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Best folding moments


Smokersmith
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I might be a bit on my own on this one (although I doubt it!) ....

What's your favourite image when you fold 'em up?

I have a few ...

  • The overhead shot that 'helicopters' down
  • The going away shot where it looks like they've been 'lassoed' 
  • The one when they're coming in, and you catch them with their wings already folded, and they just continue as a tight parcel under gravity

Perhaps you have others?

 

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The fast quartering away with the wind behind it end of season cock pheasant that's going to the shoot boundary that you swing on, hit and its head goes back as it folds and it then sort or "rolls" head over end as it starts it fall. You know you've hit and hit cleanly with a well placed shot a bird that's been really motoring. 

Edited by enfieldspares
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14 minutes ago, enfieldspares said:

The fast quartering away with the wind behind it end of season cock pheasant that's going to the shoot boundary that you swing on, hit and its head goes back as it folds and it then sort or "rolls" head over end as it starts it fall. You know you've hit and hit cleanly with a well placed shot a bird that's been really motoring. 

Funny kind of Wood Pigeon!

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Me??   The one I think I missed but then at the end of the drive the picker up comes across and congratulates me on a great shot and , yes, he picked the bird for me stone dead.  I had this experience on a superb family shoot south of Grantham on a drive which is now part of the Grantham bye pass scheme. The birds where howling at us from 400yrds away and I had three or four birds which I thought i had missed.  The picker up in the valley botom 150yrds behind me came up with the good news.

Yep, those are the birds I enjoy most.

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1 hour ago, Walker570 said:

Me??   The one I think I missed but then at the end of the drive the picker up comes across and congratulates me on a great shot and , yes, he picked the bird for me stone dead.  I had this experience on a superb family shoot south of Grantham on a drive which is now part of the Grantham bye pass scheme. The birds where howling at us from 400yrds away and I had three or four birds which I thought i had missed.  The picker up in the valley botom 150yrds behind me came up with the good news.

Yep, those are the birds I enjoy most.

And yet another funny kind of Wood Pigeon!

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1 hour ago, muncher said:

For me it’s the high bird coming in from a great height with its wings folded, very hard shot to pull off but great when they just keep diving. 

That's the one .... when they form that T shaped 'stoop' ...

Motionless from committing ...  to the deck  👍

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1 hour ago, muncher said:

For me it’s the high bird coming in from a great height with its wings folded, very hard shot to pull off but great when they just keep diving. 

Yes that is a difficult one. The idea of swinging the barrels from high to low somehow doesn't compute with the brain.

 

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44 minutes ago, old'un said:

Be it oncoming or crosser, any long bird that is dead in the air with the first shot.

 

Any that fold when persuaded.  Now I am aware the initial question was related to pigeons then the choice is too long to try even to make.  Pigeons et all are one of if not the most sporting bird on the planet.  Grouse, yes they fly fast but rarely jink and dive like a woodie. Partridge over hedgerows need lots of concentration and no hesitation but a swing jinking woodie coming into some high trees to roost is as good atest as any.  The only competitor in my experience was shooting whitewings coming into a Texas tank in the evening.  Woodpigeons on steroids and half the size.

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On some days when the brain don't agree with the trigger finger I like anything that hit the deck, then on other days you can be a bit more selective and take shots on that give you the most satisfaction when you connect , for some of the top shots on the forum they would be run of the mill shots , and at the other end of the scale the ones who find hitting a moving target difficult would be over the moon when after pulling the trigger the bird is dead in the air and the puff of feathers when it hit the deck stay in there minds for several days , since the introduction of the magnet / rotary the decoyed pigeons have been much more sporting and very often jinx at the last moment at the extreme range or just out of the range for most decoyers , I like the ones that you have locked on to from a distance, as it commit you are going to give it a shot once it cross the imaginary barrier and a yard in it take evasive action , the gun is in the shoulder in a split second with the finger pulling the trigger more or less at the same time , what seem like a delayed shot the bird crumple at my extreme range , a good shot is then whispered when only me and the dog can hear it :yes:

What I don't like is the wind blowing in your face and the pigeons come in  from behind, but the dislike shots can come under another thread at a later date .

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What a cracking thread title! 😀

Stood on a peg I often see pigeons going hell for leather at height, and seemingly oblivious of me as they flee from the beaters. Swinging through these at speed and seeing that great puff of chaff as they fly into the shot is extremely satisfying. 
In a hide it’s similar, but I really enjoy those which soar over the hide on their way to somewhere else, which are blotted out by my swing and disappear over a railway banking or hedge behind me, but you know you’ve killed it well because of all those little feathers which confetti down for ages! 
For corvids, I particularly like those which fold their wings and come down like a dart. 

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I was next to a gun I shot with regularly who was using his old Greener 3" chambered heavy damascus barreled "duck" hammer gun maybe now near thirty years ago. It was mid-drive so anything crossing over was fair game. He took a shot, one, at a pigeon maybe eighty plus yards up. It folded and came down dead. When we picked it there was but one pellet strike. Straight vertically upward and exiting almost perfectly through the centre of the top of the bird's head. I remember his single comment "Mr Greener certainly knew how to regulate the pattern his guns."

Edited by enfieldspares
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