Well it's been a few days now since I updated the Hunting and Shooting Gazette so I taught I would tell you all how I got on with my own days shooting. My brother Richie and I went out on Friday for a few hours with my gun dog Lady a Springer Spaniel. We went down to a place where we knew we would get a bit of shooting seen as Richie hasn't got any pheasants this year yet as he was sick for a few weeks and didnt get to go out shooting.
Anyway we left the house around 9am was drizzling a bit we were hoping it would be gone before we started hunting. We drove a few miles down the road to a place called the gurteens and parked the car and got the guns a dog out of the boot. When we got into the first field we decided to hunt along the first ditch down to a little ash plant wood.
As we expected no sign of any Pheasants along that ditch so we crossed a little stream into the ash plant and hunted it across to the far side of it where we new there was a maize stubble field where we taught we might see an auld cock pheasant but nothing.
It wasnt looking like a good start to the day but at least the drizzle of rain had stopped. We climbed over the fence into a grass field beside the stubble and hunted the ditches over two fields to a few wheat stubble fields only seen a few rabbits in the grass fields but let them off for another day.
When we were getting over the ditch into the stubble field when lady trailed up the ditch around 60 yards and rose a nice cock but we didn't get a shot at it. I watched from top of the ditch as it flew back for the maize field we had hunted. We hunted the bottom ditch across and she rose another cock out the far side of the ditch two pheasants seen and hadn't taken a shot yet it was looking like a good day for the birds ha-ha.
We got to the corner of the field and Richie hopped out through a gap on the ditch into another stubble field. we hunted up the ditch in between the two fields the dog was a bit steadier now and was taken her time. Half way up the ditch she started to get excited on Richie's side and he called me to watch out for something. He put lady into the ditch and a few seconds later out comes a woodcock.
It flew lovely back down along the ditch around 30 yards and I dropped him with the first shot. I sent lady back and she retrieved the woodcock back to me. After I put the woodcock in my game bag we headed up along the ditch towards a little grove in the corner separating the field that Richie was in with another stubble. Richie stood in the gateway of the two fields and I stood in the middle of the grove at my side so i could get a shot if anything came my side.
I sent lady in and she hunted the grove thats usually good for a pheasant but nothing in it today. Just as I started to walk up the rest of the ditch lady flushed a cock out towards me i fired with the first and missed then the cock turned to go back out over the ditch and I dropped it with the second. Richie wasn't to happy as he couldn't get a shot at it seen as we were out to get him his first of the season.
Anyway after stopping to have a look at the pheasant we went to the ditch on the other side of the field that Richie was in. We looked for somewhere Richie could get onto the other side but couldn't find anywhere so we hunted the ditch. Around 200 yards down and lady started getting excited and we got ready. She went into the ditch and we could hear her working her way down a bit and up gets a pheasant it was a cock it flew out the other side and we couldn't get a shot, It didn't look like it was going to be Richie's day. We hunted two more stubble fields and seen one other cock but didn't get a shot at him either. It had started to drizzle again so we decide to head back for the car.
We hunted two bogs on the way back in the first bog we rose a few snipe and richie got a fine shot on one and he dropped him. He walked on a bit further with lady and she rose another cock infront of him. He panicked on it a fired a bit quick and missed with the two shots. On we went into the second bog which had a few birch trees growing in it I gave a walk through them with lady while richie stood on the outside for something flying out that way. Half way through the trees and lady rose another woodcock infront of me. It was out round 20 yards when I fired the first shot and missed. I steadied up a bit a hit it with the second shot around 50 yards out.Second woodcock of the day down for me was delighted. We hunted back to the car but rose nothing else but all in all we had a good days shooting a bag of 1 Pheasant, 2 woodcock and 1 Snipe.
Richie and I enjoyed the day even tho he didn't get his first pheasant for the season yet but still plenty of time left yet. Hope you enjoyed hearing about our day shooting as we had out hunting and hope to see you back at the Hunting and Shooting Gazette again soon.
Yours in Sport,
The Hunting And Shooting Gazette
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Monday, November 30, 2009
Update on The Hunting and Shooting Gazette
Hey all didnt get to do any thing this weekend with the hunting and shooting gazette been a bit busy out shooting got my 10th pheasant of the season shot three altogether over the weekend. Should have had a few more but the dogs were doing a bit of messing on me seen 12 pheasants only got a shot at the three i got so good going on my behalf if i do say so myself haha. Any way my next post will be tomorrow so hopefully ill have a review or something for then. So come back tomorrow to the Hunting and Shooting Gazette.
