highseas Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 (edited) on friday i bumped into a old freind of mine,lex and we got talking about the number of rabbits about the place, and their being a lack of rabbits on my place, "its just my bloody luck i said i make a hundred snares then shoot all the rabbits" old lex says "ach no to worry lad well get up top mine the morra if ya want,ken" and so i was set, sautrday we could meet at his land at dawn and set out a few wires, untill 5am on saturday i was greeted with rain hammering on the roof, the thort of turning the alarm off and going back to sleep was a nice one but a 5 min snooze soon had we awake too the thort of a old chap sat on a hill side waiting for me to show up... or the other way around so a quick phone call was in order just to make shure it was still on,, and on it was. i got 75 peg snare with fig4 tealers and 25 fence snares loaded into a back pack, i was on the motobike today, i quick look to make shure i had everything. snares knife spare pegs knee pads wire cutters phone check list sorted i set of up to the far side of the hills, now this farm borders on a very very big estate with 7 full time keepers and a rather pig headed arab that owns it. the desision no to come snareing on hear was based on the phsant season opening as their would almost certianly be some in the fence snares. i met lex in the gateway, he looked just like the kind of rabbit catcher you would like to think exsisted in the old days, a wised old face thats seen 70 odd summers and a wax jacket that looks like its seen just as many! a flat cap topped it all off, lex has a very bright personality the kind that can liven the spirits, when you are faced with 2 hours of getting very wet you need it too. we agreed that lex would set the fences and i would do the runs with the peg snares, mainly because we dont like each others way of snareing he likes the small noose 4 fingers high, and i like the big loop 5 inches high, we both get rabbits but we always say each others method is **** so after a quick disscusion about where to go first. lead us to a pasture about 4 ach in size witha fairly steep slope going down hill thena old stone dyke topped off with a fence leading into anuther field about the same size,a bit of scrubby gorsey ground borderd one side and a big reed bed the other. we were to set the top field first then move to the bottem if we had any wires left. just stood at the gate i could see upwards of 40 rabbits running about the bit of field we could se with a fairly thick fog comeing in this was only 150m or so, i knew it would be a good haul lex went away down the right had side and me down the left, their was no wind at all but i could see rabbits bloody very where and was wishing i had more snares! i put a lenth of bailer twine on the fence about 50m fromhe top of the field this was to be my marker for the first line of snares. the runs were like bloody run ways going both up and across the field. i was going to se two lines across the field and one down. the first snare; i look for a beat thats clear but small in a streight line if i can find it then with a slightly pear shaped snare 5 and a half inch high a 7 inch across placed dead center on the beat ped hammerd home by a mallet i had cadged of lex as i left mine at home the first line of snares took 34 from my arm i was glad of this they where getting heavy. i walked 50 my further down and started setting on my way back to the reed bed, i had maybe 10 more out in this direction when i heard lex singing some god awfull vera lyn song thru the fog and chuckeld to my self, this was some thing he truely loved doing, almost as much as me i fear! with lex passed on by still singing "white cliffs of dover :o " i kept on setting their were a lot of runs down hear and i could still se lots of rabbits around me a even heard a couple of squeeals of rabbits getting the the top line of wires all ready! i only had 17 snares left by the time i had finished this row so i made my way up the field settin as i went along the reeds, setting al my peg snares. i walked the top line of wires on the way back to the other side of the field to find lex and pulled 6 rabbits from them and hung them on the fence. i made my way down the fence i could se lexes footprints in the wet grass and the snares on the fence "thats good i thort he`ll get em before they get to my mine!" their was 2 in his snares by this time so i pulled them out and re set them aswell, we had been at it about a haour and a half by this time. i found lex sat on the bank at the bottom of the field, "do you wana set this fence too" he said, holding up a bundle of snares. "well were hear so lets do the field below this one ive only got fence snares left" so i went to the far side as "i was younger" i soon had my 25 fence wires out as well as 11 of lexes that we had halfed.. we walked back up the field that seemed a hell of a lot longer than it was on the way down , lex was weezing a bit now, showing his age poor chap we picked the rabbits up on the way back up to the top a a quick brew from the flask and we went our ways. agreeing we would meet hear in the moring same time, hope fully their would be no fog that by this time was realy realy bad i was half exspecting to be eaten by a werwolf! to be cont.......... Edited October 2, 2011 by highseas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WelshLamb Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 