JDog

And 'theirs' for thirty years by the sounds of it.

A friend owns the exact stretch to which you refer. Another friend has taken over the duties of 'managing' the crays but to little avail. He runs the catching and selling as a business. When I last saw him he had caught several hundred in a few hours. There is no chance whatsoever that they will ever be eradicated from the Windrush now.

Wrong I am afraid. If you had the shooting rights the other chap would not be on the farm. There is the world of difference between verbal permission to shoot over land and actually having shooting rights in writing.

It is fairly clear what most PW members think of the man and I agree with them in the main. However I too have sensed a serious inclination to jingoism from the presenters and reporters concerning the Olympics which has made me cringe at times. I am unashamedly patriotic too.

You could be right. However the flight line I was on in the rape field turned out to have a quarter of the birds on it compared to a completely separate line into the barley field. In normal circumstances I would always go for rape over barley. Having said that if I had spent more time watching I may have chosen the correct position in the first place but it was late in the day.

How very kind. I live near Stow on the Wold. The water would be the Windrush.

I would be interested in meeting fellow PW members in the area. I have a contact who may be able to provide a venue for the cray fishing and I expect at a push that I could produce some pigeon breasts for a bbq.

This 'artistic impression' (it is the Olympics after all) is of part of a bag of 67 shot on laid barley last Saturday.

I snatched two hours yesterday afternoon on an estate next to my village. There were lots of pigeons on a rape stubble and an equal number on a barley stubble in the field next door. It is always fatal to dive straight in and set up without watching flight lines but the first few groups of pigeons I saw coming in flew over the 200 pigeons feeding on the barley stubble straigh into the rape stubble and I made my decision to set up on the latter. This was the wrong decision as although I shot a fair few (44) the strongest line by far turned out o be along a hedge into the barley stubble. I must have watched over 200 pigeons follow this line whilst I was in my hide. If the barley stubble is not grubbed up by Friday I may shoot it then.

Agreed

I will be interested in meeting but the last train from Paddington to the Cotswolds leaves at 9:48. Perhaps if we were to meet earlyish I could do it.

But don't you think that 'Jerusalem', and the vision of it, is out of context with this ...'green and pleasant land?'

Then all I can say is that you had the misfortune to run into some pretty poor calibre police officers. As others have said avail yourself to legal advice before the situation gets out of hand. Good luck.

This does seem unfortunate and I hope that it is resolved satisfactorily. I have a question for bi9johnny. Were you wearing camouflage gear at the time of your apprehension by the police?

You may find that pigeons are an essential ingredient in your day out. Some preparation in the form of a decent recce beforehand would be useful too.

Unfortunately I could not set up close to the trees where the birds were landing as they were 200m away at the other side of an uncut spring barley field.

I have just had an afternoons decoying on rape stubble. I saw several hundred birds on the field when I arrived and after twenty minutes they started to drift back but always out of range at between 60 and 90 metres. None were interested in the rotary or the other decoys but they all drifted on by, not to another stubble but to sit in a line of trees 200m away. This is the third such experience in the last three outings on fields where I have the sole shooting rights so the birds have not been put off the rotary or shooting in general.

I imagine that I am very lucky having very rural estates and farms to shoot over but having had over one thousand days pigeon shooting I have never even had one person remonstrating with me whilst out shooting never mind a visit from 'old bill'. That being the case I am unable to say whether either the '**** off' approach or the 'I'm sorry to have caused you any inconvenience' approach is the way forward.

Great pictures and very informative. I shot 21 today on a shower affected afternoon on rape stubble and only five pigeons had any rape in them. None of the remainder had full crops but they mostly contained barley from a nearby stubble and clover from who knows where.

I rather hope that my cartridges produce a lot of shot string as it is the only way I could possibly hit those long crossers.

I have noticed on some days out that the pigeons have some difficulty getting into the pattern of decoys. This happens normally when there is no obvious wind from behind or from infront of the hide, or when there is a high hedge or belt of trees nearby. A vortex must be eveident to the birds but it cannot be seen by the shooter and only the behaviour of the birds gives a clue to it's existence. Pigeon Controller in one of his informative posts once mentioned it. How is the problem solved without moving the hide position, which might not actually be an option?

A shot taken of my Border terrier 'Bounder' taken in the spring whilst shooting over drilled peas.

As previously reported I saw combines cutting rape yesterday and there were 300 birds on the stubbles in the late afternoon. After disturbed night's sleep (imagining the shooting the following afternoon)I turned up at the fields only to find them already disced over and hardly any birds on them. I was determind to have my day there so I set up out of spite with the sun and wind all wrong. Birds started to drift back and in a four hour session I managed to shoot 121. I've just got back, the dogs have been fed and watered, the gun is now clean, the birds have gone to the game dealer, the battery is on charge and I'm heading for the shower.