Where are they now?

[kitchrat]

The heavy rain has mostly failed to knock any cereal crops down around here (almost no flat bits bigger than a table cloth, maybe a dozen birds in them). Pigeons have been randomly dropping into crops via the tramlines, which with the wet weather earlier in the year, gives plenty of access, especially where the main tramlines meet those running round the headland. I went looking last evening, about 7.00pm, hoping to see them all having a snack in the evening sunshine. The groups I had been watching seem to have dispersed, even those on the wires had gone, just a few couples on telephone cables in the villages. Didn't see 200 birds over the 5 farms I drove through. (Yes I do stop and scare any up out of the crop, a couple of chunks of wood as "clackers" make a loud, very good gunshot-sounding noise -don't get your fingers trapped!) Was it just a time of day thing? I've been looking at various times and seen very little.

Then, finally, I discover some fairly well laid oats, but no pigeons on it at all - ZERO! It's come up grey and misty today but I will be checking regularly!

Any ideas anyone?

[TIGHTCHOKE]

Keep doing the Recce, the day you don't, they will all be there for the taking.

 

Good luck.

[Ultrastu]

They are hitting the winter wheat this week round my way .every field I know of in the area has birds dropping in .at 7.30 - 9 am and around  3 - 6 pm 

 

 

[kitchrat]

3 hours ago, Ultrastu said:

They are hitting the winter wheat this week round my way .every field I know of in the area has birds dropping in .at 7.30 - 9 am and around  3 - 6 pm 

 

 

Found some doing just that on rape that is due to be cut next week, and a few, as you say, on wheat. However, with no laid crops, they are going just where they like, usually where there are birds on wires, but don't come back to the same place when you walk them off.

[kitchrat]

5 minutes ago, kitchrat said:

Found some doing just that on rape that is due to be cut next week, and a few, as you say, on wheat. However, with no laid crops, they are going just where they like, usually where there are birds on wires, but don't come back to the same place when you walk them off.

Now I hear that some rape is being cut today, so the whole game might change.

[Ultrastu]

28 minutes ago, kitchrat said:

Found some doing just that on rape that is due to be cut next week, and a few, as you say, on wheat. However, with no laid crops, they are going just where they like, usually where there are birds on wires, but don't come back to the same place when you walk them off.

Exactly this .

[kitchrat]

Just been to look at the rape stubble, the 1st stubble for miles around. Just the odd 1 or 2 birds dropping in, no real traffic. Far from the feeding frenzy that some posters on here seem to have had. (lucky Boys!). I know I was a bit late at 6.45 and that today is only the 1st day it's been cut but it does not excite me. As you may know, I have this theory that the combine's caff cutter simple covers what seed gets through with a layer of chaff - pigeons can't/don't scratch so it's a pretty barren tablecloth for them these days.

The biggest number of birds I saw were on the edges of roads/farm track/driveways, presumably picking up grit, again, presumably because their diet has changed from "salad", (pea sprouts, clover etc) to grain and they need the grit to grind it up in their gizzards. No help to me if I can't tie them down.

I must not despair!

[clangerman]

plenty of birds here but all feeding on the wheat heads so landing just about anywhere in the fields 

[Wilts#Dave]

7 o clock isn’t really an ideal time to go out looking and get a real idea of numbers. 
Lots on standing wheat all over the place here, but not easy to pin down the best fields to actually shoot a decent bag! Still hitting the peas also.
More pigeons around than usual so far this year, where I shoot. 
 

[marsh man]

We would be at least 10 days away from any form of combining , there are now Pigeons dropping in on the o s r fields , not in any numbers as I haven't seen any real numbers about , the ones you see on the roads might well be eating the the rape seed that have found a small gap in the trailer that have carted it from the combine . Keep on a looking is what I say 

[matone]

In the last week I`ve seen them dropping into soft barley,almost ripe barley,green wheat ,OSR and unsown fields of weed/volunteers . Think the numbers are about but this years unprecedented variety of crops/non crops has them widely dispersed !!!!!

Went out yesterday afternoon on some patchy winter barley which crows were bothering ,shot ten pigeons in a couple of hours but they`d dried up totally by then.