Good hunting! Well done! Although personally, I dont like snaring :( I think its cruel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highseas Posted October 2, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 (edited) part 2 this morning was much the same as yeaterday jut not as much fog! only today i couldent roll over and not go, i has snares to look, shure enugh lex was their bright and early as ever, with a brew in hand. we both got our ropes ready we use blue poly rope to carry the rabbits first we hock them them thread then thru the rope like a sling. a look down the field showed my first line of snares were much closer to the road than i thort they were, probly due to the fog. i could se a few rabbits out down the bottom of the field and a good few grazeing dotted around the field, and every hear and their their was the tell tale white belly of a rabbit in the fence wires lex set of down the fence again and i set about lifting my fist line first snare one rabbit so far so good! along the line i could se a few more,from the first 34 snares i took 11 rabbits with 6 knocked snares the rest had not been touched, i was a little bit angry about the knocked snare`s i like to catch them every time! row 2 had 24 snares they had 14 rabbits in them so i was very pleased with that result but again their was a few knocked snares, the way they were knocked sugested they wernt set high enugh i could se from a dip in the field lex had not drawn leavle with me so he had a few too. i left the last line of peg snares for the way back up the hill, so moveing on to my side of the bottom field, to pick up the 45 or so fence snares i had their te first 5-6 were empty even thou they were on good runs??? even so their were a couple of rabbits out in the field so i clapped my hands and sent them running in one went thrue a run and away the other got to the fence and started doing back flips!! one more! this line of snares had only 14 rabbits and 6 pheasants the pheasants were no suprise but it happens. so i gutted the rabbits into the reed bed and made my way over to lexes side he stil was not their yet thou. i made my up this side picking up snares and rabbits as i went, i was getting hard going bby now thou i had a good 20 rabbits and nearly 60 snares and 9 pheasant. i met lex about 1/4 of the way down he said he had a load aswell! he had been braceing them up and hanging them on the fence as he went. so i gave him the snares and pheasants and he too them to the car i picked up as many rabbits as i could and took them up the hill, by this time i was almost dead! them we both come back down for the rest of his rabits and pheasants :look: once we had all them in it was time to get mine... after a brew thou brew over we set off witha spring in the step we had some money worth of rabbits by now. coleated up my bundles and snares and staggerd back up the hill, ashamed to say lew was paceing me by a long way (note to self....must get fit) we the rabbits into a blue bag and streightend the snares off and re-tensiond them at the same time we like to do this every time we pick up that way we can get them out faster. all in all from 75 peg snares and 75 fence snares we got 61 rabbits from 2 fields not to bad but not as good as we were hopeing as well as 11 pheasants that has got in the fence snares. we took them to show the farmer and gave him a brace of pheasnts and rabbits, he chuckled when he say the phesants and said "maha will be doing his nut in if he seys you wi them" we then rememberd i had not picked the last line of peg snares up i had to dop it on my own as it was my fault their was only 7 in them and they were all old smelly bucks too so back to the top i marched, had a brew and a bit of carrot cake from mrs lex then agreed to split the rabbit money 50/50 lex wanted 60/40 as he had to take them to the dealers rabbing ******* lol who knows maybe next weekend well go again??? Edited October 2, 2011 by highseas Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spara Dritto Posted October 2, 2011 Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 (edited) Top job, awesome write-up! Edited October 2, 2011 by Beretta Italy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highseas Posted October 2, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 cheers took a while to wright Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highseas Posted October 2, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2011 Good hunting! Well done! Although personally, I dont like snaring :( I think its cruel it can be a bit brutle fence snare are better they kill faster Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wharf Rat Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 Nice write up. Reminded me of going snaring with my Dad - good haul too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
39TDS Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 Nice write up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highseas Posted October 3, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 cheers lads Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
