Greetings from Australia

[Hoptoit]

Greetings from Australia to all you pigeon puffers, squirrel squiffers, fox fluffers, bunny bashers and assorted bird and rodent botherers! I'm an animal control contractor and pro shooter here in Oz where we regularly have to deal with some of the less popular English imports like rabbits, pigeons and foxes. I look forward to learning some new tricks and reading your stories. Where I can I'll add in for the for the general edification of all. 

Have a great day

Hoptoit

[TIGHTCHOKE]

Welcome aboard.    

[ditchman]

welcome.....im sure you can teach us some new tricks...

[Hoptoit]

Most if not all of my pigeon shooting is done with an air rifle around buildings and reserve. I'm loving the Z Vision red light for pigeons at night. Great for foxes and bunnies too.

Edited Friday at 14:45 by Hoptoit

[sam triple]

Hi just having a cup of tea and some TimTams a great Aussie biscuit import here , I follow a few of your Country men in you tube RJM hunting being one of them , enjoy the forum 

[Hoptoit]

3 hours ago, sam triple said:

Hi just having a cup of tea and some TimTams a great Aussie biscuit import here , I follow a few of your Country men in you tube RJM hunting being one of them , enjoy the forum 

We bite the ends off the timtams then suck your tea through it🤣

[Pukka Bundook]

Welcome Hoptoit from another new member.

TimTams yep!

Where are you if I may?

Have fiends up around Gympie, and down in the Surrey Hills.

Uncle worked on a station in WA for years and talked about it the rest of his life.

Best,

R.

[sam triple]

27 minutes ago, Hoptoit said:

We bite the ends off the timtams then suck your tea through it🤣

Yes the Aussie side of the family showed us that when we were out there , years back 

[Bigbob]

Hello and welcome mate i look foreword to seeing your posts and picts 

[Hoptoit]

7 hours ago, Pukka Bundook said:

Welcome Hoptoit from another new member.

TimTams yep!

Where are you if I may?

Have fiends up around Gympie, and down in the Surrey Hills.

Uncle worked on a station in WA for years and talked about it the rest of his life.

Best,

R.

I'm in the Mandurah area of Western Australia. Great place to live, awesome fishing and full of pigeons, foxes, pigs, roos and bunnies

[Hoptoit]

7 hours ago, Bigbob said:

Hello and welcome mate i look foreword to seeing your posts and picts 

Thank you 🙂

[Minky]

21 hours ago, Hoptoit said:

 animal control contractor and pro shooter here in Oz 

we regularly have to deal with some of the less popular English imports like rabbits, pigeons and foxes. I look forward to learning some new tricks and reading your stories. Where I can I'll add in .

 

Welcome.

Well you've got your work cut out to control any of the unwanted.  We've been trying for a looong time without success.   I see that you have made a start.  I knew and shot with a gamekeeper who used to be out every day that he could and certainly every night lamping, For fox and rabbit .  He recond on between 250.. 300 fox a year and after harvest they'd be out shooting rabbits.   I've seen his hilux pickup loaded with rabbits as if it had been loaded by a jcb excavator.   The downside of all of this is diminishing returns,  time, money and purpose.  Also killing and dealing with this does have a mental effect.   Back when I was a kid there was Myxomatosis that decimated the huge rabbit population  for many years.  There were many times that there were outbreaks but recently there has been rabbit hemorrhaging disease  which is very lethal, but nature is strong and they come back stronger.  Similar to viruses that mutate.  Now I understand that the government out there has a bounty for certain things ..but we can't discuss anything like that here.  Anyway welcome.   We can discuss fox and pigeon control  no probs. 

 

 

[Hoptoit]

7 hours ago, sam triple said:

Yes the Aussie side of the family showed us that when we were out there , years back 

You are truly a man Kemusabe when you can suck the TimTam and have no chocolate on your fingers 

[Hoptoit]

7 minutes ago, Minky said:

 

Yeah it's a job and a half. We have native animal populations affected severely by the imports so we battle with purpose. It's a constant fight between pigeons and native birds for nesting sites even. Foxes and feral cats kill everything they can and rabbits don't get me started. We have Mixie occurring as it feels like it and Calici is put out there but most populations are resistant now. Along with that the kangaroo population builds up to a point where they start starving to death during summer. People don't believe it when you tell them kangaroos actually do hop down the street in suburbia around here. We also have a huge amount of feral pigs in the area. Some places have been populated by moron pig hunters with no regard for the environment. So yeah busy times cleaning up and keeping balance.

