Fieldcraft
Airgun Licensing … What Are We Scared Of?
A request came up on my Twitter feed last night, asking me to sign a HM Gov petition rallying against any consideration of airgun licensing in England and Wales. The following is an explanation, despite my good standing within the airgun community, of why I can’t sign such a petition.
On October 10th 2017 the Home Office, unsurprisingly, announced its intention to carry out a review into the regulation of air weapons in England and Wales. I say unsurprisingly because (as is often the case with gun law) incidents involving two young victims within little more than a year had raised questions about credibility of ownership regarding air guns. In the first, an 18 month old boy miraculously survived after an airgun owner deliberately pointed the gun at him at close range because he was crying and the gun discharged. Saved only by the skill of medical intervention, he will nonetheless be disabled for life. This happened in a flat in Bristol. In the second incident, a 13 year old boy was shot and subsequently died when his lifelong friend (of similar age) was looking through the scope of a gun, swung it around and the rifle discharged into his friends neck. The gun was, according to the police, owned by one of the fathers,not made by a commercial manufacturer. It was a .22 air rifle which had a telescopic sight and silencer, could be loaded with up to nine pellets without them being visible, had no safety catch, and could discharge without the trigger being pulled.The boys had been playing in a garden ‘boy cave’. Many of you, like me, would question why, in the first case, a loaded airgun was in the presence of an 18 month old child. In the second case (like the first a blatant transgression of the Crime & Security Act 2010) a mature adult had left a weapon loaded and not securely stored. The second incident prompted the Coroner involved, Dr Peter Dean, to request an urgent Government review on airgun legislation. So that, folks, is why we are where we are now. The mature shooters amongst us know, of course, that there is no such thing as an ‘accident’ with a gun, only ‘negligence’ on somebody’s part. I could comment on my perceived lack of sufficient legal retribution in both cases, but I’m not a lawyer.
We have enjoyed a long period of unlicensed ownership around legal limit (sub 12 ft/lb power) airguns when compared to other countries. Yet as proven above, these guns can kill. That’s why we use them for pest control. Licensing for all airguns is mandatory in Australia, Romania, Eire, New Zealand, Scotland, Hong Kong, Japan, Luxembourg and Malta. Hunting with airguns is banned totally in Switzerland, South Africa, Estonia, Finland, France, Slovenia, Portugal, Poland, Lithuania, Italy and Greece. We really don’t appreciate how good we’ve got it here in the UK, so why the big fear over ‘licensing’? Is it because we don’t want to be bothered with the paperwork? Try telling that to the parents of the kids mentioned above. It can’t be cost? Taking the Scotland fee, 30p per week for 5 years?
We have long had, in the UK, stringent licensing around shotguns and firearms (+12 ft/lbs). The need for a Shotgun Certificate (SGC) or Firearms Certificate (FAC) has been widely accepted, so why not airgunning licensing?
Transition to a licensed airgun system will be a nightmare. Particularly for the police. The Scotland model has proved this. The first hurdle is that of retrospective ownership. Yet it’s all been done before, so there must be a better model to work from. In the sixties, the introduction of shotgun licensing must have presented the same problem. There would have been thousands of shotguns sitting in farmyard kitchens and keepers cottages all around the country. Yet a transition was achieved.
Given that many of the airguns in current ownership will be owned by SGC / FAC holders already, why not add a permanent and immediate exemption for sub-12 ft/lb airgun ownership? They have already gone through a process. That would relieve the burden on police licensing departments immensely.
In Scotland, of an estimated 500,000 guns, only 12,000 have been surrendered under amnesty. Over 2,500 application for an AWC (Air Weapon Certificate) were received by January 2017 (a year after introduction). Of these, only around 400 had been processed (with no refusals). So now there are hundreds of thousands of criminally owned airguns in Scotland. Yet unless they live in a bubble, these gun owners know this. Responsible owners would have attempted to comply with the law and either surrendered their guns or applied for a AWC.
That reflects dreadfully on the mentality of the ‘casual airgun owner’ and justifies the public stance against these guns. Complacency has already cost lives. If you are reading this and think I am ‘bracketing’ people, you are right. There are airgun owners … and there are ‘responsible’ airgun owners. I only ever represent the latter.
So how would I handle the ‘retrospective ownership’ problem? You’re not going to like this, guys and girls! I would get really tough with gun owners. The key to the shotgun transition was to include the purchase of ammunition. No ticket, no cartridges.So no AWC, no pellets. That would either deprive non-compliant shooters of ammo (eventually) or draw them out to apply.
Many keen airgunners swap and changes rifles regularly. The Scotland model covers this adequately. The AWC is for the person, not the guns. It does not record the guns in ownership, which is sensible. It also seems to cover airgun clubs well, who can apply for a club license and loan gun to members. I have heard arguments that target (club) shooters shouldn’t have to be licensed? Why? Clay and skeet shooters have to be. The potential for harm is surely greater in the crowded environment of a competition than hunting alone in a wood. Yet we shouldn’t be arguing amongst ourselves, should we.
It is interesting to note the stance of the major shooting organisations on this issue. BASC and the CA (I am a member of both, incidentally, and think they do Trojan work) have done little but try to reason with the Home Office that there is already sufficient legislation in place and that licensing won’t achieve anything. The CA Briefing Notewas superb but I’ve seen nothing since October last year. As a passionate airgun hunter, I have learned never to expect too much from either organisation in support of what they seem to consider a ‘feeder’ sport but on this issue, I think their relative silence speaks volumes. Most of those 4 million airgun owners aren’t members of any such organisation and probably won’t even have shooting insurance. How can we justify that and why should we support them? Forgive the pun but we are staring down the barrel of the inevitable.
What of the airgun supply and manufacturing industry? The impact of licensing could be significant … or will it? It could hit the cheaper end of the industry (who wants to buy a £100 springer and have to apply for a £72 license?) Remember though that any license will endure for 5 years or more, depending on decisions. Surely the top-end air rifle manufacturers should be able to use licensing as a marketing tool? “Buy our prestige £2000 PCP and we will subsidise your license fee!” Shotgun licensing never affected the major manufacturers. Bleating from the gun trade won’t get any sympathy, particularly when the most elite have tried to market 100 ft/lb ‘superguns’ in .30 calibre in recent years. FAC airguns with no purpose in the UK other than bragging rights.
