Benthejockey

I think the washing machine would be perfect but our washing machine would die with the sheer weight of it. I can’t think of any outdoor laundrettes around here and I’d definitel get thrown out of an indoor laundrette because it stinks of sheep. I think I’m going to have use an old bin and be a mainuak washing machine. It’s not worth being murdered by Mrs BTJ or killing the washing machine.

Yeah I was right on the cusp of being too late. There’s a few checks you can do before you go to the effort of starting the tanning process. It’s a seriously big fleece so if I do It the stretching will be fun! I need the goat to turn out well as it’s going to be a xmas present.

You two definitely want to get me killed 🙈

I’ve got a sheep skin to tan. Not in itself a tricky job, I’ve done deer, Fox and I’m doing a goat skin at the minute. But this sheep is different because it’s a big woolly beast of a thing. Tight ish fleece not long straggly welsh type wool. I’m in a quandary as to how to get the fleece clean before I start tanning. I’m likely going to use the snowdonia supplies Ktan because I’ve got some in the garage. Normally a cup of detergent and some degreasing soap works but I don’t think it will get it white. Any ideas?

The Warwickshire are trying to do something similar with that horrible smelly bint from the west mid hunt sabs. And if that works I imagine all hunts will go the same way. But I’d guess in the same way my ex partner ignores court orders it won’t make a jot of difference and they’ll happily breach their injunctions but it will make it easier for them to lock them up. The police on the whole don’t like the antis but they’re reluctant to do much because it’s hard to actually get any real prosecutions. And any that do get prosecuted will become martyrs for the cause.

I saw something similar with a cow, a pig, a sheep, a goat and then I got bored watching so I’m not sure what it ended up with.

Here’s a trick for anyone having a lot of people around and who can’t be doing roasting a turkey. Bone put the turkey breast off the crown keeping it as a whole, stuff it with your desired stuffing, roll and tie it. Wrap with bacon if you wish. It cooks much quicker and carves like butter, and it doesn’t dry out. And a little goes a long way. I fed 15 with a 9lb turkey roll and had left overs. I always laugh at people that ask me for a 20lb turkey. They have no idea how big a 20lb bird is!

it will keeeelllll

Baby BTJ will be 6 weeks old and step daughter will be with her father so we’re probably going for xmas tea at the sister in laws. It’ll be an early start, sort the dogs and horses and then relax a bit and enjoy the little one. We’ve had xmas on the back burner since August when we got the turkey poults.

We did 3 weeks in New Zealand when I was at college and all they eat over there is mutton because they export all their lamb. You’ll pay a premium for mutton in this country because it’s a bit trendy and foody to eat it. A bit like the posh chefs love to use a bit of bone marrow or other poverty type food and make it new and hip and exciting and charge a premium for something the butchers can’t give away.

We’ve got Southdowns and had Hebrideans in the past. The Southdown will get fat on fresh air and the Hebrideans did exceptionally well on the flood plain next to haimwood shooting ground. We found the Hebridean tup lambs were better off castrated and put down a nice bit of fat and weren’t so feral. Last year was the first lot of Southdown lambs to be killed, i castrated one and left the others with their nuts on. The wether lamb was a monster! He killed out at 30kg at 7 1/2 months old but was fatty, not terrible but a touch too much. The entire tup lambs killed out 4kg lighter each but had less fat and better muscle definition. An old boy that’s killed a lot of sheep across the world was very impressed with the carcasses and the killing out percentage. They’ve only got short legs and not got tonnes of bone so your meat to bone ratio is better. He’s having a tup to run with some of his Hill sheep he was so impressed I’ve experimented this time with running half a dozen balwen x welsh things with the two tup lambs I’ll be selling next year. Any lambs they have are for the freezer and the pedigree South Downs are replacements and for the tup sales. I think the negatives about the Southdown is they have bushy old faces and their feet can be a bit rubbish which I think is why they’re not a commercial breed. But they’re easily the tamest sheep I’ve ever worked with, they have serious amount of milk and can rear decent triplets without any help.

In my opinion the best tasting lamb you’ll probably eat is actually late season lamb at the end of the summer. The rush to get them ready for Easter and the lack of fresh grass means they’re fed concentrates to get them to weight, it’s still damn good lamb but grass fed, slightly older lamb is the best. I’m biased because we lamb march time and kill any lambs for the freezer October/November time, the only corn they see is when we’re getting the ewes in to do something with them. I did put a barren ewe in the freezer last week and she’s delicious but people shy away from eating mutton.

Easter lamb Harry. Got to have them lambed early to get them to weight in time. We’re having an unusually dry and warm spell at the minute so the ewes and lambs are fine out in the field. Normally it’s piddling down with rain by now and you don’t see the lambs out in the field.

Yes...well no not fondly. They owed me money for a while and the horse wasn’t worth the bill!