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Different Types of Hunting and Shooting Part 4
Hey everyone and welcome back to the Hunting and Shooting Gazette for my next and final post on the different types of hunting and shooting. In this post im going to be talking a little about lamping rabbits and i hope you enjoy.
Lamping Rabbits
Lamping invloves walking through fields with a good high powered spot lamp and battery pack searching for rabbits. There are to main types of rabbit lamping and they are lamping with dogs and lamping with guns usually rifles. Were going to start with lamping with dogs. When doing this kind of hunting sight dogs are used such as lurchers and whippets. These types of dogs are fast and have very good eye sight and are the best to see the rabbits when the light is shun on them. What you do is walk through fields at night scanning them with a spot lamp searching for the rabbits. When the rabbits are found you realese the dogs and they chase the rabbits trying to catch them while you keep the lamp on the rabbit so the dog can see where it goes.
Lamping rabbits with guns is similar to going with the dogs but not as enjoyable as watching the dogs chasing the rabbits. You walk around the fields scanning them for rabbits and when you find the rabbits you steady your gun and shoot them. Rifles, Shotguns and pellet guns are used but the main one would be the rifles. Usually low powered rifles like the .22 or the .17HMR. Now a days people use pick up jeeps or quads for this kind of lamping as you can cover more ground. Also with the jeeps you can see over the ditches alot easier. When lamping from jeeps there would usually be a team of three people. One driving, one using the lamp and the third shooting. The people lamping and shooting are usually up on the back of the jeep so they can have a 360 degree view of the fields.
Thats all from me today and on the different types of hunting and shooting for now. Please check back again in the next day or two and hopefully i will have a few reviews on hunting gear and a few recipes for your game. Hope to see you again at the Hunting and Shooting Gazette.
Yours in Sport,
The Hunting and Shooting Gazette
Lamping Rabbits
Lamping invloves walking through fields with a good high powered spot lamp and battery pack searching for rabbits. There are to main types of rabbit lamping and they are lamping with dogs and lamping with guns usually rifles. Were going to start with lamping with dogs. When doing this kind of hunting sight dogs are used such as lurchers and whippets. These types of dogs are fast and have very good eye sight and are the best to see the rabbits when the light is shun on them. What you do is walk through fields at night scanning them with a spot lamp searching for the rabbits. When the rabbits are found you realese the dogs and they chase the rabbits trying to catch them while you keep the lamp on the rabbit so the dog can see where it goes.
Lamping rabbits with guns is similar to going with the dogs but not as enjoyable as watching the dogs chasing the rabbits. You walk around the fields scanning them for rabbits and when you find the rabbits you steady your gun and shoot them. Rifles, Shotguns and pellet guns are used but the main one would be the rifles. Usually low powered rifles like the .22 or the .17HMR. Now a days people use pick up jeeps or quads for this kind of lamping as you can cover more ground. Also with the jeeps you can see over the ditches alot easier. When lamping from jeeps there would usually be a team of three people. One driving, one using the lamp and the third shooting. The people lamping and shooting are usually up on the back of the jeep so they can have a 360 degree view of the fields.
Thats all from me today and on the different types of hunting and shooting for now. Please check back again in the next day or two and hopefully i will have a few reviews on hunting gear and a few recipes for your game. Hope to see you again at the Hunting and Shooting Gazette.
Yours in Sport,
The Hunting and Shooting Gazette
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Different Types Of Hunting and Shooting part 3
Hey hows everyone doing today welcome back for part 3 of different types of Hunting and Shooting. Today I'm going to be talking a little about pigeon shooting.It is very enjoyable but you do need a bit of knowledge on laying out the decoys which i will cover later on in my hunting and shooting gazette.
Pigeon Shooting
Pigeon Shooting is a great way to practice your shooting in the summer for the duck and pheasant seasons so you wont be getting rusty but it can be done all year round. There are three types of pigeon shooting that i know of and they are Decoying, Flight shooting and Roost Shooting. In Ireland the wood pigeon is knowing as a pest to the farmers because of it eating their crops so this is probably the main purpose for shooting pigeons. But they are also shot for game purposes too as they can be eaten. It is probably one of the more demanding types of hunting and shooting as the birds are very acrobatic in the air making them hard and challenging birds to shoot.
Decoying is probably the most common type of pigeon shooting. It involves building a hide near where they feed and laying out decoys. The hides can be built from many materials such as camouflaged nets, straw bales and natural cover. The idea is that you cant be seen as pigeons have very good eye sight. The decoys are used to draw the pigeons in close enough to be shot. You can use artificial ones that can be bought in most good hunting and shooting shops or dead birds can be used to save on money.
