Innholdsfortegnelse for June 2017 i Sporting Gun

It’s that time of year when many keen shots head to the clay grounds to keep their skills sharp for the season ahead. This is exactly what you should be doing, but it can be rather demoralising, especially when you see your score in black and white at the end of the round. Then the hunt begins. New guns are sought, different chokes are combined with different cartridges and still there is no improvement in your abilities. However, I have found that just one lesson can improve your shooting dramatically and it costs a fraction of the price of a new gun. If you are in the market for a new gun, then you will be interested in our gun test of the brand new Marocchi Evo Black. However, the…

20 Twenty UK species facing extinction will be safeguarded thanks to a £4.6million donation from the National Lottery to the Back from Brink programme. 200 More than 200 eager anglers cast their first lines of the new, 40th anniversary, fishing season at Bewl Water last month. 26% Scottish rural groups have welcomed a 26 per cent fall in recorded bird of prey crimes last year. 3 The Kennel Club has announced the winners of three prestigious annual field trial awards. The Routledge-Rank Retriever Perpetual Challenge Cup was won by Ms Clare Baker. The Hanlye Trophy was won by Mr M Goodwin and the Gavosie Gundog Trophy was won by Ms Carol Calvert. £20,000 More than £20,000 has been raised at an event organised by BASC North, to be split between…

New Sportsmatch mounts Designed for CZ and Tikka centrefire rifles, these three new models are for scopes with one inch diameter tube bodies. They are a high mount and accommodate the trend for scopes with large objective lenses. RRP £29.95 www.sportsmatch-uk.com Eley Pigeon high velocity cartridge Eley Hawk has launched its new 32g 6 shot pigeon HV cartridge. With a 70mm case it is designed for use in semi-auto shotguns. Available with plastic of fibre wads, the shell is loaded with CSB2 propellant to give shooters the edge when extended range is needed. RRP £250 - £265 per thousand. www.eleyhawkltd.com Brogue socks If you are struggling to think of a present for the shooting person who has everything, then these brogue socks might make them smile.…

“There’s thought to be one million breeding pairs of rooks in the UK” Just like the rest of the corvid clan, the rook is an intelligent bird. Inquisitive, sharp-eyed and equipped with an uncanny ability to shun anything that seems to pose a danger, it is adept at living on its wits. Although not such a fervent nest thief as the magpie or carrion crow, the rook will dine on the eggs and young of other birds and has a reputation for causing costly damage to agricultural crops. Behaviour A large, black member of the corvidae mob, the rook does, at first glance, look rather similar to the carrion crow. Its habits are, however, rather different. Although rooks will occasionally plunder other birds’ nests and sometimes scavenge roadkill, their diet…

GUNDOGS GRAHAM WATKINS A professional gundog trainer for more than 35 years and runs Gamegoer Gundogs. VETERINARY NEIL MCINTOSH A practising vet in Scotland. TUITION JOHN BIDWELL 6 times World FITASC champ and pro shooting coach. LEGAL DAVID FROST Author of Sporting Shooting and the Law. TECHNICAL MIKE GEORGE Engineering author with a deep love of gunmaking. PIGEONS PETER THEOBALD Author of Woodpigeon: The Ultimate Quarry. STALKING GEORGE WALLACE Former National Gamekeepers’ Organisation’s firearms consultant. RABBITS ED COOK Professional rabbit catcher working over 30,000 acres. PEST CONTROL & WILDFOWLING TOM SYKES Passionate wildfowler and pest controller.…

“It just shot boringly well and the only fault with the gun was the handler” With the extra hour of daylight and the sun starting to show itself more regularly, my thoughts slowly turn to clay shooting. Since leaving the Navy I don’t do as much competing as I used to. But now the family is of the age where we can all get involved it is becoming a more regular occurrence. Because this is the clay shooting issue, I feel it’s only fair I put the wildfowling guns away and break out some clay guns to take a look at. I had asked around a few importers if anything new was available for review but had came up a little disappointed – that was until Viking Arms picked up…

“After winding up the winter on growing rape, it’s a treat to decoy on open ground” With new growth carpeting the hedge bottoms, tree buds bursting to soften the winter landscape and a snowstorm of blossom on the blackthorn bushes, it was great to be alive on such a beautiful morning. The songbirds were in full flow and driving through an old-fashioned area of quiet, narrow and overgrown country lanes, the sights and sounds of the awakening countryside were all around. The warming air even smelled like spring; a rich earthiness laced with the occasional delicate hint of primroses wafting gently on the breeze. Spring at last, and best of all, I was looking forward to a few shots over the pigeon decoys! Late drillings It was unusually late for…

