black powder gunner

Thanks markm for your comments I am just an ordinary basc member with over 40 years off going wildfowling , and just wanted to give some young shots a chance to go wildfowling on one of the best inland marshes in the north. If us ordinary members do not do any thing to help nothing will change. the venue is 8 miles north of York , pm me for full address.

If any young shot living in the northern region of basc are interested they are organising a introduction to wildfowling on our farm on November 24th. This will commence with an introduction to safety gun handling bird identification ,guns and cartridges, decoys and equipment, reloading cartridges. Then in the afternoon we will do some clay pigeon shooting and then each young shot with a mentor will go on to our inland marsh to try for a duck or goose. If we have time in the morning I may even fire the punt gun off. If any body is interested get in in touch basc North East regional officer .

You can get all reloading supplies from clay & game just go to there web site. You will want some 3.5 primed cases tps wads some 20 bore felt wads to use as fillers to bring shot up to required level, steel shot I use copper coated ones 42 grams which is not a heavy load but does the job on ducks and geese and does not kick as much as a heavy load. the powder I use is maxum sb 150 its cheaper than alliant steel and works just as well and a shot card. you will need a roll turn over available from clay & game and pillar drill to use it with. I have a friend who just seals his shot card with bathroom sealer and works real well.

Grahamch if you fancy a trip to near York I will load you a couple of boxes and show you how to reload pm me.I load my victorain 8 bore with bismuth the cheapest way is to buy a box of eley alphamax 46gramm bismuth from York guns at £25 per box for bbs and take the shot out of them works a treat hope this helps bpg.

I once had a fell terrier puppy given when we got him he did not like bare legs any body in shorts or a dress he used to bite there legs so we called him trousers . As he got older he got worse one night I was in the bath and the telephone rang I put towel around me and went down stairs to get the phone trousers was a sleep in front of the aga I am talking to my girl friend and suddenly the dog has me by the back of my leg I managed to get him of but needed 10 stiches and a two hour wait in A&E after that we always made sure we had a pair of trousers on, he was the best working terrier I have owned and lived till he was 16 years old.

Here in Yorkshire on our in land marsh duck numbers have been down low numbers of mallard very few teal and widgeon before Christmas but in the last three weeks we have had a lot of rain which has flooded the ings bringing large groups of teal and widgeon on to the flood water but not many mallard. Two weeks ago got the sneek boat out and paddled out to a hide I built which is on a flood bank built like a high seat set in some willow trees surrounded by over a hundred acres of deep water set the decoys out along a sheltered hedge line 30 yards from the hide this was at 6 o clock in the morning and waited for day light to break . Has the light was breaking through a dozen greylags flew over just out of range its been the best ever season for geese we have written records of every thing that has been shot on this marsh going back over sixty years and have never shot as many as this year. The next thirty minutes were very exciting with many teal and widgeon coming in to the decoys having had a good few shots and accounted for several teal and widgeon and one mallard decided to call it a day got into the sneek boat and paddled out and picked the shot ducks up and the decoys and headed home for a good breakfast.

Last night we went onto the marsh for a evening flight when it was still light the first bunch of greylags to come over us the black goose was with them these were about seventy yards up so out of shot. It is the same size as a greylag and looks like a greylag but it is jet black. We do some times get brent geese later in the season and it is not a brent. We had a good flight and shot eight greys between three of us.

It was not a cormorant because I shoot two or three every year on licence to protect our fish breeding ponds and it was not a black swan because we sometimes see these on the river. I have been wildfowling for over forty years and seen white greylags also hybrid geese but never a jet black goose.

This afternoon I went down onto our inland marsh to repair one of our permanent hides has I was nailing some boards on when the magic sound of geese approaching to my left got down in the hide and about a hundred greylags went over about thirty feet high but one of them was jet black with no markings what so ever. Was it a greylag or another breed of goose any ideas.

We were out on Friday night shooting on our marsh with two 19 century made 8 bores both with Damascus barrels we had ten shots between us and shot 6 greylags. the cartridges were home loads resized industrial cases blue dot powder and 2.5 ounces of BB bismuth these cost £3 each to reload total cost of the night out £30 you can not go and watch a football match for that. The amount of shots you get in a season is not that many, but the shear joy of firing a piece of history that was made when Queen Victoria was on the throne out ways the cost of the catridges.

