who's got all the pigeons .

[Highlander]

I raised this topic sometime back on here after reading an article by ‘The Major’ that he wrote back in the early ‘70’s. Nobody read it then but I'm going to re-post it just in case anyone bothers...Official figures then put the number of pigeons being exported by UK game dealers at close to 2 million birds per annum and Archie’s rhetorical question was whether the (woody) population could withstand such a ‘cull’ and queried how many breeding pairs of birds were needed to keep the population at (then) current levels.

 

I assume the official records only covered ‘exported’ birds and there was no record of the additional numbers being killed but not exported. How many in total I wonder, 2.5 million, 3 million?

 

So onward to today, some 40 years later. A lot more people out shooting pigeons, a lot more large bags being reported etc etc so how many are we shooting each year now? Certainly more than in Archie’s time, maybe 3 million, maybe 4, maybe more. Whatever the figure just stop for a moment to consider the number of breeding pairs needed to sustain that sort of continuous cull. I know we can all tell tales of woody breeding 3 times in a year, that’s 6 young per pair BUT how many survive to adulthood, 1 maybe 2 possibly but I doubt more and suspect less. Therefore at best woody is maintaining numbers, certainly NOT increasing them and most probably is in decline or will be if current cull levels are maintained.

 

Oh I know we can all talk about the numbers we see BUT when we also see pictures on here and elsewhere of 500, 600, 700 bird days it won’t take long for local populations to fall to very low levels and ‘local’ is what woody is about as in spite of people still talking about ‘continental’ visitors and birds migrating I think there’s enough science to prove that doesn’t happen to any extent.

 

OK so farmers and growers will probably not shed a tear (might even party) and neither will those guys on here and elsewhere who, like your herring fisherman and other sea fishers in general ,refuse to consider let alone believe that woody might one day (and possibly in the not too distant future) become a rare bird. A sad day for those of us who respect the woodpigeon for their craft, their guile, their aerial acrobatics and above all for the sport they provide us. Yes (at present) they are an agripest (to be managed not wiped out) but still worthy of our respect.

 

I’m not saying it will happen BUT if we continue to shoot the numbers we do and are encouraged to do so by all the shooting organisations and the media we should at least consider whether our kids might like some of the sport we’ve enjoyed all these years.

[anser2]

Harnser I shoot 15 miles to the west of you and until three weeks ago we had almost no pigeons . A number of birds , perhaps 2000 moved in feeding on maze strips and drilling , but these seem to have moved on. I was out on drilling yesterday and never got a bird. They ignored rape since christmas and i have only seen the odd small group on the crop in the past 3 months . Many days I tour my 7000 acres of pigeon shooting and never even bother to get the gun out of the car only seeing a hand full of pigeons . I have a wildfowling club draw winner up thisn weekend , but god knows where I am going to find any birds for him to shoot.

 

I have a strong suspicion two cold winters have taken a heavy toll on the birds

Edited March 21, 2011 by anser2

[M ROBSON]

We've had good numbers of Pigeons in Fife all winter, even through all the snow we had.

 

The drillings are late on my ground due to rain and SNOW :o last week, I'm shooting my first drills tommorrow, about 200 acres of barley on one farm.

 

They are still on the rape in good numbers though, just starting to break up out of their big bunches.

 

I had 4 Danish guns out today, 1 on clover shot 31, and 3 on rape shot 36, 37 & 51 for a combined 474 shots.

 

Mark.