[mossy835]

i have 5 big fields of barley,all standing cant pin them down to one place there all over the place,not good shooting at all,

[old'un]

12 hours ago, kitchrat said:

Just been to look at the rape stubble, the 1st stubble for miles around. Just the odd 1 or 2 birds dropping in, no real traffic. Far from the feeding frenzy that some posters on here seem to have had. (lucky Boys!). I know I was a bit late at 6.45 and that today is only the 1st day it's been cut but it does not excite me. As you may know, I have this theory that the combine's caff cutter simple covers what seed gets through with a layer of chaff - pigeons can't/don't scratch so it's a pretty barren tablecloth for them these days.

The biggest number of birds I saw were on the edges of roads/farm track/driveways, presumably picking up grit, again, presumably because their diet has changed from "salad", (pea sprouts, clover etc) to grain and they need the grit to grind it up in their gizzards. No help to me if I can't tie them down.

I must not despair!

I found pigeons seem to take around 3 days before any numbers are seen, although I have seen then dropping in behind the combine as its being combined, also conditions on rape stubble need to be just right, day/days after combining need to-be warm and dry, any rain or heavy dew seem to put them off it, rape germinates very quickly, Its possible the caff is holding moisture.

With regards pigeons scratching (like chickens) you are correct but they do use their beaks to move anything covering the food they are after, plus I doubt the caff is covering every seed on the field.

Try watching the field around midday onwards, good luck.

[mellors]

pigeons can't/don't scratch so it's a pretty barren tablecloth for them these days.

Oh yes they do I've watched them on drilled beans do it. 

[old'un]

17 minutes ago, mossy835 said:

i have 5 big fields of barley,all standing cant pin them down to one place there all over the place,not good shooting at all,

Yep, I have similar but on green wheat, no pattern, just dropping in the tramlines anywhere on 3 fields, have had a bit of success flighting them over a small spinney.

[marsh man]

old'un was right when he was saying that the rape seed will soon germinate after a drop of rain , well down this way it seem to have rained more or less off and on virtually every day , and seed that had fell away from the ripening pods would be already be Greening up and when they get around cutting it you will find the soil is covered in Green leaf , what a strange year , you never seem to get two years the same , last year they had started the harvest by now with several fields of barley already cut and a continuation of day after day of combining with the drier never having to be switched on .

Now today is dry at the moment but very cold (12 degrees ) for the time of the year and everything very damp after the overnight rain , next week should be better but still with some rain on and off , roll on the Summer , it can't be far away , or can it ?      MM 

[old'un]

7 minutes ago, marsh man said:

old'un was right when he was saying that the rape seed will soon germinate after a drop of rain , well down this way it seem to have rained more or less off and on virtually every day , and seed that had fell away from the ripening pods would be already be Greening up and when they get around cutting it you will find the soil is covered in Green leaf , what a strange year , you never seem to get two years the same , last year they had started the harvest by now with several fields of barley already cut and a continuation of day after day of combining with the drier never having to be switched on .

Now today is dry at the moment but very cold (12 degrees ) for the time of the year and everything very damp after the overnight rain , next week should be better but still with some rain on and off , roll on the Summer , it can't be far away , or can it ?      MM 

Yep, always found it odd that they will hit spring rape hard sometimes yet they never seem interested in the newly sprouting rape after combining.

[marsh man]

31 minutes ago, old'un said:

Yep, always found it odd that they will hit spring rape hard sometimes yet they never seem interested in the newly sprouting rape after combining.

I can never remember shooting any Pigeons on germinated Summer o s r stubbles , in fact when you see the Green leaf it is then a sign of leaving it well alone , maybe with all the available grain seed about then there is no need for them to scratch about , same with the Peas and Beans, as soon as the green leaf appear then you know the best of the shooting is over , I also find it strange that the pigeons will move off the Winter barley once it is ripe and move on to the milky wheat , then as soon as the Winter barley field is cut they will then move back onto the barley stubble , I think that is what Pigeon shooting so interesting ,is we can only guess at times as nobody know all the answers .      MM

[kitchrat]

14 hours ago, Wilts#Dave said:

7 o clock isn’t really an ideal time to go out looking and get a real idea of numbers. 
Lots on standing wheat all over the place here, but not easy to pin down the best fields to actually shoot a decent bag! Still hitting the peas also.
More pigeons around than usual so far this year, where I shoot. 
 