Do I need to get more contentious, or have you had enough? We shouldn’t be wasting our time signing petitions (that’s what anti-shooting types do, they achieve nothing but to piss on some strawberries for a day or two). We should be thinking about how to negotiate a sensible transition, which seems inevitable. Looking forward, not backwards.
The gun trade should be talking directly to Government about impact on business, not leaning on our representative organisations to lobby against licensing. How about trade-ins on guns without safety catches.Why not license ammunition purchase too, as I’ve suggested?What about license grants that run alongside a BASC / CA / NGO / GWCT membership? Could the cost of a license be spread over the duration?
I don’t have the answers but I, for one, think we are facing licensing. So let’s not just roll over and squeal ‘victim!’. How dare we, given the circumstances that have driven this consultation. Let’s do something positive about it, before there are more real victims.
I have been championing airgunning for the past 15 years in the media. I have been an airgunner for more than four decades. But as Heraclitus said, “There is nothing permanent except change”.
Copyright Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, April 2018
Ian Barnett is author of the best-selling ‘Airgun Fieldcraft – The Definitive Hunters Guide’and contributor of hundreds of airgun related magazine articles. His views in this blog are his own, not that of any publisher.
Where Did All The Rabbits Go?
The decline of the humble rabbit, Oryctolagus cuniculus, across many areas of the UK has been notable. This has been reported by many country folk, hunters and conservationists. Yet the dearth of rabbits in distinct areas is matched by reports from some areas that the rabbit is alive and kicking in healthy numbers. So what’s going on?
There is a specific reason for the rabbit famine, of course. A very worrying reason. The proliferation of any ‘species-specific’ disease is cause for concern. Even more so when there is suspicion of deliberate introduction into the UK for purely commercial reasons. No, I’m not talking about myxomatosis this time. I’m talking about both RHDV1 and RHDV2. The rabbit haemorrhagic disease viruses.
Viruses that effect rabbits or hares are known as lagoviruses. In China (in 1984) a new lagovirus emerged amongst a population of Angoran rabbits which had been imported from Germany just days before the outbreak. The new disease proved unstoppable and wiped out around 140 million farmed and domestic rabbits in Asia. The disease was RHDV1. In 1986, it turned up again in Europe and spread like wildfire from Italy to Scandinavia. By 1988 it had infected the European wild rabbit population. In 1990, the disease reached the famous rabbit population on the island of Gotland in Sweden. Almost the entire population was dead within one week. The start of the spread of the disease two decades ago was largely attributed to contaminated rabbit meat … a popular product in Europe. Our Antipodean friends, as they did with myxomatosis, saw RHVD as a potential for biological pest control (not as a threat). Unfortunately the Australian Government’s experiments on Warranga Island (4km off the mainland) resulted in accidental transmission to the mainland, probably through flies. The New Zealand government, to be fair, decided not to adopt RHVD as a pest control medium. So someone introduced it illegally in 1997!
It is now spread by many different vectors. Insects, flies and fleas can carry the virus from infected host rabbits to other rabbits. It travels in animal faeces. Birds such as carrion eaters can carry it in their beaks, mammals such as fox, dog or badger can carry it in their mouths and their faeces. It transmits by ‘aerosol’ means too (breath, sneezing, breeze). One of the most important vectors for the spread of RHVD is us, humans. We can carry the virus on our hands and on our footwear.
The virus is extremely robust. Chinese experiments have shown that it survived in rabbit livers frozen at -20oC for 560 days. It also survived temperature of +50oC for 60 minutes. It can survive on clothing at 20oC for over 100 days. In short, RHVD is the rabbits worst nightmare. So what is the difference between RHVD1 and RHVD2? And why does the virus seem to have completely missed many geographical areas of Britain?
To answer the first question, RHVD2 (sometimes called RHVD Variant) emerged in France in 2010. Latter research has shown that it has been in the UK since 2010, too. It ‘variance’ is allowing it to attack rabbit populations which had previously built up resistance the RHVD2 and many rabbits are now exposed to the new lagovirus. The most devastating property of RHVD2 is that newly born rabbits have no resistance to the virus. With RHVD1, kits under 5 weeks of age contracting the virus had a naturally immunity which would stay with them for life. That at least gave a life-line for survival for the wild rabbit. There is a worry that this new strain may carry its pathogens to other Lagomorphs, which could have huge consequences for the Brown Hare.
What of the second question, though? The random spread of the epidemic? There are two threads of research that may offer the answer to this enigma, yet neither are conclusive at the moment. Both relate to Rabbit Calicivirus (RCV).
The first possible explanation is the immunity built up to RCV. Many of us will recall the emergence of RCV during the mid-nineties?. A disease closely related to RHVD but non-pathogenic. Many rabbits survived RCV and built up anti-bodies which rejected the RHVD virus. So, ironically, it is possible that many colonies that have resisted the first wave of RHVD could be those who were strengthened by infection by RCV in their community.
The second possibility relates to research undertaken in Australia in 2014 which suggests that climatic conditions influenced the spread of RCV and has therefore reduced the pathogenicity of RHVD. A quick and simple summary of the research is that RCV was most infectious in the cool and damp areas of South East Australia. Therefore resistance to RHVD is most prevalent in those same areas. Great Britain has many areas with cool, damp micro-climates. Are these where the rabbits are holding out in numbers? If so, how long will it be before the new variant affects these colonies?
The rabbit became an established staple in the British countryside centuries ago and is sorely missed where it has lost its foothold. I know that from personal experience. I haven’t shot a rabbit for four months as I write this. Not that I haven’t seen a few here and there but you simply don’t shoot what has become rare. You only harvest what is abundant. That should be a hunters apothegm. But I don’t just miss the rabbit as ‘quarry’. As a primary prey species its loss will have an detrimental consequence on many other species and a knock-on effect, too. The fox and stoat, in the absence of rabbits, turn their attention to the hen-house or the ground nest. The buzzard, to the poults.
The British Countryside without the ubiquitous ‘coney’ would be unthinkable.
Copyright Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, March 2018
Labour’s Animal Welfare Plan? A View From The Countryside.