Products containing second generation anticoagulants(SGARS)which most modern rat poisons are,should never be used in open country side or near game covers it tells you this on the label. This is because of secondary poisoning of raptors red kites barn owls buzzards this is because poisoned rats and mice can take while to die and if eaten by raptors will kill them. You can use other rat poisons but these are not as effective due to resistance building up. To buy (SGARS) you have to go on a training course and take a short exam which will give you a certificate of competence enabling you to buy this product. There are many people offering this qualification including BASC city and guilds lantra. Always read the label wear protective clothing and transport use and dispose of pesticides and poisons safely. Going back to your original question the best way to control rats in holes around feeders is to gas them using phoxtoxin or talunex pellets. You have to have certificate of competence to use and buy this product which is available from the same ones who do the rat poisons. Hope this helps black powder gunner (city and guilds assessor and trainer)

30 years ago I had been combining a field of wheat a couple of miles from the farm and noticed a lot of rabbits in the corn. We finished the field at 8.30 and went home for my tea I said to my dad I will take my lurcher back to the field and see if I can get a rabbit or two. It was 10pm with a harvest moon I walked across the field were there was a old sand hole where the estate used the sand to build the village in the 19th century it was now all grown up with trees and scrub. I kept putting the lamp on but no rabbits about walking up to the sand hole I noticed Brin my lurcher frozen to the spot with her hacles up I looked up and there was a man walking towards me he had a red beret on and a large black felt overcoat on tied with old baler twine and boots tied up with band and a large beard he got within thirty feet of me and I put the lamp on him and there was nobody there feeling quite scared i ran back home. Next morning I am telling dad the storey and he says that was Ned he was a world war two veteran who lived in a tin hut on a near by farm he used to come and help us at harvest time he would be on is way to the pub I said well I have never met him no you would not have he has been dead twenty five years.

Last year when I ran out of alliant steel I got some to try in the 10 bore could not tell the difference shot both duck and geese with it, I will not be using alliant steel again its that good and much cheaper. The recipe I use is 89mm cheadite case cx2000 primer 41gr SSB+150 powder tps plastic wad 42 grams no1 copper coated steel a shot card then RTO finish you may have to put 1 or 2 20 bore fibre wads in the bottom of the tps wad before you fill it up with shot to get the correct shot height before you RTO. Hope this is helpful BPG.

I have a Taurus 9 shot revolver blanked of to take 2 .22lr in stainless steel never rusts shoot every think with it horses sheep stirks foxes never goes wrong. I have a .32 cash but only use it for bigger stuff the bullets are expensive. But my favourite humane killer is my bond arms over and under stainless steel 410 pistol it as a 3 inch barrel and is the snake slayer model had it ten years never lets you down. Bought these from York guns.

What a good question having done most field sports including driven game shooting rough shooting pigeon shooting catching rabbits with ferrets and lurchers fox control with terriers deer stalking hare coursing before stupid law came in. The one for me is wild fowling shooting geese with a double barrel 8 bore that was made when queen Victoria was on the throne the smell of black powder the flash of fire and the splash when it hits the water.Also punt gunning putting yourself up against the weather conditions in a small craft stalking the ducks for over an hour laid flat out with your hands submerged in freezing cold water while paddling then when your in range pull the lanyard boom a cloud of smoke when it clears your spoils of the stalk ready to retrieve fantastic.

Its been the worst season for many years this is due to it been a dry winter and I shoot over 6 miles of ings land and inland marsh and none of it has flooded so we have very few geese and duck coming onto the ings . Last year was our best year ever with all the meadows flooded for most of the winter so this year built some new hides and built a new sneek boat to go decoying out of have not used either. We have shot the odd goose and duck of the river and had a few of our flight pond but very little compared to last year . Early last week I was talking to a farmer up the road who said he had a spring open up in a 50 acre field flooding about a acre of land he had his sheep on most of the winter when he moved them last week he noticed a few feathers on the water so he said I could go and try for duck. So Saturday afternoon I had got all my jobs done on the farm so got the dog and the ten bore and went over to the flooded land about 4 pm. Took a hide with me because there was no cover got set up and waited over an hour nothing came just thinking about packing up when two teal came thundering past and landed at the far end then two ducks appeared and headed straight for me safety catch of gun up then just in time noticed a lot of white on them put the gun down and watched two shell ducks land with in ten feet of me they swam to the far end and left me in peace. Then a widgeon flew past just about to shoot when I heard the sound of geese six greys coming straight to me gun up bang bang never touched a feather then another eight appeared dropped the fist one missed the second one a quick retrieve. Another ten minutes past and it was starting to get dark then fifty came in hit one hard then finished it of with second barrel went to open the gun took the right empty cartridge out but the left had jammed and ejector had gone over the brass end the gun would not close properly it was stuck in the chamber tried to free it with my knife but it was not moving so had to pack up then the geese started to come in must have been over two hundred I was pleased with my brace and left them in peace hope to catch up with then in September.