semiautolee Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 Well that killed 10 mins of my board time, well done mate nice write up p.s spelling police will have a field day reading that :lol: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alanl50 Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 Superb write up I really enjoyed it, well done as said before it reminded me of my younger days when I used to do some snaring, not on your scale though, but after seeing them stuck in the snares with swollen heads etc I decided it wasnt for me I prefered to shoot them. Well done Alan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frenchieboy Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 I'm not a big lover of snares, there are too many "cowboys" about that use them and get it all wrong but I don't have a problem with them set by "experienced operators" even though I would not use snares myself! That was quite a good haul of rabbits - Shame about the pheasant though! Good write up mate and well done guys! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kent Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 it can be a bit brutle fence snare are better they kill faster Strange, i always preffered them well out were the rabbit was more likely to hit them with some momentum especially effective on slopes. Never been a fan of snaring fences due to the pheasant issue etc. To the critic who says Cruel? what in relation to shooting? never had a rabbit go off wounded from a snare, occasionally you catch them round the middle but they tend to settle if not harrased and snaring normally means high dencity of bunnies and checks every two hours or so to maximise the catch. One should not be throwing stones in a glass house The idea is to catch them on the hop and get a instant necked bunnie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frenchieboy Posted October 3, 2011 Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 Kent - I think that this is where the problem with snares really kicks in! Snares are an effective and humane form of rabbit control. The problem (In my opinion) lies when you have inexperienced people setting snares that not only set them in the wrong places they also tend to set them at the wrong heights etc and don't check them often enough, and can catch all types of creatures in a rather inhumane manner. This was what I was pointing at when I said about not having a problem with snares when set by an experienced operator. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
highseas Posted October 3, 2011 Author Report Share Posted October 3, 2011 yeh the spelling and grammer is pretty bad,but i was snareing rabbits insted of takeing english lessons i think the old way of snareing rabbits is a compleat wast of time! and ive heard so many stupid rules about snareing rabbits like sooting them over a candle so the rabbits dont se them :blink: a freind of mine uses bull`s eye snareing it sounds odd and is almost inpossible to master but my god its humane! if you want ile do a wee post on "how too" haveing them out in the open in peg snares means they are almost always alive so the crows dont get them but their heads are all swolen up and legs tangled in the wire some times :unsure: with fence snareing their hung in no time and i found that the crows wont eat them if they are hanging from a fence, i dont know why at home seagulls were a problem for this too. i thing the best of both worlds is eather useing kill sticks for small munbers of snares or hoop snares rigged so the snare wont spin on the leg and gets wraped around the other one. ive heard of a field up their that you catch more pheasants than rabbits :yp: as a game keeper is should be discusted at this but, the gameie on this ground cut up 200 snares once for us! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
islandmartin Posted October 12, 2012 Report Share Posted October 12, 2012 Good writeup. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
POPPY-72 Posted October 12, 2012 Report Share Posted October 12, 2012 nice read :good: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paddywack12 Posted October 15, 2012 Report Share Posted October 15, 2012 Nice write up. Enjoyed reading about your exploits Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pestcontrol1 Posted October 16, 2012 Report Share Posted October 16, 2012 top write up and with a good bag of bunnys to boot Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rimfireboy Posted October 16, 2012 Report Share Posted October 16, 2012 Interesting read, thanks for the write up. Enjoyed reading it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
la bala Posted October 16, 2012 Report Share Posted October 16, 2012 great write up, interesting reading Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billywoodsman Posted October 16, 2012 Report Share Posted October 16, 2012 I too found that a interesting read,thanks for posting buddy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sharkeyes Posted October 19, 2012 Report Share Posted October 19, 2012 cracking read Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moor man Posted November 3, 2012 Report Share Posted November 3, 2012 Thanks highseas good writeup, lot of effort put in snareing and writing. Some photos of your technique would be good, can you explain bullseye snaring please? thanks MM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
halight Posted November 4, 2012 Report Share Posted November 4, 2012 Great write up mate, Well done Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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