So today saw the launch of the Labour Party’s ‘50 point plan’ for Animal Welfare Reform and what a cuddly, gushing document it made too! Hardly nature ‘Red’ in tooth and claw, as would be expected. The brief introduction (by Sue Hayman MP, Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) sets the stage. “Last year the Prime Minister Theresa May openly declared her support for fox hunting and to bring back a free vote on the matter”. Sue Hayman seems oblivious to the fact that the PM backtracked on this weeks ago. Never mind, though. There are other facts to ignore. “Last year almost 20,000 badgers were killed across England in the largest destruction of a protected species in living memory” No mention of the reason for that, of course … but more on that later. She then draws on the RSPB (that most reputable of charities?) Birdcrime report. “For the first time in thirty years, not one prosecution took place for raptor persecution”. Surely that’s cause for celebration? No. But we know why, don’t we folks. If the RSPB hadn’t blundered around private estates setting up illicit and intrusive hidden cameras then submitted ‘inadmissible’ evidence, there may have been a couple of prosecutions that even we, in the shooting world, would have welcomed. The Plan is set out in seven separate sections, so please allow me to comment on each in their relevant order. Purely from the perspective of a shooter and rural commentator, of course.
Strengthening animal welfare in UK law
The matter of animal sentience is a valid one, which can’t be overlooked by the country-sports or farming community. The old defence of ‘Morgans canon’ died with modern understanding of animal physiology and psychiatry. I covered this in a recent blog called “Anti-Hunting: Be Careful What You Wish For”. In this manifesto, Labour are seeking to include ‘decapod crustaceans’ … that’s lobster and squid to you and me … as animals. Quite right too. They are ‘animals’. Obviously the good people of Islington and Brent have been offended by lobster thermidor. The chef will have to despatch the lobster before cooking (which I would prefer, to be honest). But where do we draw the line? Conveniently in this whole manifesto there is no reference to ‘pest control’, which I find amazing. So a rat dying slowly in its lair, poisoned by a coagulant, has no sentience? A mouse in a trap feels nothing? If we accept that a lobster feels pain, what about the cockroach, the wasp and the ant? Where do we stop? Anyone who has stamped on a few ants near a nest will have seen the immediate ‘stress’ and panic it causes to their community? So will the ‘Loony Left’ soon be calling for a five year jail sentence for swatting a fly? Those Jungle Celebrities will be on life sentences!
Domestic Pets
Perhaps the most worrying section in this release. For a party claiming to act in the best interests of animal welfare, they definitely don’t like dogs, do they? The Hunting Act, if the Masters and community hadn’t remained stalwart, threatened to end the lives of thousands of hounds. Today, in this document, they’ve done it again! Following Scotland and Wales in suggesting the banning of (and I hate this word) ‘shock’ collars. There are a reputed 500,000 ‘correctional’ collars in use across England and Scotland. If we accept that there are many dogs with behavioural problems … often rescue dogs which have been mistreated or have missed out on proper training as a puppy … are we saying just kill them? I can’t use the word ‘euthanize’. A kill is a kill and we countrymen accept that. Scotland SMP’s knee-jerked and voted for a ban just last week. I suspect that, like airgun licensing, it will be largely ignored. Yet many owners dependent on collars and electronic barriers will now be criminalised. The mandatory micro-chipping of cats is included but why? What purpose does it serve, except to allow Miss or Mister Snowflake to be re-united with their roadkill moggie? I’m sure many of us (the RSPB included) would prefer to see mandatory fitting of collar bells to save the millions of songbirds slaughtered by domestic cats every year? To make matters worse, this manifesto is promising to explore a ‘pets-for-all’ policy and lobby the landlord and social housing sector to allow all residents to keep pets. I have just spent my last 12 years in the ‘day-job’ dealing with council and social housing sector tenants. One of the highest reasons for ASB (anti-social behaviour) complaints by neighbours in social housing is dog noise, dog aggression, dog fouling and over-population of cats. Often in properties where keeping pets is excluded from the tenancy agreement (flats and communal housing schemes). Yet Labour wants to exacerbate this problem. Worse still, they want to champion pets following their elderly owners into care? Are they mad? So the ‘minimum wage’ carer now has to not only clean and bathe the poor patient but also clean the litter tray and feed the cat or dog too?
Factory farming and slaughterhouses
Where do I start on this one? At least Labour recognise that “the majority of British farmers take pride in their high levels of animal welfare”. Remember the big ‘sentience’ issue? How can any political party (and I include all parties) ignore the controversy of ‘halal’ or ‘shechita’ animal slaughter in any welfare agenda. Other than a cursory mention re ‘stun or no-stun’ labelling the issue is conveniently ignored in this manifesto. Anything to do with the 85% Muslim vote for Labour last year? Of course not. So it’s ok to ignore animal sentience if it fits your religion. Labour will ignore it. Come on? Am I being fair here or does this stink of sheer hypocrisy?
Wild Animals
I love wild animals and know far more about wild Britain than any urban keyboard conservationist, so this is where I went first when reading the Plan. Labour will “close loopholes that allow for illegal hunting of foxes and hares”. Got me on that one, Sue? I’m no lawyer but if there’s a loophole then surely it remains ‘legal’? Next is “End the badger cull”. Forgive me for being suspicious but it seems that Labours discrimination doesn’t just extend to dogs but also to cattle? They seem to have ignored the positive trend reported on by the Governments CVO (Chief Veterinary Officer) regarding the badger culls. A reduction in TB cases reported in cattle in badger cull areas. The justification for “Last year almost 20,000 badgers were killed across England in the largest destruction of a protected species in living memory” And, of course … no mention in this manifesto of the serious decline in hedgehog numbers. I’ve written about that before too. Which is a great shame because when I was a child I was much more likely to see a hedgehog that a badger. Interestingly, early in this section there is a reference to ‘promoting high standards with regard to game shoots’ yet a few lines later sits the intimidating ‘ban intensive rearing of game birds for shooting’. The final point in this section would be admirable if weren’t so hypocritical. “Embed and enhance the responsibility for farmers to conserve, enhance and create safe habitats for birds and animals during the breeding season, and encourage the growth of wildflowers.” I kid you not! This is the party seeking to rip up rural tradition proposing to teach those who know the countryside how to manage the countryside! So the dairy farmer will be asked to feed the badger and the arable farmer to feed the rabbit.