Having a large area of in land marsh and Ings land to shoot over that floods most winters I needed a boat so I could shoot out of put decoys out and get in between the trees and hedges .Having a gunning punt I have used this but it is a big job to take the gun off,and is not very easy to manoeuvre and not very easy to shoot out of especially when shooting over decoys. Three years ago I borrowed a friends fibre glass rowing boat which was totally useless it was cockily and every duck with in 3 miles saw me. So what I needed was a easy to manoeuvre boat that was stable and compact and be able to carry 2 people witch I could park up in the flooded bushes and not be seen it also had to be safe when crossing a fast flowing river. So decided to build one myself not having the skills of Old farrier it had to be quit simple a bit like me. I came across a advert selling Canadian canoes rang the man up and got him to build a Canadian canoe out of fibreglass that was 12 inches at the back and 9 inches at the front 16 foot long and 3 foot 6 inches wide in middle . This arrived a month later the shape was good but it was so flimsy it would not carry any body with out putting your foot through it I put it in the shed and it stayed there for two years. Last year it was the wettest winter in twenty years with over 600acres under water for over 2months and thousands of duck and geese about I really needed my boat so this summer decided to finish it of . I decided to deck it out with marine ply put cross beams in the hull and fibre glassed a floor in then decked it out like a punt so not to get big waves swamping it out I also put ballast in the hull to make it sit down in the water. While I was doing this I thought it might be a good idea to make a hide where two rivers cross which will need the boat to get to when it is flooded l built this 12foot high near a tree the highest the water gets to was 11foot last year. So every thing was set for this season got some new decoys painted the boat camaflarged the hide . This year it has been the driest winter in living memory and have had no floods or even standing water very few ducks and geese hope it rains before the end of the season. Now trying to attach a picture that is not upside down but reckon it's because it's off my iPad here goes

Went yesterday to Alan Myers to take a gun to be bored out and he has plenty of alliant steel and blue dot powder in stock.

A friend of mine had his double punt 1.3/4 inch gun and trailer advertised last year for £11,000 he had built the whole thing his self and it cost a lot more than that to build it sold quickly. These outfits do not come up to often so are sought after but buyer be where. A old punt can look good from the out side but under the decking can be very rotten and will cost a lot to put right. A good modern punt built with modern materials will be far more cost effective and if you want to use it on the sea will be a lot safer. I have a single modern built punt with a double barrel four bore built in the 1980s. I also have a Birmingham made double eight bore built in 1895 when I get to old to use them I will give them to a young wildfowler who will look after them and use them as they were intended to be used on the marsh. After all I am very fortunate to own these guns and are really only custodians of them and they should be looked after and preserved but most of all used and fired on the marsh and foreshore then passed on to there next custodian.

Last night I went to do a hog roast a for birthday party on kings snaith which is in the centre of York on the river ouse near Stgeorges field car park . I was amazed at how many greylag goslings there was I had ten minutes to wait so set on to count them got to over a hundred and lost count. People were passing by and the geese did not bother when I left I had to shoo them out of the way.They ranged from a week old to eight weeks old what was unusual was there was at least twenty Canada geese there but they all appeared to be barren and never saw any of there goslings.

In 1962 when I started junior school Snowden Slights great granddaughter Hilary was my first teacher and she had the original copy of her granddads book in later years we borrowed it is a good read of a bygone age. Telling the storey of Yorkshires last professional wild fowler who harvested the wildfowl in the winter caught eels and made willow baskets in the summer. Sadly where he plied is trade on the Derwent at East Cottingwith and Weldrake is now a nature reserve with very little shooting taking place but some of the local farmers still get to have ago at the ducks and geese that still frequent in abundance this part of the derwent. His family many years ago donated most of his guns including his large punt guns to the Yorkshire museum at York were they can still be seen today.

