and it has improved my scores and eased the recoil issue on a long standing shoulder injury. Olympic skeet and Olympic trap are shot with 24g loads very successfully and an OT target is pretty tough by anyones standards but they seem to break well enough if the pattern is on them. Could be a clue there.
  21. Essentials. Shooting glasses (Topgun for value, Oakley for niceness) Ear defenders (foam plugs £1, top spec electronics £500 plus.) Baseball cap. INSURANCE. Nice to have and very useful. Skeet vest, range bag. Nice to have if you have nowt else to spend it on. Shooting shoes/boots. Proper shooting waterproofs. As to cartridges and chokes. Find a comfortable cartridge at a sensible price and stick to it. Put 1/4 and 1/2 choke in and spend the time worrying about pick up points, gun hold, lead, mount stance and other very important stuff. Nobody ever missed a target because they had the wrong choke in. They might not have broken it, but bad technique makes you miss, not the "wrong" choke. All this presumes you have had the basics of fit, mount and eye dominance sorted. If not, a lesson with a proper coach is money well spent.
  22. THIS DOG IS NOW SOLD. Thanks for all your enquiries.
  23. It's been used on a ram raid. Some bloke in Barnsley used it smash his doors in. You were slow today people.
  24. Try Northumberland. Good thing is there are no people on most of the beaches. You can go to Seahouses for fish and chips, tourist tat and chav watching, maybe a boat trip over to the Farnes see the vermin, sorry, seal colony, other than that its almost perfect. Good place if you like castles. Flodden Field 500th event just North of Wooler this year too. Maybes not so good if you vote SNP.
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