Animals in sport
Strangely, a section completely dedicated to greyhound welfare. Labour are worried where all the retired greyhounds go? Well, I’ll tell them. If they are not re-homed, to the same place that foxhounds without a purpose and troublesome dogs without a correctional collar go, Sue Hayman MP. Dog heaven.
Animals used in research
The usual lip service expected from any party on such a sensitive subject.
Appointment of an Animal Welfare Commissioner
Great idea … not. We already have APHA (the Animal and Plant Health Agency). We already have DEFRA (Google it) and we already have the Governments CVO (Chief Veterinary Officer). But then, I suspect that Labour might have someone lined up for the position. They probably live in Hounslow, keep two cats and a budgie and therefore know all they need to about ‘animal welfare’.
Copyright, Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, February 2018
www.wildscribbler.com Norfolk based country-sports author, magazine contributor and rural commentator.
Overcoming “Shooter’s Block”
I’m an addictive and prolific writer but even I get ‘writers block’ from time to time. You pick up a pen or open up a blank Word document and waste time staring at a blank page or screen as ideas won’t come. The best cure for which, I find, is to just put down random thoughts in a mind-map. This often kick starts a thread, which builds into a blog or article. The other way I overcome a mental ‘log jam’ is to scan through the photos I take while in the shooting field. The old adage that ‘every picture tells a story’ is very true. Often, revisiting these snapshots prompts recollections that evolve into anecdote and advice. Writers block is usually short-lived. There is another kind of ‘block’ which I fear much more. “Shooters block”. I’m sure I’m not the only shooter who suffers from this and many of you will recognise the signs. It often starts with that feeling of shooting being a chore, a commitment you have to undertake to fulfil obligations and keep your permissions … rather than sport and recreation. You’ve been concentrating on particular quarry and specific tactics, perhaps ambushing warrens weekend after weekend (few of us with ‘day jobs’ can do this daily). Everything has become a bit mundane. You walk the same paths with the same gun, in rain or burgeoning heat, thinking you must have better things to do? Better things than hunting? Oh dear! You start making excuses not to shoot. It’s too hot. Too wet. The garden needs attention. These are typical symptoms. When you go out with the gun, your indifference will result in poor returns. The best way to revive your enthusiasm is to approach things differently for a while.
Reverse your routes.
It’s amazing how different a shooting permission can look when you walk it in the opposite direction to normal. It offers a different perspective and you will see things you’ve overlooked before. Even your normal shooting stances will be challenged at times and approaching obstacles (and shooting opportunities) such as gates or hedgerow gaps will change.
Leave the regular rides or paths.
Take time to explore all of your acreage, landowner permitting. Follow the deer and badger trails. Winter is great for this, with the briars and bracken shrunk back. Instead of walking through a wood, walk slowly around the edge. You’ll find small warrens you were unaware of, dreys, dens and vermin runs from wood to field etc. Explore the parts of the land that were inaccessible during summers growth.
Spend a day in a hide with a camera / binoculars.
Leave the gun at home. Not only will this educate you as to what exactly passes through your shooting land but it will also bore you stupid if, like me, you need to be on the move. You will soon realise that your permission is alive with vermin and you’ll wish you had the gun with you. You might, too, get that shot of a lifetime but with the camera.
Observe … don’t shoot.
As with the ‘hide’ exercise, leave the gun at home and just go tracking and trailing. Walk the paths looking for vermin sign. Stop at puddles and gateways to study tracks. Learn what is frequenting your land. Examine scats and faeces. Watch the pigeon flightlines. Study the behaviour of hare, fox, pigeon, corvid, rabbit, stoat, partridge and pheasant.
Leave the dog behind.
If you normally take a hound with you, try shooting without it. It will break their heart but you will have to really fine-tune your shooting to ensure you don’t ‘lose’ shot quarry or waste any game. You will also come to appreciate how much of a partner your dog is when you have to search and retrieve yourself. I know … I’m in that unenviable position right now!
Take a dog along.
If you never used a dog as a companion, think about getting a pup. Sure, initially, they are hard work. Yet training (in itself) is a rewarding experience for the shooter if approached with a passion to get things right. Trust me, there is no better companion in the field than a loyal and trained hound.
Take a different gun, challenge yourself.
I’m very much an advocate of sticking to one gun and mastering it. Yet if shooting is becoming boring, take a different gun out (most of us have more than one, don’t we!). If I get bored with one rifle, I switch to another for a few weeks. Park the PCP air rifle and pick up a spring-powered rifle. Take out the 20g instead of the 12g. Sharpen your shooting this way.
Try a different shooting discipline.
If you shoot a particular discipline, try another. After decades of air rifle shooting and feeling very stale, the purchase of a .17HMR rimfire has totally re-awakened my passion for riflecraft. I have new ranges to master and quarry such as fox to add to my ‘acceptable target’ list.
Spend time just target shooting.
Don’t hunt live quarry or game for a week or two if you’re feeling flat. Visit a rifle range or set up your own targets somewhere. If you’re a shotgunner, shoot clays for a while. If you’re an adept stalker or sporting shooter, you’ll soon be gagging to get out into the wilds again.
Read some books or magazines.
Pick up some shooting books or magazines. Sit and read pieces written by people at the height of their shooting passion. Look for ideas or projects that could enhance / revitalise your own shooting. In case you hadn’t realised, you’re doing it now!
Lock the guns away and go on holiday.
Your landowner may miss you if you take a break (so inform them) but the vermin and wildlife won’t give a hoot. Do whatever floats your boat. Fly-fishing, hill-walking (my favourite), lying beside a pool somewhere hot (not my preference), scuba diving (that’s more like it!).
Remember the privilege you enjoy.
Always remember, when you are feeling low about shooting, that there will always be someone who would love to walk in your boots and attend the land you are shooting over. Shooting permission, while accessible to many, is nigh on impossible to gain for others. Even your licenses rely on the ‘access to land’ for shooting firearms. That should be inspiration enough.