One of the most bizarre things I saw once was related to a woman I knew was a lesbian. Went to fetch a horse off her knowing full well she was a lady gardener and she had a long term girlfriend/partner whatever label is currently acceptable. Met her to get a lead the final mile to the yard because apparently it was impossible to find. It wasn’t! Whereupon I met her lady friend. Only her lady friend had a big enough bulge in her latex mini skirt to put the horse to shame! I clocked the lady formerly known as a man and swerved the situation and left it all to the lovely Mrs BTJ. Even funnier was I didn’t even say a word to her I just got out of the lorry and went to drop the ramp. She didn’t think it was funny not giving her a heads up. What I struggle to understand is the gender stereotypes these people use as a role model. Fair enough you as a 50 something year old man identify as a woman but if that’s what you think you are why wouldn’t you dress appropriately? This particular person was dressed in a way that a cheap hooker would be embarrassed about. Thigh high boots, latex mini skirt, boob tube...in December!

5 knife murders in the capital this week alone. I presume they’re all young teenage men. Think about that 5 young men that are now dead and it’s almost a side note on the news nowadays. Yet some beered up ******** burn a cardboard cut out of a block of flats and the mob wants them hung drawn and quartered and the police are happy to oblige. The world has gone mad.

Granted you’d be left wanting if you went to Tesco for a tub of powder but as long as you don’t mind paying the p&p you can buy it off the internet. You buy fireworks because they explode and go bang if you’re stupid enough to buy them because the dodgy graphic on the front makes them look like a toy then you’re either too young or too stupid to be in possession of them anyway and should be a prime candidate for a Darwin Award.

I just heard on the radio they want to put pictures of fireworks related injuries on boxes of fireworks. They’re explosives of course they’re going to take your fingers off or burn big holes in your skin! I’ve got some to set off tonight, they’re only little ones but they have a recommendation that spectators stand 8m back. That surely says they’re potentially a little bit spicy and need handling with a little bit of care! I know common sense isn’t common any more but really do we need pictures of disfigured people on boxes of fireworks?!

Ultimately it comes down to whether you want to run the risk isn’t it. If it was a deer immobilised or cwtched up crippled and dying and it was quiet and there was nobody around then you probably wouldn’t have an issue. If it was the same deer but there were people or police in attendance and you run the risk of them questioning what you’re doing and the more discreet option of using a knife might be the better option. At the end of the day you must do what you feel is appropriate for the situation without getting yourself in trouble.

More likely they’re nicked for breeding like moose man said. The popularity of those horrendous mongrel breeds sproodles, cockerpoos, labradoodles etc makes a gun dog a valuable commodity. You’re looking at £800+ for one of these mongrels. Equally it’s not rocket science to switch microchips with registered pedigree dogs and breed pedigree whatever’s. I think the price of pedigree dogs over the last few years has reached ridiculous levels. I wanted a pedigree whippet puppy 18 months ago but couldn’t justify £500-700 for puppy to catch the odd rabbit and come shooting with me.

You’re allowed by law to use any means necessary to prevent an injured animal suffering. This could be a quick jab in the atlas joint with a sharp knife, a good crack on the head with a hammer or decapitation with a Samuri sword...probably want to check the legality of carrying and using a Samuri sword though. The problem comes with the wording on your fac. Like most people you probably haven’t got humane dispatch conditioned especially for deer with the HMR. It’s one of those daft grey areas, the HMR is more than capable of scrambling a deers brains in a dispatch situation but you’d fall foul of your certificate conditions. Yet conversely you could potentially use the rifle as a club and that would be fine providing you didn’t cause any suffering. Anyway I hope you helped the deer out regardless of how you did it.

I was annoyed to find the suntek ones had gone to the TF cards which clearly stands for tiny f’er. But I’m very very pleased with image quality etc on my cheap and cheerful ones.

We’ve been here before towards the end of last season if I recall. And I’m sure I did some fag packet maths with the end result being somebody making a decent profit. The general public as a whole don’t know/want/like game. I work with people who don’t know what a partridge is never mind how to cook one. Game has two attached stigmas 1 it’s tastes very strong because it’s hung forever and a day. 2 it’s a preserve of the hoypoloy rich folk. My argument has always been the same chop it up, stick it in cheap and cheerful pies for people on the breadline - the same people that were buying the Tesco horse meat pies - and they will sell. These people are on a budget and can’t afford to be fussy. When the horse meat was discovered instead of incinerating it they had reduced it to 25p a lasagne they would have sold. They could also produce a higher end product vacuum packed breasts etc in smaller quantities The carcasses can be minced into raw dog food and the feathers and guts can go to compost. There’s not going to be a lot wasted. If I had the money and the connections to set this up I really would because I think it would make me rich enough that I could go shooting all the time!

Not to sound patronising but you’re only 15 matey and at the minute it’s probably the end of your world but at your age your life is progressing so quickly that in a couple of years you’ll be living somewhere else either working or away at uni and you’ll be posting about how to hide a cabinet in a rental property and attach it to plasterboard walls. Be patient and don’t worry you’ll get it eventually. But rightly the police are so twitchy about anyone with violent convictions having any access to guns. Gun cabinets are secure but they’re not inpenetrable by a long stretch and as a consequence they believe it wouldn’t be a massive stretch for the convicted person to steal the keys or break in to the cabinet and go on a shooting spree. As ridiculous as it probably sounds to you who knows this person that’s their position.

I must say I love my 243. It’s my most accurate rifle and I think I could pretty much fill a case with any powder and ram a 6mm stone in the top and it would still shoot sub moa! It makes foxes and deer feel particularly unwell when they are introduced to it.