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Overall condition of quarry in this weather


Ferret Master
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Hi,

 

This isn't intended to be a thread about the rights and wrongs of shooting various species in this hard winter weather, but more of a resource to see what other people are experiencing in your area and around the country.

 

So, who has been shooting? How much snow is on the ground where you are? How long has the ground been frozen and most importantly what condition is the various quarry you have shot been in? Full crops and stomachs or empty?

 

Cheers,

 

FM

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we had a good bout of snow couple weeks ago, it rained one night and melted it, then we have just had hard white frosts alday everday

 

any still water is frozen and has been for a week now

 

pigeons are in fine fettle, full crops at roost and plenty of meat on them

 

rabbits are as good as ever

 

pheasants are in good shape aswell

 

partridges seem to have dissapeared (we usually have a couple of small coveys)

 

wildfowl are doing fine, plenty of running water for them near here

 

woodcock seem to be in good shape, not seen a poor flyer since the snow

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Had a couple of inches here 2 weeks ago and a week of hard frosts. Then had 3 days of thaw but the ponds and reservoirs didn't fully melt. Had a foot of snow 4 days ago and it's melted to about 6 inches now but it's still freezing at night.

Pheasants, Partridge and Pigeons are in good condition.

Most woodcock are in good condition but a few seem to be struggling as wel as the snipe.

Ducks are in pretty poor condition and 2 days ago I saw in excess of 600 wigeon feeding on rape as the whole reservoir they'd come from was frozen and this was the only available food.

Song birds are doing OK as well.

Edited by Cam-S94
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same here had snow on the ground for a month and still snowing, pigeons are fat as mud, pheasants are ok along with partridge, woodcock and snipe suffering a bit.. shot one of each today and they were very thin indeed.

rabbits are ok aswell as they are eating all our newly planted christmas trees :angry:

ducks seem to be ok.

no worries yet

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we have had snow on the ground for over 3 weeks here and its been freezing at nights for over 4 weeks (apart from 2 nights). stopped shooting ducks and geese 5 days before suspension was brought in as on a tide flight the teal were starting to show the effects of the weather but borderline to still shoot , we then had a pink and a wigeon which were both very thin so we stopped shooting . although birds were in this condition the were not suicdal to decoys and still offering testing shots but we packed up and left anyway . i heard wild partridge are thin as my mate shot 1 over a week ago . our pheasants were in top condition on sat but all feeders are full so no probs for them . had a day vermin shooting which we had 16 squirels (all fat and healthy) 4/5 in some dreys . 13 pigeon which were ok but the only feed they could get were the tops of sprouts and berries of trees as there was 22 inch of snow at the time . snow melted a bit now and rape starting to show through and pigeon hitting it hard in some areas . cant comment on rabbits as not shot one in a while .

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