JDog and the Fog.

[Clodhopper]

JDog and I had planned to meet up today and just see what we could find. I had some birds on my farms and J Dog had spied a few on his but nothing too promising. We met up at Chateau del JDog at 10 am. We were both some what dispondant as a thick fog had rolled in meaning we could see nothing beyond 100 yards at best. Nevertheless we are both mad(keen) so we pressed on anyway. 

We headed to a bomb hole in which grows some  Scots pines and Larch, this is surrounded by rape and popular with the local pigeons. Upon arrival we could not see the trees but decided we had nothing to lose and would give it an hour. Off we marched into the fog with only guns, cartridge bags and the ever optimistic canine companion Jasper.  As we drew close to the trees we put off around 200 pigeons. We were a little surprised to see these but hopeful the may return.

 

We each took up post in the bomb hole and awaited the return of the birds. They did come back occasionally and we dropped a few but this was tricky sport with a limited field of view the birds were there and gone in an instant on the increasing easterly wind. This wind began to bite asnd a change of plan was in order. With about 10 birds in the bag we decided to get some nets and a rotary from the car and setup on the lee side of the trees.

 

This worked nicely as we were now out of the cold wind and the birds began to appear and channel their line to the decoys. We eerre edver hopeful that the fog would clear with the wind but this was not to be. However birds still came and provided exciting sport as the jinked and dived on the now 30 mph wind. Jasper must get a mention as he made some wonderful retrieves of birds that were hit hard and travelled a long way with the wind before falling into the next field.

 

We finally called it a day around 3 pm as we had not seen any action for a while and were pleased to pick 36 sporting pigeons. As always good banter accompanied good sport. JDog wasthe consumate host when things went quiet he would help things along by taking important phone calls which inevitably caused birds to appear from nowhere.

 

Overall a good few hours sport in conditions that we would not normally shoot in. 

[sako751sg]

Good going and if you had the wind we did today it would have made for some testing shooting.

[Clodhopper]

13 minutes ago, sako751sg said:

Good going and if you had the wind we did today it would have made for some testing shooting.

It was good fun.

[GingerCat]

Good report. I know that bomb creator and how windy it gets there.  Must have been very sporting.

[marsh man]

Thirty six would have been a respectable bag during decent weather , in todays dreary misty , murky conditions , you two done well in finding where they were and for sticking the conditions out .

One thing I noticed in your report was it came to a standstill during early afternoon , I have been out lately at mid morning , dinner time and just after and each time it stopped around 2 pm with hardly a pigeon to be seen anywhere in the area where any shooting have taken place . and yet when P C is out he get shooting well into the afternoon , no doubt I have still got a lot to learn about pigeon shooting 

[JDog]

The pigeons for the first hour were so quick that I couldn't even mount on them. This is a worrying sign of old age and slowing reactions. Had we stayed where we were we would have missed a lot of shooting opportunities. Decoying on the leeward side of the small spinney was a brain wave by Clodhopper.

As mentioned Jasper performed very well. One pigeon, subsequently found to be shot in the eye, flew on for 400m into the mist and over a hedge. I wanted to go and find it and we all went looking and it was found not far from where we had last seen it. The other one was shot by Clodhopper when the fog was thickest and to be honest I never saw it until I watched it disappearing upwards into the fog. It was lung shot and Jasper made short work of it when I worked him into the wind.

These were great pigeons and we were well rewarded for sticking it out in the cold wind and fog.

This picture shows the one time the fog lifted temporarily.

[Clodhopper]

9 hours ago, marsh man said:

Thirty six would have been a respectable bag during decent weather , in todays dreary misty , murky conditions , you two done well in finding where they were and for sticking the conditions out .

One thing I noticed in your report was it came to a standstill during early afternoon , I have been out lately at mid morning , dinner time and just after and each time it stopped around 2 pm with hardly a pigeon to be seen anywhere in the area where any shooting have taken place . and yet when P C is out he get shooting well into the afternoon , no doubt I have still got a lot to learn about pigeon shooting 

Very true, the birds did stopping coming shortly after 2pm. Having said that I was watching a rape field last weekend and birds were still coming in to feed at 5.30pm.

It was an odd day altogether as we really did not expect the fog to hang around with the strong wind had. 

 

 

 

 

[aga man]

You boys did very well to shoot the number you did. I had hoped to venture out myself yesterday afternoon, if only to try and keep some farmers happy.

The rain/drizzle never stopped over this side and pigeons simply sat up in the woods all afternoon.

[Clodhopper]

8 minutes ago, aga man said:

You boys did very well to shoot the number you did. I had hoped to venture out myself yesterday afternoon, if only to try and keep some farmers happy.

The rain/drizzle never stopped over this side and pigeons simply sat up in the woods all afternoon.

I also suspected the birds would do exactly that but it was I was wrong. They came nicely out of the fog. This afternoon could provide some interesting sport if you  can find a spot out of the wind. It is bitterly cold this side of the river.

[aga man]

6 minutes ago, Clodhopper said:

This afternoon could provide some interesting sport if you  can find a spot out of the wind.

The only spot I can find out of the wind at the minute is here in front of the computer with a nice hot coffee!. I am sure plenty of mad/keen folk will be out today but not me.

I will venture out tomorrow hopefully.

 

[marsh man]

2 hours ago, Clodhopper said:

Very true, the birds did stopping coming shortly after 2pm. Having said that I was watching a rape field last weekend and birds were still coming in to feed at 5.30pm.

It was an odd day altogether as we really did not expect the fog to hang around with the strong wind had. 

 

 

 

 

I fully agree , if the field or surrounding area haven't been shot they will carry on feeding late into the afternoon , in fact talking to the tractor driver he was saying one field of rape I went on last Saturday afternoon was full of pigeons when he left off at 4pm early on in the week , we have got several rape fields , some border each other and odd ones half a mile apart .

It don't take long to find what ones they are feeding , you normally get a few shots more or less straight away once you have set up , there is only one flight line and that is from the wood nearest to the field , once the wood have been emptied of pigeons that is it , you can then ride round to the next wood beside the rape and that will be full of pigeons just sitting about , once a few are brave enough to drop in onto that field the rest will follow so when the farm hand pass that field on the way home he will plenty of pigeons feeding on that particular rape field.

At the moment ours are still in big flocks and all I am doing is making them jumpy , but at least the farm manager can see I am doing my bit and before long things will improve with the weather and hopefully the pigeon shooting will follow suit .