Travelling light

[JDog]

The rape fields which I wanted to shoot today were 300m from the road with no hard tracks available so I decided to cut down on the amount of kit I took. To me this normally means leaving behind the rotary and battery. Today I left the hide poles too.

 

I set up on a wide belt of trees with the strongish wind coming directly at me. The is never ideal but I had no option. The fifteen shells were placed in two groups 25 to 35m from the hide with a wide gap inbetween. The hide was easy - I broke off some long branches and fixed then into the barbed wire and old pig netting and simply draped the net over them. The wind kept the netting in place.

 

I readily admit an error here because the birds coming directly at me did not have sufficient time to turn into the wind and the decoys and I was too idle or too thick to see that if I put the decoys further out the conundrum would be solved. Those coming from either side could get into the decoys as could those directly over head from behind but there were less of them.

 

In an hour and a half I shot and picked 13. Some were difficult others were easy. The walk back to the car was manageable.

 

* Note to myself..... even if I travel light I must take my seat. It weighs very little and getting up from the seat to take a shot is easier than bobbing up and down in the hide keeping out of sight then rising to shoot.