[Pukka Bundook]

2 hours ago, Hoptoit said:

Yeah it's a job and a half. We have native animal populations affected severely by the imports so we battle with purpose. It's a constant fight between pigeons and native birds for nesting sites even. Foxes and feral cats kill everything they can and rabbits don't get me started. We have Mixie occurring as it feels like it and Calici is put out there but most populations are resistant now. Along with that the kangaroo population builds up to a point where they start starving to death during summer. People don't believe it when you tell them kangaroos actually do hop down the street in suburbia around here. We also have a huge amount of feral pigs in the area. Some places have been populated by moron pig hunters with no regard for the environment. So yeah busy times cleaning up and keeping balance.

Have a mate over where you are Hop, does shifts in the mines then back to the old place when he's off.

He's a heeler, and enjoys his shooting as well.

You have your work cut out with feral trouble.

Any cain toads?

 

[Hoptoit]

17 minutes ago, Pukka Bundook said:

Have a mate over where you are Hop, does shifts in the mines then back to the old place when he's off.

He's a heeler, and enjoys his shooting as well.

You have your work cut out with feral trouble.

Any cain toads?

 

Not yet but they are expected. An old timer from Queensland once told me a spray bottle full of Dettol knocks them over but his 410 was much more fun. Is it bad that I'm kinda hoping that one day my little HR 410, you know.........

[Houseplant]

G'day.

[Minky]

19 hours ago, Hoptoit said:

An old timer from Queensland once told me a spray bottle full of Dettol knocks them over but his 410 was much more fun. 

FUN,?  You not supposed to have fun.  Detol,  ?? Who'd have thought it.. how does Detol kill toads ??  I  suppose that Its a lot cheaper than cartridge.   Cost was a major consideration what with fuel, tyres, wear and tear,  etc etc, then cartridges .  It didn't used to be a big consideration but cartridge prices and/or reloading components have gone through the roof IF YOU CAN GET THEM.  Being out every night until home at one AM gets wearing. Sometimes we'd go out lamping for perhaps 3...4 hours and not see a single target but one,  A hundred yards up the road from the yard when we were coming back in.  Sometimes in the winter we would have to come back in for a cup of coffee and a thaw out because we were frozen solid.  Also it wasn't much fun gutting out a truck load of rabbits.  We used to do it for FUN.  I used to like being on my own out there, knowing a piece of land and Walking the wind and the land.  For FUN.

[Hoptoit]

59 minutes ago, Minky said:

FUN,?  You not supposed to have fun.  Detol,  ?? Who'd have thought it.. how does Detol kill toads ??  I  suppose that Its a lot cheaper than cartridge.   Cost was a major consideration what with fuel, tyres, wear and tear,  etc etc, then cartridges .  It didn't used to be a big consideration but cartridge prices and/or reloading components have gone through the roof IF YOU CAN GET THEM.  Being out every night until home at one AM gets wearing. Sometimes we'd go out lamping for perhaps 3...4 hours and not see a single target but one,  A hundred yards up the road from the yard when we were coming back in.  Sometimes in the winter we would have to come back in for a cup of coffee and a thaw out because we were frozen solid.  Also it wasn't much fun gutting out a truck load of rabbits.  We used to do it for FUN.  I used to like being on my own out there, knowing a piece of land and Walking the wind and the land.  For FUN.

I know, I castigated that Queenslander severely for his perversion and tropic induced delusions. It's all the sunlight you see. They're all a little bit cooked not like us in the southern half who have to endure 20 degree days in winter frozen solid. Mind you I did live in a town called Collie during some of my formative years. It would get down to minus 2 at night during winter but you were guaranteed a sunny day. Nights were cold for spotlighting though. I did have one roo shooting trip where it got to minus 5 in the valley while I was riding around on the quad bike trying to earn a living.

[Minky]

The gamekeeper was out to protect the pheasants but I was a mechanical engineer by day and about a fourty minute drive away from the shoot. So I wasn't out there for any sort of monetary gain. It really was for the love of it.  My wife is a fantastic woman and partner who never complained or moaned about me being out on patrol.  The only thing that she said was .. don't put your cold feet and hands on me when you come home.!

Edit.  It can get cold here right down south.  although nowhere down as much as up north.  Sometimes when we had to come back in to  defrost and thaw out a bit our clothes would be covered in frost/ice.  We had to 2ear about three top layers. T shirt, jumper, coat and a wet weather suit to stop the wind going  through.   Face was covered br a balaclava with eye holes.  The face felt like a bit of meat out of the freezer and sometimes the eyelashes felt a bit sticky. But we had fun.

Edited 17 hours ago by Minky

[islandgun]

Welcome, look forward to your contributions. I spent a year in WA. loved it