There is nothing wrong with a hatson auto bought mine four years a go it is the 3.5 inch chambers with synthetic stock bought it at the shooting show for £300 put thousands of cartridges through it never jams up if you use 70mm cases or above will sometimes jam if using 65mm cases.Last year went out on the punt with the big gun on was out all day never had chance of a shot decided at 3pm to head home with a rowof two miles half way from home with dusk approaching fast five widgeon flew over me and landed 80 yards in front luckily I had not unloaded the big gun so decided to have a go at them got down and gently paddled towards them got to about 60 yards I could just see they getting uneasy so pulled the lanyard and let the left barrel of a great bang and a cloud of smoke started to row to them 3 stone dead and one swimming 20 yards away got the hatson out put three cartridges in gave it a shot just has it was going to dive started to flap so rested thehatson on the deck next to the big gun lent over to pick the duck but it lunged forward I grabbed it but rocked the punt sending the hatson into 20 feet of water what was I going to do now.Attached to the big gun I have a nylon rope with a 5litre plastic container filled withexpanded foam and painted orange just in case I hit a big wave and lost the gun over board.I undid it from the gun and tied to the anchor and through it over board. Next morning when the water had gone I went back to find my gun found the marker but could not see gun in a seaof mud then trod on it picked it up covered in mud left the cartridges in it an took it home then washed it of in hot water and emptied the magazine then put it on the aga for 24 hours a good spray of oil as good as new. If you want a cheap gun that will take some abuse it may be the gun for you.

Over the last forty years I have shot several dogs that have been worrying our sheep always as a last resort with there owners never present always rang police straight away and never had any problems.On one occasion about 25 years ago we had 100 ewes and lambs turned out for the summer on our ings and marsh land one day we went round them and found a dead lamb that had been eaten with just its head and skin left this did not bother us to much because you can loose a lamb and the foxes will eat it.The next day when we went round there was another dead and over the next 2 weeks we picked 10 lambs all the same we went round all hours and never saw any thing I even sat up all night be hind a tree nothing came.Then one Saturday morning I had been into the village and was coming back to the farm over the other side of the river I could see all our sheep huddled together in a corner went home and got dad and brother and our shotguns there were two large hedges that ran from the road down to the ings dropped them off dad went down one hedge and brother the other I went in the landrover to were I had seen the sheep and came a cross another dead lamb no sign off a dog. I checked the rest of the sheep just then I heard a shot in the distance drove round to dad and a fox hound and come down the hedge to him a bb stopped it in its tracks and it still had wool in its mouth. We looked in its ear because all fox hounds have to be tattooed to show which hunt owns them this had a M in its ear for the middleton hunt. Went back home and rang the kennels up the kennel huntsman denied all knowledge of it till we said it had there mark in it he then said the master of the hunt would come and see us which he did and he paid us for our losses. It turned out they had lost this hound 6 months ago when out hunting over thirty miles from us and nobody had seen it from that day to the day we shot it but there had been a bit in the local paper about a farmer 20 miles away who had lost some sheep and he was blaming a puma or big cat.

With the flood gates shut for the last five days over 150 acres of our ings land and water meadow land under water and with our neighbours over 700 acres of land flooded. Had a look round this morning a lot of duck about so had a early lunch got the punt out and took the big gun off and decided to go out on the flood water to a large area of water sheltered by a large hedge put my decoys out and drop anchor and wait for the ducks to flight in.So got the punt on the trailer put the gun, decoys in the punt and headed of to the flood water got to the launch site and it was blowing a gale pouring down with rain got the punt floated and headed off rowing against the wind with waves nearly 3 foot high and the punt slowly filling with water from the spray that hit the front of the punt after 300 yards of hard rowing decided it may be was not a very good idea after all so headed back to the trailer and called it a day got back home and unloaded every thing then decided to go to another of our flooded fields and walk down the hedge to the waters edge and put ten duck decoys out 30 yards into the water. Then put 6 goose decoys out on the waters edge then sat down behind a large oak tree with the lab next to me. By this time it was 3.30 five widgeon flew by never picked them up till well past me some more went over very fast put the gun up but had not taken the safety off what a muppet. It is now 4.30 and light disappearing fast suddenly 3 greylags appear heading straight for the decoys bang bang never touched a feather the day was going from bad to worse.The light had nearly gone and it was blowing a gale I thought give it five more minutes then I will pack up just then heard the wonderful sound of wink wink looked up and ten pinks right above me up with gun hit the lead goose with the first shot then gave it the second to finish it off crashed into the flood water 50 yards out an easy retrieve for dipper my first pink of the season and a good end to the day.

Yes it was built by your dad I have had it 5 years for a small caliber gun it is really hard hitting and he did a good job when he built it.