I'll be going out looking about midday today but overnight rain may have changed things yet again

[kitchrat]

19 minutes ago, marsh man said:

I can never remember shooting any Pigeons on germinated Summer o s r stubbles , in fact when you see the Green leaf it is then a sign of leaving it well alone , maybe with all the available grain seed about then there is no need for them to scratch about , same with the Peas and Beans, as soon as the green leaf appear then you know the best of the shooting is over , I also find it strange that the pigeons will move off the Winter barley once it is ripe and move on to the milky wheat , then as soon as the Winter barley field is cut they will then move back onto the barley stubble , I think that is what Pigeon shooting so interesting ,is we can only guess at times as nobody know all the answers .      MM

Yes, their habits are hard to explain. I would guess that oil-rich osr seeds or cereal grains have much better food value that salad foods like new leaves? Like bears in Canada catch a salmon and only eat the eggs and the brain and chuck the rest back.

Do they have to learn these things from parents? The reason I ask is that suddenly we seem to have acres of this blue stuff, which I think is Borrage. I saw it drilled, I saw it sprout and never a pigeon on it although it looked palatable enough to me! Similarly, we have some sugar beet in the area for the 1st time. I have read they can go for the chips left after harvest, will they know this? 

The parallel would be milk tops, I'm sure we (most of us) remember milk bottles being left outside the house early in the morning and how the tits used to peel the foil tops off and drink the cream. They even knew gold tops had more cream, then the silver and lastly the stripy skimmed stuff and would attack them in that order of preference. Anyway, I'm sure that if milk deliveries started again, it would be free from tit-attack but how long would it take for them to learn and how fast would this new knowledge spread?

Will the pigeons mellors saw scratching spread the word across the UK? Good news for us, drillings (and stubbles) would become easy food again and attract pigeons but bad news for farmers.

Edited July 13 by kitchrat

[Wilts#Dave]

17 minutes ago, kitchrat said:

I'll be going out looking about midday today but overnight rain may have changed things yet again

Best time to go out looking if you can would be 2/3 o clock, if they’re going to be there they will at that time generally for their afternoon feed/flight. 
Often at this time of year you can look at 11 o clock and see very little movement, go back mid afternoon and they’re everywhere! 
Good luck 👍🏼

[kitchrat]

5 hours ago, Wilts#Dave said:

Best time to go out looking if you can would be 2/3 o clock, if they’re going to be there they will at that time generally for their afternoon feed/flight. 
Often at this time of year you can look at 11 o clock and see very little movement, go back mid afternoon and they’re everywhere! 
Good luck 👍🏼

I was there, watching/chatting to the farmer, from 1.00 until 2.30. The biggest number we could see was 50-60, slowly built up over an hour. I showed myself and they all jumped up, some left and some went into local trees. Over the next hour they slowly filtered back. That number on a big field is hardly worth setting up for and I'm sure that 1 shot would have sent them from the trees to distant places and further slowed the rate of return. Some seemed a bit flocked up but the individuals/pairs just flipped out of the trees onto whichever part of the field they fancied, ie didn't decoy to birds already there. 

Maybe tomorrow?

[old'un]

2 minutes ago, kitchrat said:

I was there, watching/chatting to the farmer, from 1.00 until 2.30. The biggest number we could see was 50-60, slowly built up over an hour. I showed myself and they all jumped up, some left and some went into local trees. Over the next hour they slowly filtered back. That number on a big field is hardly worth setting up for and I'm sure that 1 shot would have sent them from the trees to distant places and further slowed the rate of return. Some seemed a bit flocked up but the individuals/pairs just flipped out of the trees onto whichever part of the field they fancied, ie didn't decoy to birds already there. 

Maybe tomorrow?

I’d sell your gear mate.

[TIGHTCHOKE]

1 minute ago, old'un said:

I’d sell your gear mate.

[JKD]

Have you thought about leaving your nets and decoys at home and simply wearing something like this ?! 🤷‍♂️😆 Might get them a bit closer 👍😆