Jump to content

Bloody Chukar half breeds!


Bleeh
 Share

Recommended Posts

I'm not saying this Did/Didn't happen to me. But has anyone else noticed some Chuckar traits in your french this year? - From British reared french eggs.

 

 

I am well aware of the law surrounding the realease of Chuckar. But like I said I ain't saying nothing' guv.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

you want to get straight back to your supplier, maybe a discount for next year. what kind of evidence do you have?

 

Not saying I did. But if I did, it would be the classic band between the cream and blue on the chest/side (You know the ones I mean) feathers. It's not a heavy band, and it's not on all the partridge - but I'd it's certainly there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Alright, Chukar can be, and have been cross bred with french partridge.

 

The result is usual a bigger, and as such, healthier looking game bird, but they have the distinct disadvantage of flying very low and producing poor sporting birds for driven shooting.

 

Because it was discovered that Partridge Chukar hybrids do not breed in the wild, The release of French/Chukar hybrids was banned in the 1990's for conservation reasons.

 

Unfortunately; The French still breed Chukar/French Hybrids for food, and sometimes when buying Partridge eggs over from France, (as many game farms unfortunately do) They sometimes ''Fill the gaps'' of an order with Hybrid eggs; You cannot really tell a Hybrid from a Pure until several months old.

 

You can then find yourself in the situation as Gamekeeper, where you have possibly several thousand pound investment in partridge, which are illegal to release, and could provide poor sporting birds if you did do so.

Edited by Bleeh
Link to comment
Share on other sites

One of the prime reasons they crossed Chukar with Redlegs is that the hybrids then produced more eggs per pair than the pure Redleg partridge, thus increasing production and profit for the game farmer. I must be getting old as it seems like only five minutes ago when most redlegs releases were hybrids. I know someone who released a few dozen pure chukar ex layers, they were very tame, ran around the farmyard like chickens all winter and roosted on a barn roof, oh and refused to fly. The chukar is a Meditterean (sp) species of partridge, bigger and greyer than the Redleg.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My mate in New Jersey shoots these - I always assumed that Chukar was an Americanism for partridge (in a cilantro/coriander, aubergine/eggplant kinda stylee).

 

Pardon my ignorance, but if they are a cross breed of a partridge, why are they illegal to shoot??

 

They are not illegal to shoot. Only illegal to breed and release in UK, see wikipedia link above. Chukar is an Urdu word probabally derived from birds call? (Also in wikipedia).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Many thanks for the clarification.

 

Pardon me, but I think this 1990 law is very poor. So what if they cannot breed in the wild? Since these birds are bred with a sole purpose to be shot, I honestly do not see the problem of releasing them and using them as game birds. After all, one should hope that most reared birds will be shot during the season. Excuse my ignorance, but these reared birds have little or no chance of surviving a winter. I can bring the example of pheasants when, after the season is over, get run over by cars en masse in the motorways. I think there should be no season for reared birds. After all, I find it more humane for a bird to be shot, rather than get run over in the M55. I hope my opinion will not be misunderstood, I am just expressing my marvel on the lack of purpose some laws have...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So what if they cannot breed in the wild? Since these birds are bred with a sole purpose to be shot, I honestly do not see the problem of releasing them and using them as game birds. After all, one should hope that most reared birds will be shot during the season. Excuse my ignorance, but these reared birds have little or no chance of surviving a winter. I can bring the example of pheasants when, after the season is over, get run over by cars en masse in the motorways. I think there should be no season for reared birds. After all, I find it more humane for a bird to be shot, rather than get run over in the M55.

 

No shoot ever has 100% return on there birds, maybe 40% upto 70% ish. Vermin conrol is carried out all year to give the surviving birds a chance to breed and increase the now (wild) birds on the shoot.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Pardon me, but I think this 1990 law is very poor. So what if they cannot breed in the wild? Since these birds are bred with a sole purpose to be shot, I honestly do not see the problem of releasing them and using them as game birds. After all, one should hope that most reared birds will be shot during the season. Excuse my ignorance, but these reared birds have little or no chance of surviving a winter. I can bring the example of pheasants when, after the season is over, get run over by cars en masse in the motorways. I think there should be no season for reared birds. After all, I find it more humane for a bird to be shot, rather than get run over in the M55. I hope my opinion will not be misunderstood, I am just expressing my marvel on the lack of purpose some laws have...

 

The chukar partridge is a separate species to the Redlegs partridge but is quite closely related and very similar to look at. The main reason for the banning of the release of Chukars is that they are an alien species. Now I know most of our game species are, but the chukar is a very recent intro and the authorities wanted to stop the releases before they became established in the wild, and particularly before they started to cross breed with the wild redlegs and contaminated the gene pool. Anecdotally hybrid chuker/redlegs do not fly as high or as strongly as pure redleg, so are therefore are not such a challenging bird to shoot.

 

As for reared game, well if given a chance they will breed successfully in the wild, particularly pheasants. They can and do survive the winter in good numbers. With adequate spring feeding and predator control reared pheasants can do quite well the following breeding season. Reared partridge though do seem to struggle, they may very well survive but very rarely rear young successfully, reared greys have an even worse record that reared redlegs in this regard.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...