ClemFandango

Henry.

this.

good attitude.

Brilliant. Well done for standing up to them and seeing it through.

Thanks for the update. Hopefully what unfolds is the arrival of your certificate, as requested in the post and no more questions asked!

With all due respect. Don't generalise, I know plenty of foreshore gunners that are out on the 1st. Myself included, as I have been since I was a child with my father and grandfather and will continue to. Admittedly the shooting is quite restrained but it is possible to pick out mature birds, this year I shot a single drake teal out of about a dozen opportunities. If you extend the inland season at the expense of the extra days in September I will lose out and I'm not happy about that suggestion. Also, September is the only month of the year where it is still light enough to get my lad out on the marsh during the week after school. After that I am limited to weekends and school holidays. As for extending the inland season to match the season below the high tide I have no objection. I assume that the thinking behind it was that resident birds will be more likely to be inland whereas migrants may stay on the foreshore? I am also one of those fifty or less active puntgunners you speak of and will be until I can't physically drag myself into the punt anymore. I don't usually even think about punting until the weather comes in hard and the birds pack up which is usually early January.

You are aware that it's not compulsory to shoot birds just because they are in season? And that there are adult birds present early in the season as well? Clubs can educate shooters on best practice, the majority of people exercise restraint early in the season Below mean high tide the season ends on the 20th of Feb, would you extend this season by a month into March then? if you make the season start a month later coastal fowlers are losing a month at the start of the season for a gain of eight days at the end. Leave the season as it is.

The old ******* a sporting chance of getting out of bed before first light.

I've heard they taste nice roasted. Trouble is they have a tendency to repeat on you.

Nice. I hope you get the right result without too much fuss. Maybe Essex licensing branch should do DSC1, they obviously need the education.

Your FEO is dead wrong. The Deer act specifically names Muntjac DEER and CWD. A person shall not be guilty of an offence under section 4(2)(a) above if he uses for the purpose of taking or killing or injuring any Chinese water deer (Hydropotes inermis) or muntjac deer (Muntiacus reevesi)— (a)a rifle having a calibre of not less than .220 inches and a muzzle energy of not less than 1,356 joules (1000 foot pounds), and (b)a soft-nosed or hollow-nosed bullet weighing not less than 3.24 grammes (50 grains).] Why would they be named in the deer act if they were vermin? Take this to your shooting organisation as your police force are taking the mickey.

Personally I can see the sense behind the idea, I'm not totally sure banning energy drinks for under 18's is the answer but at the same time I can't see that the ban will do any harm - nobody really needs energy drinks to function, if you do you have a problem. And much less someone under 18, I did my GCSE's and A levels without energy drinks as have hundreds of thousands maybe millions more, what has changed that school children need so much sugar and caffeine? I would say that a ban on the sale of energy drinks to under 18's would do more good than harm so in principal I am behind it. That or heavily tax sugar and caffeine past a certain threshold and use the money to subsidise the cost of fruit and veg? Who knows what's best? not me. What I do know is that for as long as I have control over my kids they won't be allowed energy drinks and personally I am not in a rush to start chugging red bull.

I work with some conservation bodies, part of my work is raptor monitoring etc. I spend a lot of my time and energy defending the shooting community, trying to build bridges, it's in all our interests to work together. Every time something like this happens it's a total kick in the balls for the shooting community's reputation and a massive "I told you so!" for all the people out there who think that every shooter is out there murdering birds of prey. The fact that this sort of stuff still goes on is utterly ridiculous. ******* cretin.

Yeah, good point. Avoiding them as well. I would agree, or a pump action of course. That said I enjoy using my side by side for driven days, not that I shoot many days through a year.

I close my gun stock to barrel and raise the barrel up from behind, that way it never passes through the line.