Copyright, Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, January 2018
A Simple Blast Of Air
Another walk out this morning with my little rimfire saw me return with a full five-round clip, yet again. On a bitterly cold morning, with icicles hanging from the alloy field gates, I didn’t expect to see much in the way of vermin. Even the hoar-hardened plough forbade the probing beak of rook or crow. The hope of an early coney was optimism in the extreme. The few that are left on these fields rarely show beyond the cover of darkness. Similarly, prospects for grey squirrels in such a chill are low. The drey is a much warmer attraction than the freezing wood. There was quarry about, of course. Woodpigeon and crows mainly, though all in the trees. So not quarry for the long-ranging .17HMR round. I had hoped to run into the fox that killed one of the Lady’s peacocks recently. No such luck. I saw hares aplenty but they are ‘verboten’ on this estate. For probably the fourth outing running with this gun I had to walk away from opportunities I wouldn’t have hesitated to take with my legal limit .22 air rifle. In fact, during the past week I have taken the air rifle out twice for half a dozen woodies and a number of squirrels (therefore meat for the freezer). Back at the car today I unclipped the HMR magazine and ejected the chambered bullet. At least there is no waste of ammo with a rimfire; yet that is poor compensation for another barren hunt. Had I taken the air rifle (or a shotgun) I would have definitely taken pigeons and corvids today. I have, as is well documented, no great love for the blunderbuss …. that ‘scatterer‘ of wildlife.
So once again I see myself drifting back to my lifelong favourite. The legal limit .22 air rifle. I mention the calibre simply to defer any argument about which is best; a closed debate as far as I’m concerned and the title picture illustrates. The air rifle (and a bit of shooting permission) gives the proficient hunter and pot-filler access to food and sport 24/7/365. No ‘close season’ frustrations. No ‘buck or doe’ seasons. Elevated shots with minimal risk of harm when taken sensibly. Ammunition as ‘cheap as chips’. Whisper quiet execution (excuse the pun).
The .17HMR will maintain a place in my cabinet for longer-distance shooting and close-range fox culling as and when needed. Far more useful than an FAC airgun.
The days when I take an air rifle out stalking or roost shooting and come back with a blank card are as rare as hens teeth. That’s why I have hunted with a sound-moderated .22 PCP airgun for over 40 years now. Diversity, efficiency, economy, silence, solitude, self-reliance and sustenance. True hunting. No politics, ritualism, false etiquette, class comparison or cap-doffing. No syndicate fees, tipping, gun envy or fear of ridicule. A simple, everyman’s (or woman’s) country sport.
All that’s needed is a rifle, a pellet and a blast of air.
If you’ve never seen my books on the subject of airgun hunting, check out www.wildscribbler.com/books
Copyright Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, January 2018
Provenance and Pigeons
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Christmas is always a bit barren for me in hunting terms. Not due to family commitments or work. I to tend to volunteer to work across the break as I prefer to take my holiday days in fairer seasons. The main reason, however, is that it is often the one time of the year my landowners would often rather not see me! On the lead-in to the traditional Boxing Day shoot, they have been busy dogging-in game-birds and topping up the feeders to keep the birds close in the coverts. The last thing they want is me creeping around the spinneys and pushing the birds away, much as they appreciate my efforts earlier in the year. One landowner always hosts the local Harrier pack on the land just prior to Christmas too, so I make myself scarce. These are small prices to pay for the freedom to roam with gun and dog for the rest of the year.
This morning, two weeks into the New Year but with the pheasant season still live, I slid from the seat of the motor into an unusually warm Westerly breeze. I had parked alongside a high log-pile and the miserable grey cast to the sky foretold another damp and squalid day ahead. As I loaded my two magazines with Webley Accupells, the sterling fodder of my little BSA Ultra SE, a haunting sound grew in volume and I looked toward the pollarded willows bordering the flooded water meadows. A huge skein of greylag geese came beating over the tree-line. An avian blitzkrieg, their huge wings beating a down-draught that could topple cathedrals. They wheeled about, en-masse, then descended legs akimbo into the splashes on the meadow beyond my view. Their vocabulary drowned out all other sound … even the inland gulls that so annoy me with their presence. Xenophobia? You bet.
Staring along the track towards my intended venue, I smiled as a couple of cock pheasants broke from cover noisily. I tipped my cap to this seasons Boxing Day survivors. As I moved along the muddy trail, my own quarry broke cover consistently. The clatter of branch and the flash of grey, violet and white … darting out across the winter stubbles. Again I could afford to smile. They would be back later. My plan was a walk-about and then a session at the ‘elevenses’. ‘Elevenses?’, I hear you ask. These are the woodpigeons that come to a late-morning roost while they digest their early morning plunder. I paused on my walk to check the rifles zero using one of the tiny paper targets I carry in my bag. The thirty yard zero was fine. I moved on. My activity had disturbed one of the local buzzards. It came sweeping over to protest. How would you describe a buzzards call? Scribes of old called it ‘mewling‘ and I can find no better description. The bird swept low over the wood, it’s complete contempt at my presence paying compliment to its lack of persecution in these parts.
I had already marked a spot, at the woods edge and with a cover of pines to use as my personal backdrop. No kit, no decoys, no frills today. Just a solid, dark curtain of cover at my back and an open view of the bare sitty trees to my front. As I crept into position I could see dozens of woodies and corvids way out on the stubbles and in the trees half a mile away. Had I picked the wrong spot? We would see.
This quiet retreat (for an hour or two in a wood) is pure indulgence. This my church, my temple, my mosque, my synagogue … my space. Nature is my ‘deity’. And Nature demands no subservience from bird or beast or tree or flower. We human hunters are simply beasts of a higher order and must still bow to Nature. We are feral. Our eyes, ears, nose and instincts are tuned into a dimension that few of our associates understand, often even our direct kin. We don’t hear a crow ‘croak’ like most. We hear it speak. It’s call will tell us it’s state of mind .. alert, relaxed, warning, courting? We can smell where the fox passed an hour earlier. We can sense that we’re being watched intensely and will stop in our tracks until we identify the ‘watcher’. The more time we spend in the wild, the more we understand and identify with the wild. And what many fail to realise is that until you ‘kill’, you can never recognise the value of life and the importance of the provenance brought through death. That is too deep a thought for many to face.
Having put a few birds in the bag from the morning roost, I decided to go walk-about. It was evident that Old Brock has clearly been plundering the buried squirrel caches and sign of their nocturnal meandering was all over the wood. The badger is definitely becoming the dominant creature in the coverts, even to the extent of evicting foxes from their dens to expand their social housing projects.
