doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Bird shoots in Britain - a thing of the past?

Tom Kelly in his turkey hunting cult book, The Tenth Legion, observed that urban flight helped the wild turkey grow in population in rural Alabama. There weren't as many folks left to dent the population and the population rebounded. Unfortunately as goes urban flight goes positive attitudes about hunting. Gil

Sure, blame us city folk.

Merry Christmas, King! Did that Hammer and Sickle fall off your tree and hit you in the head? That last post of yours was one of your best!


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Interesting bunch of blokes we have here.

No one knows the effort I put into making sure my daughters would be tolerant of the sporting life.
I constantly work to maintain their understanding of just how much it means to me, and others like me.

On the flip side, I shot, and dined, with a lovely woman from London, a Law Professor from Cambridge, shooting an H&H 28ga Sporter, and I was absolutely fascinated by the effort she made as a Single parent, to raise her sons as gentlemen, and Sportsmen. In modern London.
Her story was a mirror image of my own experience with my daughters.

The thing to work on is tolerance and acceptance of the choice.

The hammer and sickle I was given by the party when I was born is a tiny sterling silver thing on a delicate necklace. The one that toppled from the top of the tree was really heavy and it hurt like an elbow from Gordie or maybe (I won't admit it) from Sid! Merry Christmas to you, too!

CZ,

Most of what is said on this website is totally useless. Occasionally, I learn how to fix a gun. Rarely, I find something to buy. But CZ, what I really want for Christmas... is the phone number of that damned law professor!

As a Brit I will add my pennies worth. Driven shooting is growing in popularity in the UK. It is mostly pheasant / partridge based, and plenty of estates are rearing and releasing phaesants to cater for demand. This is every thing from walked up rough shoots which release 100 odd birds and have half a dozen days with 6 or 8 guns, a few dogs and a couple of children acting as beaters. Tend to walk in a line and have a few standing guns. Most guns will have a few shot during the day and the bag will be 20 ish.

In between we have the syndicate / farmer type shoots where there is a part time gamekeeper, a few hundred birds are put down and there will be 6 to 8 shoots a years with the bag being anything from 50 to 120 odd birds. Most guns doing this type of shooting will spend a few thousand a year on their sport - most of it going on birds, feed and wages for beaters / keepers. Most syndicate members will take a couple of guns on each shoot - one for themselves and one for a guest, and shooting is very much a reciprocal thing. These shoots often require quite a but of time input from the guns - doing work on the ground, managing vermin ec.

And then we have the much more commercial shoots where a farm or estate has a shooting business, and days are sold to guns - there are many roving syndicates who take paid for days. It is all about the experience and you are generally well looked after with good food provided during and post the shoot. Cost is generally by the day and in proportion to number of birds, quality of the shoot and shoot lunch etc. �30 to �40 a bird is pretty typical.

Grouse are more a speciality as there are limited areas of heather moorland, and is ever decreasing due to pressures from forestry and Wind turbines. A driven grouse moor is a very expensive luxury. Grouse cannot be reared, so its all down to maintaining optimal habitat for grouse to get the numbers required for a driven shoot day. This requires manpower and even a small moor will cost the owner �1m a year to maintain. Some of this cost can be recovered by letting days to guests - going rate is �100 plus a bird.

There is walked up grouse shooting available for a lot less - typically �50 to �150 a gun - at the low end, its best described as an armed walk, and you might come home with a grouse or a snipe or two.

We do have a lot of pressure from the Anti's - not sure if the shooting world has helped itself. But the anti's keep making noise and irritation. Often its jealousy etc. But what does amaze me is on a shoot you get people from all walks of life.

That' s what you do in South Dakota and other places as well. Pay to hunt a farmer's land. You can hunt the dirt roads but the best shooting is in those cornfields.

Yes, and with a variation on the old joke, have her send photo of gun. Gil

An interesting trend lately--speaking of the urban/rural split--is the "locavore" movement. Basically environmentalists who believe that they should eat foods that are available locally. A fair number of them are taking up hunting, recognizing that the game they shoot is "organic". And a lot of them are involved in the reverse flight: urban to rural, because it's easier for them to raise/forage/hunt/fish in the country than it is in the city.

Those grouse shooting "British Aristocrats" MADE the London and Birmingham gun trade and that trade took the world from Flintlocks to modern, breech loading double guns.

The grouse are a money crop - guns pay big money to shoot and the game is sold in shops all over the UK and Europe.

Without this rather intensive use, the moors would be neglected, the employment of the shoot helpers would be gone, along with numerous economic benefits.

There are not many places in the UK where single man and his dog can wander out in the moors and walk up a few grouse. And to tell the truth, the Brits have very few worthy bird dogs.