Norfolk wildfowler

End of season Blues . My season has been a real wash out. To start with only on rare occasions can I get on to this forum. I got a new computer which needed a new email , but this forum would not let me log onto it. But nor would it recognize my old email , but there are just odd times when it changes its mind. But then back to square one. As for the season it started with a few mallard and a cracking single high greylag downed with Bismuth 4s in September followed by a couple more mallard and then all my marshes both syndicate, club and private just emptied of duck and geese and I never fired another shot for the remainder of the season. At one stage I went for 1 flights without even seeing a bird and to top it all the pigeon roost shooting was restricted to gunners living in the home village by the lock down and my shooting for the winter finished. Doubly annoying because my dog has finished her training stage , performed quite well , but is at the stage where what she needs is experience. Lets hope we can pick up the threads again next season without any problems. On a brighter side settled in my new home just south of Gt Yarmouth and love to be back in the area I grew up in.

There by talks someone who has never given a fair trial to steel. What many people do not realise steel needs a bit of for thought, changing shot sizes , matching the chokes to the load and speed of the shell and so on. I have shot everything from game to wildfowl with steel and found more cleaner kills and fewer wounded birds and all this talk about rebounding shot is rubbish. It does not rebound as much as lead in my experience. Get a gun made to shoot steel and learn new methods of shooting and you will have no problems with it. Steel is just as good as lead these days.

What you said wha true in a few studies where it was needed to know what dosage was fatal. One pellet was found to be enough to kill a mallard. But most studies are of ducks naturaly picking up lead pellets from water or are of wild birds finding lead in their habitat .

Ms Pain was one of 3 authors the others not from the WWT . They draw information from dozens of papers by many other researchers most of whome have nothing to do with the WWT. another link https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2716116/ if you do not like Ms Pains joint paper. It has nothing to do with money ( steel shells can be found cheaper than many similar lead shells, its to do with the birds welfare.

Google Waterfowl poisoning and you will find plenty of info. But here is a sample https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13280-019-01159-0

Most of the studies were done with the mallard picking the lead from a separate dish of water and with grit available. To my knowledge only one test was done force feeding the duck and has been disregarded as unsafe data. Lead poisoning is far more common than most fowlers realise. There is no reason to even think of shooting led at waterfowl these days. Get a gun that will handle steel and there will no problem. Steel works very well at waterfowl, pheasants and pigeons. I have shot thousands of pigeon with steel and found my killing average is better with steel than lead. And there have been fiber wad steel cartridges available for years. No use steel or bismuth.

But what happens to the lead shot that falls on firm surfaces on for example gravel pits. I have handled dozens of tufted duck and pochard while duck ringing that have been suffering from lead poisoning.

I can tell you now waterfowl cannot tell the difference between lead and grit. If you do not belive it get a few mallard, place a mixed dish of grit and corn and give it a few weeks. By then most of the mallard will be dead, from lead poisoning. Could you tell the difference between lead by touch in the dark when most wild duck feed ? Its been done many times.

For the forth year running the East Norfolk duck seem to have had a very poor breeding season. This season at least I thought the warm dry spring would let them do well , but I have only seen 2 well grown broods on the marshes and too many pairs about for the time of year. Village ponds are a different story where the young get fed by the public. I have been doing a lot of fishing on the Chet and Wavenly and yet to see any ducklings on the open rivers. What is even more worrying I have been doing some pond dipping on the South Breydon Marshes and insect life is very sparce. Few water beetles , no water boatmen, only a handful shrimps and few dragon and damselfly lava. In short the dykes are almost empty of aquatic insect life and its this very life that the ducklings depend on in their early days. Just look up the national trends in mallard populations in the UK and the breeding population were down by -7 indices over the last 20 years and -33 for wintering birds. Greylag on the other hand seem to have some very good broods with one of five and a second of 8 seen ( all just flying ) seen on the Wavenly Yesterday.

We have 3.5 months before the wildfowling season starts , but now is the time to make sure the government knows what wildfowling is and how its conducted. Too many non shooters thing shooting is a social sport with lines of guns and beaters. We need to make sure Boris and co know its a solitary sport.

You are right for you and me , but a few on here can and do hit their geese mainly in the head time after time such as 6.5SSE. My personal choice in steel for geese is BBB with a very full choke (.700) but I have shot a lot of lowish geese ( greylags ) with no 3 that have come over while I have been duck shooting. Most have been immobilized and unable to escape , but few have been killed outright. But then I am not that good a shot and most have been body shot. I should add that I rarely use steel these days , but Bismuth and Tungstun.