I stopped to indulge in a flask of tomato soup. Remember Barnett’s Laws? The minute you lay your gun against the tree trunk, your quarry will appear. A fat carrion crow lit on a high branch as I drank. I slid behind the tree trunk deftly, lowered the flask slowly to the deck and lifted the Ultra. I chambered a pellet and slid around the blind side of the tree. It was still there. Compensating for elevation, I slipped the pellet. The bird tumbled into the mulch. A small victory in the grand scheme of things … but that’s how Nature works. If things are balanced gently, with moderation and respect, she doesn’t have to unleash the fury she often does to restore her demanded equilibrium.
Keep the faith
Copyright, Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, Jan 2018
The Buzzard and The Betrayal
The decision this morning wasn’t whether to brave the winter weather. It was what guns to take? Looking out of the windows at home I could see the light boughs of young yew and cedar bending under a Northerly blow. In the habit lately of taking both air rifle and rimfire, I glanced at the digital weather station in my kitchen. The technological claim of 30C would be challenged later. What was certain was that was going to be a ‘warm hat and shooting glove’ morning so I opted for the air rifle. I had already decided on a location where I could balance leeward shelter with hunting opportunity. The expectation of some sunshine later added to that choice.
Arriving on the estate I ploughed the recently valeted CR-V through deep puddles and thick mud with a grimace. Oh well … no gain without pain, they say! I had hell n’ all trouble getting a set of serious all-terrain boots for this motor due to the wheel sizes but I have to say it was worthwhile. It hasn’t let me down yet … touches his wooden head! I parked up at the top of the escarpment, near the woodsheds, pointing my bonnet in the direction I would be stalking. An agreed code which allows the Lady and her staff to know where my rifle and potential risk is if they take some exercise, with their dogs, in the woods. I slid out of the warm motor and stepped onto the muddy track. A bitter wind, keen enough to make the eyes bleed, slapped at my face. Under the tailgate I donned a trapper hat, a snood and a pair of shooting mitts. It would be more sheltered in the old arboretum at the base of the escarpment … but I needed to get there first, with at least my trigger finger thawed! I loaded a couple of magazines with .22 Webley Accupells, loaded the gun, checked the safety was on and locked the car. Above me, rooks and crows rolled in the Artic born draught. Black surfers on an invisible tide.
The walk down the escarpment was slippery and testing, so I kept the ‘safety’ on despite the plethora of woodpigeon in the sitty trees on the slopes. They departed tree by tree, as I progressed; squadrons to be challenged another day. At the base of the hill I was met with the sort of target that every airgun hunter hates. A grey squirrel leapt from a flint wall onto the track just eight yards from me. It stared at me as I fumbled to bring rifle from slung to ready but was gone before I could level the gun, let alone focus so closely. Fair law and fair escape.
I paused at the gate in the lane between wood and field; just to watch and hear the birds on the recently flood-drenched water meadows. The waters have receded now but the splashes still hold a diaspora of fowl. Teal, wigeon, mallard, greylags, Canadas, mute swans and a little egret all visible from the gate. Turning into the murk of the wood and it’s umbrella of ancient yew, I immediately heard the chatter and hiss of Sciurus carolensis. The grey invader. A species that was innocently introduced to Britain when these yew trees were mere saplings. Non-native, like the yew, they too have thrived. I stalked the garden wood and toppled three, which is two more than I expected in this chill. Squirrels don’t hibernate but they will sit tight in the dreys in cold or excessively wet weather.
The climb back up the slope later warmed my limbs and at the top, as my heaving lungs expired the mist of spent breath, I looked into the blue sky; drawn by the shout of the rooks and the furious mewling of a raptor. The old buzzard wheeled and jinked majestically, pursued by a throng of nagging corvids. They might feint and fuss, but the old bird had the confidence to ignore their meaningless threat. She has ruled these woods too long to take umbrage to inferiors and this year, as in the past seven, she will breed here again.
It was with a heavy heart, when I got home later, that I read of the capitulation of another old buzzard, from a tribe in which I had placed the confidence of my vote for many terms of election during my lifetime. Resilience is the backbone of a stable and sustainable genus. Caving in to perceived ‘popular opinion’ is like letting the crows (or should that read Corbyns) batter you from your righteous perch. To then insult your voters by saying you will build a ‘new forest’ just confirms that you were never concerned about the ‘old forest’ anyway. This, for me, was the ultimate insult and most landowners don’t seem to have spotted this dressed reference. An attack on private landowners by Tories? Ye Gods!
“This new Northern Forest is an exciting project that will create a vast ribbon of woodland cover in northern England, providing a rich habitat for wildlife to thrive, and a natural environment for millions of people to enjoy.”
Lest they forget, we already have a multitude of habitats for ‘millions of people to enjoy’. They’re called National Parks or ‘Nature Reserves’.
Consider this too? “Paul de Zylva from Friends of Earth told BBC News: “It is a supreme irony that tree planters will have to get funding from HS2, which threatens 35 ancient woodlands north of Birmingham”
Great! Rip up ancient established woods to build a train line? Can you see the perverse ironies here, folks? Money matters, wilderness doesn’t?
And the people that know, the Woodland Trust, say “the Forest will be less of a green ribbon and more of a sparsely-threaded doily”. £5.7M doesn’t buy many trees, let alone the design and labour to implement this nonsense.
I enjoyed my little sortie into a patch of ancient mixed woodland today, with my gun and not just a little taste of freedom. I’m old enough not to fret too much about all this getting closed down eventually (not the land but the hunting, the shooting, the freedom to walk it as a hunter). It’s the young guns I fear for. And those whose income depends on the shooting and hunting tradition. A whole generation of urban, flat-living, cat-keeping keyboard warriors and plastic politicians who rarely leave suburbia (they might get muddy!) are about to destroy the countryside. We have fought to preserve the wild places against eco-hooliganism based on a real knowledge of how nature works … red in tooth and claw.
Those that seek to ‘save’ the fox seem totally oblivious to the fact that fox populations are in decline since the Hunting Act. Let’s put our heads under the pillow, shall we? Perhaps let the cat sit on it? Killer of (in RSPB terms) some 55 million songbirds every year?
But I digress. I had a good day out today in an ancient wood today. I saw muntjac, roe, hare, squirrel (not for long), long-tailed tits … the list is endless. Strangely though, I didn’t see a fox. Having got home and opened up the Mac, I wished I had stayed there.