“We should never compare our dogs to others because we all want different things” Age 13 months Countdown to first shoot 4 months 26 days Last month Ted turned 12-months-old and I can still recall the immense relief I felt when I got the phone call to tell me that Dizzy, his dam, had her pups and there was just one little boy in the litter – sometimes fate simply plays its part. A few weeks ago, I headed up the M1 to visit his breeders to have a few days training in the hope that I could get his hunting going a bit better. It is a long haul up to North Yorkshire, but I have long been of the opinion that you only ever get out of a…

“I often have to do a lot of research before setting my thoughts on paper” I am flattered when this magazine refers to me as a “gun expert”, because the real gun experts are time-served gunsmiths. Gun enthusiast, shooting writer, or even technical nerd might be more accurate, but one thing is certain – I often have to do quite a lot of research before setting down my thoughts on paper. To do that research I need several tools to augment my sometimes-dodgy memory, and one of those tools is a rather specialised library. That library is small – not much over 50 books – and it covers not just shooting, but engineering techniques used to make guns as well. Engineering gene Engineering knowledge wasn’t part of the plan when…

Roe kidney bedevilled Ingredients • 1oz of butter • 2 roe kidneys • Worcestershire sauce • Pepper to taste This is one of Jon’s favourite stalker's breakfast. Take two roe deer kidneys – lamb kidneys work well, too. Remove the outer skin, split the kidneys down the centre and remove the core – giving you four halves. Melt the butter in a pan, place the kidneys in with the melted butter and start to cook, turning the kidneys occasionally in a high heat. Add the Worcestershire sauce and pepper to your taste. Stir until cooked through to your liking without burning the butter. Do not over cook or they become hard, around five minutes maximum. Jon likes them cooked through, but on the rare side. Serve on a slice of toast or flat bread…

• MAX PRICE: £1,000 • TYPE: O/U • MAIN PURPOSE: Field shooting • PREFERRED MAKE: Anything with proven reliability Mike George’s buying advice When people ask for a multi-use gun, most experienced shooters recommend a sporter. Sporters are built to tackle our domestic sporting disciplines and similar targets under the international FITASC rules, all of which try to simulate targets encountered in field shooting. Most sporters weigh within the odd ounce or two of 7¾lb, which means they are heavy enough to soak up the recoil of 100 targets or more over a day, and the weight makes them steady. They don’t have to be carried over long distances. Game guns are usually lighter. Many traditional British side-by-sides weigh less than 7lb, which allows them to be carried with ease over a long walked-up…

This month we delve into the archives and look at a piece from June 1978 called “Fast birds foil Britons” by Melvyn Bagnall. The story is about a trip to Denmark sponsored by Eley and Sporting Gun to take part in a clay competition. “The weekend became not just a clay shoot with a difference, but a social occasion which left many of the party pledging not to miss next year’s Danish Adventure,” writes Bagnall. Sadly, the magazine doesn’t have the budget to sponsor jollies like that these days. However, in 1978 clay-shooting was taking off in a big way both in the UK and in Denmark. The Esbjerg Shooting Club near Sonderhede, that hosted the competition, had just spent £10,000 installing 10 Danleck fully automatic traps. The club at…

“The sky almost went black as the plague of crows erupted to the skies” Last year I headed up to the estate, as the farmers were busy cutting grass, to see if I could take advantage of any situation to add some crows to the summer tally. So far the summer decoying had been going reasonably well with steady bag numbers building up with each visit. I quite often have good success chasing the crows around as they flock to the fields onto the freshly cut grass looking for bugs and grubs. With no particular plan, I arrived at the shoot sheds and transferred my basic crow busting equipment across to the estate’s Kubota, which would be my chariot for the day. Once I had the gear on board I…

Not far out of Stockbridge, above the delightful Test Valley, lies Acorn Shooting School run by the cheerful Des Sturgess. Des has featured prominently on the competition circuit, but didn’t come from a shooting family. His major influence was his grandfather, Tom, who was a warrener on Exmoor before and after World War II until myxomatosis put paid to his career. Des was originally from London and his father, also called Tom, worked on the railways and Des moved west to Hampshire with his family aged 12. His grandfather’s influence took him down the keepering route and in 1977 he did a year’s gamekeeping and as a “general dogsbody” on the Compton Manor estate in order to go to Sparsholt College – something that ultimately didn’t happen. There followed four…

“ACC Orford doesn’t see it as a fair system when viewed from the user’s point of view” Assistant chief constable (ACC) Dave Orford of Durham Constabulary is the national policing lead for firearms licensing and has been in post since early 2016. He chairs the Firearms and Explosives Licensing Working Group (FELWG) of the National Police Chiefs Council (NPCC). As such he is responsible for developing policy and providing strategic support so as to maintain standards and secure consistency of approach by individual forces. I have often, in these pages, been critical of FELWG and its failure to ensure we all get a good service but, to be fair, FELWG has no executive authority and can only advise and cajole. ACC Orford recently agreed to talk to Sporting Gun about…