In the first post itwas you who opened with insults directed at me. Just to remind you the Wildflower (sic) schoolboy comment. If you disagree with what I have put on hear then find and reference your opinions. You seem great at claiming people have lost an argument without offering any counter arguments yourself. Still more signs of immaturity I suppose.

I am not a member of the EU and have no access to their minuets. But A small sample of others who do and come from both left and right wing politics do so follow them up yourself. And Hancocks own admission was on several TV news programs brushed over by saying he was confused . The Guardian Ministers are being pressed to reveal the full details of how the government missed out on four opportunities to join an EU medical supplies consortium, in the wake of a U-turn by the top civil servant in the Foreign Office over comments suggesting it was a “political decision”. The Labour MP Chris Bryant, who sits on the foreign affairs select committee, said on Wednesday that he “feared the government was involved in a full-on cover-up” over how it came to miss out on four rounds of procurement of personal protective equipment (PPE), ventilators and laboratory supplies launched by the EU in late February and March. UK officials failed to take up an invitation to join the steering committee of participating countries that issues orders for medical equipment until 19 March – after the bulk purchases had been made. Bryant said he feared either Foreign Office ministers or the prime minister decided not to be associated with any EU scheme for political reasons “even though it was patently in the interests of the NHS and its staff to explore every possible avenue to acquire masks, gowns and ventilator equipment, as fast and most effectively as possible”. Evening Standard The Health Secretary has been forced to deny the UK's failure to take part in an EU scheme to get vital ventilators for the coronavirus crisis was politically motivated. The Foreign Office’s top civil servant Sir Simon McDonald claimed earlier that officials had briefed ministers on what schemes were still open to the UK after leaving the EU at the end January. Sir Simon told the foreign affairs select committee on Monday that "it was a political decision" not to be involved. https://www.thenational.scot/news/18399718.eu-rubbishes-matt-hancocks... https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/g63v7q/eu_rejects_matt... EU rejects Matt Hancock’s claims that UK is part of bloc’s PPE scheme B efore spending 100,000 of Uk taxpayers you would have thought Boris and co just might have thought about sending a NHS official to check the PPE was up to standard.

I think you have read the post wrong. No its not true The EU had offered and the UK turned them dowm. Rea d the above post on the time line.

You have not a clue what the hell you are talking about. I come from a staunch Tory family and certainly do not hate them. What I hate is the fools who are the party now putting their personal interest first and those who never listen to 2-3 or even more sides to an argument. Closed minds. Most Every days I trawl a dozen news sources to look at all sides of an argument. pity you do not do the same. And why the so called jibes calling me a wildflower ( sic ) . just shows how immature you are. Whats wrong with an anti Brexit slant , you have a right to your pro Brexit stance in the same way i have to anti brexit or have you got such fascist ideas that every one must agree with you or they are not worth listening to. More signs of immaturity. As for more comments about the present corvid 19 situation. You cannot be happy with our country having the highest mortality mortality in Europe due to the failure of our government. Time to grow up J dog.

I do not know exactly what the EU produces , but it includes most of the equipment we are very short of.

What I did not realise the EU scheme did not need to import from abroad and was able to get their needs internally though they thought they were going to have to import from outside the EU , but internal demand was not as high as expected. Pre the virus outbreak. World PPE production. EU 25.95%USA 18.30%China 7.72%Row 48.03% Source: World Bank WITS and Bruegel’s own calculations. That’s why the scheme never got going , but instead of scouring the world markets the UK could have shared in the excess they were producing. The timeline of the episode shows how the government handled the situation: 4 February British officials attended a meeting in Brussels during which the European Commission said it was ready to help organise the bulk-buying medical equipment using the power of the single market. 2 March British officials attended another EU meeting where the commission’s health department said 20 EU countries were ready to join such a scheme for personal protective equipment. 13 March British officials attended another meeting where EU officials discussed the addition of ventilators to the procurement scheme. 17 March A spokesperson for the commission confirms in public when asked by journalists whether the UK is able to take part in the procurement scheme. 19 March The prime minister Boris Johnson is urged by British politicians to join the scheme. In Brussels, the UK takes part in another meeting on joint procurement 24 March Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, announces publicly that the commission’s joint procurement initiative had generated “concrete offers of considerable scale at short notice” to supply surgical masks, overalls, goggles, and face shields. 26 March Asked in the morning why the UK isn’t taking part in the scheme, a Downing Street spokesperson says: “We are no longer members of the EU.” Boris Johnson is accused off being “ideological” for not taking part. Later in the evening the prime minister’s spokesperson tells Westminster journalists that in fact, a communication error meant the UK had missed the invitation to participate in the scheme 29 March Asked why the government did not join the scheme, cabinet minister Michael Gove tells The Andrew Marr Show “there is nothing that we can’t do as an independent nation that being part of that scheme would have allowed us to do” adding that there was “communication confusion”. 10 April Matt Hancock tells a Downing Street briefing the UK is working hard opening new supply lines for protective equipment around the world to fill a shortage. 12 April The extended deadline for putting orders in the latest round of the EU’s equipment procurement scheme. The UK has placed no orders. 14 April Cabinet minister Therese Coffey seems to suggest not going the scheme was a deliberate decision, telling LBC radio: “The government has made an assessment that by joining the schemes, it wasn’t going to make any particular difference.” 21 April The Foreign Office’s top civil servant Sir Simon McDonald tells MPs he briefed ministers about the options and that they made a “political decision” not to join the scheme. Later in the afternoon, Matt Hancock tells a daily press briefing “as far as I’m aware there was no political decision not to participate in that scheme ... we are now members of that scheme”. Following the briefing by the health secretary, Sir Simon writes to MPs to retract what he told them. 22 April Contrary to what Matt Hancock said the day before, EU officials tell The Independent: “They are not participating in any of the existing schemes but they have indicated that they would be open to participating in any future schemes.” In Brussels, a Commission spokesperson refers to the meetings the EU attended and says there was “ample opportunity” to join. At a briefing in Westminster, a Downing Street spokesperson says “nobody” leant on Sir Simon to get him to retract his report to MPs Too little too late the story of Boris and co.