Disappointed? Most definitely. Because a PM turned on promise. I’m just one in millions today to feel betrayed.
Copyright, Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, January 2018
‘We Do It To Ourselves, We Do’
The title? “We do it to ourselves we do.” is a line from a Radiohead song. Never more pertinent.
That I’m a committed ‘shooter’ is beyond doubt, despite a CV which predominantly reads ‘air rifle’ and includes many hundreds of shooting press articles. Not to mention several books. I have three shotguns and a .17HMR rimfire in the cabinet. The shotguns rarely come out as I have no real love of driven game shooting (a personal thing; it isn’t ‘hunting’ and I’m a hunter). So tonight, when I ventured onto social media to see what all my Twitter contacts had been up to, I was mortified to see the posts about a North Yorkshire shooting travesty. Talk about an ‘own goal’! What were these morons thinking when they did this? It hit home even harder when I noted the area.
I’ve just returned from a Christmas sojourn with my ‘in-law’ family in Hutton-le-Hole, very close to Helmsley. On Christmas Eve four of us (with a cocker and lurcher pulling us along, both leashed) enjoyed a testing circular walk up through Gillamoor from Hutton and back around to the village via what must be some of the most interesting shooting terrain in North Yorkshire. I was the only ‘shooter’ in the party and my eye was drawn far from the path in front as we passed the myriad feeders along the high trail. The hyper behaviour of the two dogs mirrored my observation. I watched dozens and dozens of birds (mainly hens) sliding into cover and disappearing down the slopes. Few birds actually broke cover but those that did drove Charlie the Cocker into an apoplectic frenzy. Not to mention the rabbits and grey squirrels criss-crossing the trail! Let me make this clear, I am not accusing this shoot of the despicable behaviour reported today, they were ten miles away from that discovery, which was made a month earlier.
At one point on the walk we reached an unmarked fork in the track and despite following the OS map, we were lost. A quad bike sped past towards the feeders, traveling too fast to hail down. Then a Range Rover appeared up another track and I was able to stop it and ask directions. The guys in the motor put us on the right path and I wished them good shooting on Boxing Day. I was hugely jealous. Not wanting to be part of the ‘big shoot’ (obviously imminent), but because of the terrain and the small vermin it must hold.
Alas, as always at Christmas, I was on a ‘no-shooting, attend to family’ agenda. On Boxing Day, as the family walked the moor North of Hutton-le-Hole with the dogs, the salvos could be heard across the other side of the beck. The Boxing Day shoot is as important a tradition as the Parade and trail-hunt of the Foxhounds. I applauded it from afar. The difference, of course, is that at this point in time we can’t kill foxes but we can still shoot game and vermin.
I cull hundreds of small vermin every year. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a magpie, crow, rat, rabbit, stoat, squirrel, woodpigeon or fox. If it’s edible, I recover the meat, as these miscreants seem to have done. What isn’t edible is disposed of with discretion or intelligence. Leave a few breasted or paunched carcasses at the mouth of a live fox or badger den and they’ll be cleared by dawn.
If the result of a legitimate driven game shoot leaves such a volume of breasted carcasses that can’t be disposed of this way, surely a simple bonfire and restful cremation is easy to organise?
I doubt that the perpetrators of this damaging act are intelligent enough to be reading this piece? If you are, then please respond and explain your inane actions, which has damaged the reputation of all game and vermin shooters and will once more let loose the ‘anti’ hounds.
Best I finish now … because I am so bloody angry at what you have just done to our community.
Copyright, Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, December 2017
The Fairy Tale Of Re-Wilding
The Fairy Tale Of Rewilding
It was Christmas Eve, in the inn next the muir
Ex-keepers debating how life could endure.
Re-wilders, with funding, had bought up the land
No shooting, no snares, all vermin control banned.
They planted the hillsides; a young forest grows,
The grouse have all gone, replaced by the crows.
No gamebirds, no wardens, ‘tis the realm of the pest
The curlews gone too, with no safe place to nest.
The sea eagles soared as the beavers felled trees,
Their dams slowed the rivers before they reached seas.
The estuaries were drying, the waders in plight
But the Fools continued to pitch their ‘good’ fight.
The hen harriers died, with no game to dissect
While Reynard and Brock walked the fields unchecked.
As the trees drowned the moors; a landscape was lost,
Rural economy and jobs? No-one counted the cost.
But the higher the sapling, the bolder the roe
Even muntjac had come here, to follow the flow.
“We need lynx”, shouted Fools, “to trim out the deer.
Throw a wolf or two in, to keep the rides clear”
But what of the beavers? The start of the plan?
“Will the wolves eat the beavers?” asked the Chieftain.
“Of course not”, the Fools laughed. “The wolves will eat deer!”
So in came the wolves to the Fools loud cheer.
Now, out of control, the wild creatures rule.
The re-wilders doctrine, the creed of the Fool.
A man can’t kill fox … but the fox can kill bird?
A creed of hypocrisy, biased … absurd!
A hound can’t chase hare but a lynx can hunt deer,
Where is the reasoning and logic at play here?
And the Fools had lied, there was blood on the hills,
The slopes strewn with wool from the numerous kills.
“Don’t fret”, said the Fools. “lets bring in the bear”
Old Bruin will bring balance and make things more fair.
So the bears were brought in but made rivers their home,
Scooping the salmon that leapt through the foam
The farmers and shepherds tore their hair out in rage,
For the Fools, again, were on the wrong page.
As the lynx and the wolf avoided bears paths,
Still slaughtering sheep and sometimes the calves.
Back at the inn, with the log fire full flare,
The wise men of old talked of balance and care.
When the grouse were in lek and the curlews would cry,
When the hen harrier flew and the eagle passed by.
But in the ale-house, no shepherds stood there.
They were guarding their flocks from the lynx, wolf and bear.
Yet they needn’t have worried, for Natures is strong,
And will level the field, when the balance is wrong.
Came the day when the salmon couldn’t get through the dams,
So the bears slew the beavers and dined on their hams.
Then they turned on the wolves, who fled further downhill,
Where the shepherds rebelled and started to kill.
The sea eagles were famished, with no fish in the lochs,
So they swooped on the lynx as they preyed on the flocks.