Flight shooting is growing in popularity these days but still not as common as decoying. this involves shooting the pigeons on there flight lines. The gun would be hidden in a hedge or at the edge of a wood and the pigeons would be shot as the fly past.
Roost shooting is more common in the winter months of the year when the days are getting shorter. The gun would be positioned at the edge of a wood and shoot the pigeons when the going to roost. you will need a fairly good hunting dog for retrieving the shot birds as it will most likely be dark wen you are finishing up.
Hope you enjoyed reading the post and hope to see you back part 4 at My Hunting and Shooting Gazette
Pigeon Shooting
Pigeon Shooting is a great way to practice your shooting in the summer for the duck and pheasant seasons so you wont be getting rusty but it can be done all year round. There are three types of pigeon shooting that i know of and they are Decoying, Flight shooting and Roost Shooting. In Ireland the wood pigeon is knowing as a pest to the farmers because of it eating their crops so this is probably the main purpose for shooting pigeons. But they are also shot for game purposes too as they can be eaten. It is probably one of the more demanding types of hunting and shooting as the birds are very acrobatic in the air making them hard and challenging birds to shoot.
Decoying is probably the most common type of pigeon shooting. It involves building a hide near where they feed and laying out decoys. The hides can be built from many materials such as camouflaged nets, straw bales and natural cover. The idea is that you cant be seen as pigeons have very good eye sight. The decoys are used to draw the pigeons in close enough to be shot. You can use artificial ones that can be bought in most good hunting and shooting shops or dead birds can be used to save on money.
Flight shooting is growing in popularity these days but still not as common as decoying. this involves shooting the pigeons on there flight lines. The gun would be hidden in a hedge or at the edge of a wood and the pigeons would be shot as the fly past.
Roost shooting is more common in the winter months of the year when the days are getting shorter. The gun would be positioned at the edge of a wood and shoot the pigeons when the going to roost. you will need a fairly good hunting dog for retrieving the shot birds as it will most likely be dark wen you are finishing up.
Hope you enjoyed reading the post and hope to see you back part 4 at My Hunting and Shooting Gazette
Monday, November 23, 2009
Different Types of Hunting and Shooting part 2
This is a continuation from my last post on different types of Hunting and Shooting. In the last post i told you about Pheasant shooting and in this post I'm going to be talking a little about duck shooting.
Duck Shooting
Duck shooting in Ireland where I'm from starts on the 1st of September and finishes on the 31st of January every year. Duck shooting is totally different from pheasant hunting its more of a waiting game in my opinion. You don't walk around after ducks or usually use dogs to flush them either. When after duck you would use camouflaged hides on wetlands or beside rivers and lakes. The best part of the day for hunting ducks would be early morning before the sun comes up or late evening before the sun begins to set. Now a days hunters use decoys and calls for luring the ducks into shooting range instead of just waiting for the birds to come in. The best type of dog for duck hunting or shooting would be the Retriever as the dogs would only be used for picking the birds of the water and from around the wetlands and these types of dog love the water. the most common gun used is usually the semi-automatic shotguns for shooting duck as the ducks usually fly in small groups and these kind of shotguns can usually fire up to 5 shots. These guns would be the better option for duck shooting instead of the double barrel shot guns. If your a patient hunter and like the water you should give duck shooting a try. Well that's all from me at My Hunting and Shooting Gazette for now make sure and check back again soon.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Different Types Of Hunting and Shooting
Here is the the first proper post for the Hunting and Shooting blog. Ive being here trying to think of what to start off with and Ive decided to start off with a brief description for the different types of hunting and shooting there is. First I'm going to start of with one of my favorites which is Pheasant Shooting.
Pheasant Shooting
Well to me there are two main types of pheasant shooting which i do every year and they are Rough Shooting and Driven shooting. Today I'm going to talk a little about both of them. Ill start off with Rough Shooting which i do mostly. Rough shooting is the most common form of Pheasant hunting in Ireland and the UK. Pheasants are usually found on the ground in ditches and heavy cover in rough terrain such as bogs and woodland so this is where we get the term Rough Shooting. This type of shooting involves walking thru fields and bog along ditches with the use of gun dogs for hunting the cover to find the pheasants. When the dog finds the birds it then flushes them from the cover for you to shoot them. Now driven shooting on the other hand is not really that common in Ireland as it is in the UK. Driven Shooting is where you have 8-10 gunmen usually lined up at the edge of a wood or cover which the pheasants are in. Instead of using dogs to get the pheasants up a group of people which are called beaters that beat the cover with sticks to flush the birds out over the gunmen. This kind of shooting is for the more upper class people which don't like the aspects of rough shooting and don't mind paying for the shooting. Driven shooting is found on big estates around the two country's which rare thousands of pheasants a year for this purpose.