You got one right. But I follow the news on all channels and from abroad.

Not according to Sky news, C4 news, CBS news ITV news , Radio 4 news and the BBC news plus a number of other current affairs programs. 3 tines the EU asked if we wanted to join their PPE bulk buying program . 3 times the UK government said no or did not bother to reply. Where did you get your info from because its clearly wrong. We did have an arrangement to get some with Germany , but that was later and the Germans by them needed ourselves. We also had PPE come from the USA. Just to add it took seconds me to find this quote from the Guardian online UK missed three chances to join EU scheme to bulk-buy PPE Exclusive: Britain did not take part in €1.5bn order for kit to protect against Covid-19 despite shortages in NHS

You really do not get it. Anyone with any intelligence knew what was coming just watch the news . Sp why did the government ignore what they knew what was coming. Probably they hoped it would blow over and them they would save money. If the government had acted when they knew the lock down would have been far more effective because the virus would be be established. As for being PM , Boris gets paid to deal and minimise the effects of things like this virus. In this he has failed. Where is a real leader when you want one. I never though I would say this , but where are you Maggie.

O yes they were. I could see it coming and took preventive measures well before our government had given it a second thought. I had PPE and in lockdown 2 weeks before the government had even thought about lockdowns. Asleep at the wheel is exactly what they are guilty of. Its their job to spot and act on these things , but they ignored it. If I saw it so should have Boris and co, but then he never was much good at things that affect people. He never even bothered to visit the poor ******* flooded out in the west country. Boris excuse- he did not want to get in the way. An curtsy visit to see what was going on is not getting in the way on the contrary its raseing the profile of the problem. And yes any potential pandemic is very comparable. As for shutting down the aircraft flights, the UK still has not done it and an average of 15,000 a day are still flooding into the country. Ops Boris is still asleep. I am very sorry he caught the virus , but whos fault was that. There were many occasions when he did photo\publicity meetings with Drs and nurses, he did not practice social distancing and shook more hands than you could count. If he had not caught the virus it would have been amazing. Asleep again.

I will contact you if we have any again this year . They do not come every year and are usually late, well into January before they arrive. They like it if its wet and we have a few splashes. I have moved back to my old Broadland haunts and love it down here. Coastal fowling is getting a bit to much for me these days. Look after yourself too. I take it you are still in the Fens. I have been doing quite a bit of game shooting and wildfowling down there in the last 20 years on the washes and at Soham. Even managed a few geese too.

Took me years to get my first whitefront. My first attempt. Watching a skein full of barred adults take off , pass at extream range. My single pulled out the only pink foot that was flying with them. second with 6.5x55se on the sea wall. We both droped a whitefront under the moon , but mine was winged and it was high tide. Went back without a gun ( no Sunday shooting in Norfolk ) the next morning only to see it run for a flooded creek and swim away. The next flew away when I went to pick it up. The next fell in an ice filled creek on the Wash where it was impossible to send a dog and then finally got one while in the middle of a major pink foot flight. Once one was in the bag got 5 more before the end of the season. 4 shot on my syndicate marsh last season , but not by me.

Boris and Co will not trust us to know what is going on and would rather treat us like children and sing happy birthday twice while washing our hands.

The WHO managed to stop the last 3 potential pandemic virus and SARS, Swine Flue ect. The leaders of the world were asleep at the wheel on this one