Poults Vs Ex-Layers

[poshpaddy]

What is everyones experience of putting down ex layers?

 

Trying to expand the shoot I'm involved with next year and putting a budget together at the moment. I know they are a lot cheaper, free/£1 compared to £3.00/3.50 for a poult but do they fly / hold / survive any better or worse?

 

Views / Experiences much appreciated.

[Lez325]

This is the welcome section Mate

 

Les

 

so welcome to the watch

[Blackpowder]

Ex layers are in my mind a total waste of money regardless of how cheap they are. Of fity released on a shoot I was involved with a few years ago only one wing tag was recovered. Where they went no one knows as none of the surrounding shoots reported any, which they would have done with great glee. No whatever your budget is spend it on poults and by what I have seen on self keepered shoots try and get them as late in the year as possible as lang as they are mature well tailed birds by the time of your first shoot.

 

Blackpowder

 

PS and welcome to PW

[poshpaddy]

Thanks for the welcome and apologies for sticking this on the wrong forum, still trying to find my way around the site.

 

Cheers for the input Blackpowder.

[Piebob]

The first ever year we started our shoot we had ex-layers, and whilst they faired reasonably well they weren't fantastic.

 

After that, we switched to more expensive poults and they did much better.

 

I suppose that each year we are learning a bit more, creating better habitat, etc. and when it was my turn on the feeding / watering checks I used to spend quite a bit of time whistling them in, then herding up any stragglers.

 

Still feel that the poults were much better though.

[proTOM1]

You will find ex-layers tend to walk a bit so numbers and dogging in are very important . When putting ex-layers down i will now not put down any less than 100 due to them walking off ,if you have the money go for poults

[RichS]

We're putting down ex-layers for next season, mostly because of the time we'd have to spend on the shoot if we put poults down, im a little worried now having read peoples experiences of their tendency to wander!!

[danddo]

I know that cost has a large part to play in this but beware of going for the cheaper option as ex-layers WILL wander and not return) and your returns will be nowhere near that of putting poults down. Good Luck

[trxnav]

if putting down ex layers what we tend to do is put them in a pen hold them in there for as long as poss but when it comes to letting them out only let out about 80% of them, the remaining 20% will act as a kinda calling bird so the others will tend to come back to roost but like said they do like to wander but then thats in a pheasants nature. We allways put down ex layers because we do not have the time to spend on poults as the looking after part is a lot more intense!!! good luck with what you decide it is all trial and error.

[RichS]

Hi trxnav,

 

What sort of returns do you get on your ex layers?

[ollieb84]

What is everyones experience of putting down ex layers?

 

Trying to expand the shoot I'm involved with next year and putting a budget together at the moment. I know they are a lot cheaper, free/£1 compared to £3.00/3.50 for a poult but do they fly / hold / survive any better or worse?

 

Views / Experiences much appreciated.

one of your biggest problems with ex layers is the disease, they carry alot and if you release with poults it might transfer to them in my mind ex layers are a waste of time, one thing i would try is offer a bit of shooting in return for some poults if the budget cant stretch too far.

[trxnav]

we allways manage around 40-50% return which shou,d be about right it all depends on the land and what the surroundings are we do seem to be building up a good head of wild birds now as well.