Well that's all from me today. Check back again tomorrow to the Hunting and Shooting blog and ill have another post on the different types of hunting and shooting there is.
Pheasant Shooting
Well to me there are two main types of pheasant shooting which i do every year and they are Rough Shooting and Driven shooting. Today I'm going to talk a little about both of them. Ill start off with Rough Shooting which i do mostly. Rough shooting is the most common form of Pheasant hunting in Ireland and the UK. Pheasants are usually found on the ground in ditches and heavy cover in rough terrain such as bogs and woodland so this is where we get the term Rough Shooting. This type of shooting involves walking thru fields and bog along ditches with the use of gun dogs for hunting the cover to find the pheasants. When the dog finds the birds it then flushes them from the cover for you to shoot them. Now driven shooting on the other hand is not really that common in Ireland as it is in the UK. Driven Shooting is where you have 8-10 gunmen usually lined up at the edge of a wood or cover which the pheasants are in. Instead of using dogs to get the pheasants up a group of people which are called beaters that beat the cover with sticks to flush the birds out over the gunmen. This kind of shooting is for the more upper class people which don't like the aspects of rough shooting and don't mind paying for the shooting. Driven shooting is found on big estates around the two country's which rare thousands of pheasants a year for this purpose.
Well that's all from me today. Check back again tomorrow to the Hunting and Shooting blog and ill have another post on the different types of hunting and shooting there is.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
What The Hunting and Shooting Gazette Is About
OK well the Hunting and Shooting Gazette is my first go at making a blog I said it give it ago seen as I don't have anything better to be doing with my time at the minute like most people these days with the recession and all..i was sitting here in front of the computer browsing thru the internet the other day trying to think of ideas to pass the days a bit quicker and found out about blogging and decided to give it ago...
I started with the Hunting and Shooting Gazette for one reason and that's because I love it from walking the fields on a winter’s morning after pheasants to shooting a few clays in the summer evenings or even just going for a stroll with the .22 after a few rabbits to decoying pigeons over a field of rape. It’s one of the best feelings in the world for me to be out in the countryside with my gun and my dogs hunting the ditches and cover.
Well as you can see I'm in the very early stages of making the site so there's very little on it at the moment. So at the minute I'm just going to go thru what my hopes are for the Hunting and Shooting gazette.
I started with the Hunting and Shooting Gazette for one reason and that's because I love it from walking the fields on a winter’s morning after pheasants to shooting a few clays in the summer evenings or even just going for a stroll with the .22 after a few rabbits to decoying pigeons over a field of rape. It’s one of the best feelings in the world for me to be out in the countryside with my gun and my dogs hunting the ditches and cover.
Well as you can see I'm in the very early stages of making the site so there's very little on it at the moment. So at the minute I'm just going to go thru what my hopes are for the Hunting and Shooting gazette.
My hopes for the gazette are that it will be a place for me and other people to tell my experiences out hunting and tips about hunting and shooting in general. I have a few ideas about having a few articles about different types of hunting. Like lamping for rabbits with lurchers and whippets pheasant shooting, duck shooting and so on. I’ll have another section to the blog that I will be reviewing all the accessories for hunting and shooting from scopes, knives, and lamps to guns, ammunition and gundog accessories to use for training your gundog. Another aspect I am thinking about for the reviewing part of here is hunting clothing from boots, wellies and socks to jackets, jumpers, shirts and trousers.
Another idea I was thinking about was having a little section on the cooking aspects of hunting like skinning and preparing the game. Then I will have recipes for cooking the game like rabbits, pheasants, woodcock, duck and much more. There may even be a few surprising recipes for animals that you didn’t even know you could eat. Anyway that’s enough for today on the subject my fingers are getting a bit sore now from all the typing so I hope u are all looking forward to the blog being up soon like I am. If anyone has any suggestions for the blog please feel free to leave comments about it and I’m sure we can get something going on your subject. Thanks very much for looking at the Hunting and Shooting gazette and hope you will be back again very soon.
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Hunting and Shooting Gazette
Welcome to the Hunting and Shooting Gazette.... Hopefully when the hunting and shooting Gazette is up and running fully it will provide articles, product reviews, reciepts for cooking and various other hunting and shooting related stuff... Please check back soon as i will be adding content to the gazette in the next few days.
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