The bears in their hunger, then came down to the farms,
To be met by the herdsmen, who raised up their arms.
I went to the Chieftain … to tell him the truth.
In Nature, life’s balance is often uncouth.
That’s why these creatures had long left our shores.
Starved, hunted; displaced and by natural laws.
Rewilding? What nonsense. What human conceit.
Mother Nature decides what will thrive, or forfeit.
If the creatures should be here, they’d never have gone,
Restoration was fruitless, intrinsically wrong.
And the Fools … they bleated like the cat-killed ewe
As the carnage continued and their dream went askew.
The dams were dissembled, the rivers could run,
The rewilding Fools were back where they’d begun.
The hills and the forests returned back to the Lords
While the disproven Fools all fell on their swords.
Mother Nature herself had re-balanced the glen.
Beaver, wolf, lynx, and bear … inexistent again.
Copyright, Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, December 2017
The Importance Of Our Hunting Heritage
Many anti-hunting protagonists debate from a standpoint that there is no place for hunting wild creatures in the twenty-first century. I’m sorry but I fail to accept that the hunting gene had a ‘use before’ date. What has modernity got to do with it? Half the world still has to hunt for (or grow) its own food. It’s a basic precept of being ‘human’. To say that we don’t need to hunt because we are intellectually superior and scientifically advanced is accepting an almost Orwellian reliance upon technology and governance. Both of which have proved unreliable, right across the planet. Contemporary Homo sapiens are becoming far ‘too soft’; not ‘too intelligent’. The skills and intuition that brought us to the top of the food chain are being lost, generation on generation. Yes, we can get meat from the supermarket shelf without getting our own hands bloodied … but somebody has to breed, feed and kill a cow, chicken, lamb or pig to allow that privilege. We could, of course, go ‘vegan’ and take a huge step backwards in evolutionary terms (which I will explain later). Non-hunters would do well to read a marvellous old book called ‘The Hunting Hypothesis’ by the anthropologist Robert Ardrey. The one certainty about Homo sapiens as a species, given all the evidence of history, is that one day our world will self-implode. When that happens … whether by natural or man-made catastrophe … there will be survivors. Both man and beast. Then everyone will cling to the hunter … not the scientist. I’m immensely proud to be a hunter and therefore bow to the hunters that came before me, across the millennia.
The great apes from which we descended in the Pleistocene era were frugivores (fruit eaters). They lived in the huge swathes of forest that teemed with vegetation and fruit. Climate change (no … it’s not a new concept) reduced the forests to small clumps of shelter between huge dry savannah plains. The savannah was populated with both passive and predatory mammals. The apes (passive) had to adapt to move around these lands to seek sustenance. Hominids evolved. Short (four foot high) and very like chimpanzees. They learned, for their own protection, to move in small groups. To traverse dangerous savannah and plains, our descendants had to adapt to stand on two legs frequently, not only to survey for danger but also to learn to run and brandish sticks, as weapons. The fossils of the first hominids are dated at around 5.5 million years ago. What was the difference between hominids and apes? There were several. Evidence from fossils shows that the former had increased brain capacity in the skull. Their dentition had reduced, indicating that hominids no longer needed to tear at the meat or protect themselves with their fangs. They had tools to do that.
There were two huge leaps (anthropologically proven) which changed the course of our evolution. The first was the neurological development of the nervous system and the hominid brain. This was dependant on cells being supplied with structural fats that can absorbed swiftly by eating meat. Hominids were too small to ‘scavenge’ or chase large predators from their catch. They learned to hunt (perhaps also trap) their own meat. The fact that meat-eating triggered the development of our ancestors and the expansion of the brain is beyond doubt. Had early man not learned to hunt and to consume meat, Homo sapiens would not exist. Around 400,000 years ago Homo erectus emerged. A biped with a brain three quarters the size of ours. No vegetarian ape could have evolved like this. The second leap was the capture and caging of one elusive piece of natural magic … fire … by Cro-Magnon man. Archaeological digs showed that hearths were commonly used during the Neanderthal period. Furthermore, they had learned that vegetation, seeds and grains could be cooked or boiled. A secondary source of the fatty acids needed to develop the nervous system and increase brain function. Thus we moved from carnivore to omnivore, expanding our facility to survive.
Modern man owes much to the Pleistocene and Cro-Magnon hunters. The necessity to gather together in small communities was borne of the need for security and protection from large carnivores. Creatures that would have ended the emergence of the early hominids. These were the first society’s. Developing from frugivores (fruit eaters) to omnivores opened out Natures larder. As our brains enlarged, so did our ingenuity. Fire brought with it the ability to survive the cold. To cook and smoke meat or vegetation, thus negating seasonality and possible putrescence. Fire allowed us to progress from flint tools, to smelt and soften metals, to create iron weapons and become more efficient hunters. We learned to fire clay and craft pots and containers. This allowed us to store and ferment food and drink. By then, of course, we had already gathered herds of beasts on which we could feed and had domesticated the wolf to help protect those flocks. Only hunters could have domesticated wolves, drawing them from the cold to the warmth of the fire with offerings of cooked meat and controlling them without endangering the encampment. Without hunting, the symbiotic relationship with the domestic dog would never have evolved. So the concept of hunting with dogs goes so far back into our evolution that it is outrageous for contemporary society to seek to forbid it.
Throughout the last three hundred years, despite our brains staying the same size, our knowledge has increased exponentially. Yet we should never lose sight of the skills and crafts that brought us to where we are today; nor the traditions that uphold these. History is as important to human development as new scientific research. Hunting is still as pertinent today as it was a hundred or a thousand years ago. There is still a need to fill the pot, control predators, remove pests and cull unhealthy animals. Many contemporary Homo sapiens just can’t understand that concept because they live in sanitised, urban environments. We now have generations in cities across the civilised world who have never seen any wilderness further away than the local park. Wildlife is a two-dimensional experience or (even worse, a trip to a zoo). They have no personal engagement with the meat they eat until it touches their teeth. Teeth which have evolved to cope with meat which has already been skinned and butchered.
Now there’s a point to consider. If we’ve outgrown the need to kill animals, perhaps we don’t need teeth any more? We have the technology to pulverise everything and suck it in through a straw. Any takers?
Copyright, Ian Barnett, Wildscribbler, December 2017