“I have found that emptying glands weekly on a number of occasions usually works” Gosh, I hope it is her too! I think the smell you describe will be coming from her anal glands (sometimes called anal sacs), which are two structures situated on each side of the anus at about 4 and 8 o’clock. Each gland has a short duct, which opens externally and allows the secretion of a very strong smelling pungent substance that is normally deposited on faeces and is involved in scent and territory marking. Anal gland secretion lasts a long time in the environment and can therefore cling unfavourably to carpets and vet’s clothes, making it a severe occupational hazard! Normally, the glands are prompted to empty by the physical passage of faeces, but they…

“It never fails to amaze me how accurately a terrier can pinpoint a rat underground” The phone rang, “Hello Nick, it’s Harry Parsons, what you doing next Tuesday?” A quick check of the diary and it looked all clear. “Fancy coming out for a day’s ratting?” As much as I hate rats, especially their scaly tails, I do enjoy a day’s ratting with the Working Sealyham Terrier Club. Everyone involved are great fun, but they also go about their sport in a professional and controlled manner, especially in situations where they have been asked by a land-owner to reduce the population of rodents on their land. Harry went on to explain that he had been approached by the owner of a big shooting estate near Hereford, the game shooting season…

“The woods are bursting with energy and new life is around us – roe deer are no exception” May and June is my favourite period in the year. The woods are bursting with energy and new life is all around us – roe deer are no exception. Some roe does will have given birth to their young. In Northumberland, a number will have offspring by mid to late May and others in June. It is always a good idea to get out without the rifle to try and find a newly born kid. They are very difficult to spot, often a hint that one is around will be the doe moving off barking in her attempt to draw attention away from where she has set her kids down. My advice…

Northern Shooting Show Yorkshire Event Centre, Harrogate. For more information and for tickets, tel 01472 809727 or visit www.northernshootingshow.co.uk . Wiltshire Clay Shoot Barbury Shooting School, Wroughton. For more information or to book tickets, email Huw Stephens at enquiries@barburyshoot.com . Highclere Country Show Highclere Castle, Highclere, Berkshire. For further details, visit www.highclerecountryshow.co.uk or tel 01889 563232. Ladies Charity Shooting Day in aid of SCAA Auchterhouse Country Sports, Auchterhouse, Dundee. For further information, email auchterhousecountrysports.co.uk .…

Bonhams Antique, Arms & Armour Montpelier Street, Knightsbridge, London Tel 020 7393 3900 or visit www.bonhams.com . Southams Modern Sporting Guns & Antique Arms Bedford Auction Centre, Newnham Street, Bedford, Bedfordshire Visit www.guns.southams.com or tel 01832 273565. JS Auctions Selected antiques and art, arms and sporting guns, wines and spirits Cotefield Auction Rooms, Oxford Road, Banbury, Oxfordshire Visit www.jsfineart.co.uk or tel 01295 272488. Thomas Del Mar Arms, Armour & Militaria 25 Blythe Road, London Visit www.thomasdelmar.com or tel 020 7602 4805.…

Conservation is integral to all that we are, and all that we do as sportsmen and women. That is obvious to those who are involved, and reflected in the names of so many of the organisations that represent and defend our interests. After all, we have the British Association of Shooting and Conservation (BASC); the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT), and so the list goes on. Much of our work, maintaining and improving habitat, controlling predators and managing the landscape certainly benefits our quarry species, but much of it also helps many other species. Where their decline is directly linked to the spread of alien and invasive species, and where active control is vital, there are no better organisations, nor people to get involved, than sporting ones. Back from…

“The stop whistle should be sharp and to the point” The causes Gundogs are like an old Land Rover, they need a bit of constant tinkering and regular servicing to keep them working properly. Too many people think that once they have “trained” their dog that is the end of the process – wrong! You cannot expect to put your dog away at the end of the shooting season and to get him back out in five or six months time and for him to be on top form. Problems can develop during the shooting season and quite often with lack of time and the dark evenings it can be difficult to rectify these issues. But now the better weather is here, there is far more opportunity to get to…

“Seamus was transformed into a good Shot in a matter of minutes” We’ve all been there. The scorecard we hold in our hand tells us in black and white that we are not as good a Shot as we thought we were. Unlike game shooting – where misses often go unremembered – on a round of sporting clays, every miss is noted. And so it begins. You think there is something wrong with your cartridges, or your chokes, or your gun and after a lot of expense you find you are still shooting as badly as you were before. However, there is another way to improve your shooting that will cost less money and have real results. What is this miracle cure I hear you ask? A lesson. The benefit…

I mentioned the parasite liver fluke in the last issue of Sporting Gun . I have recently come across an abnormality that showed a heavy burden of the parasite as well as it possibly having developed into a tumour. The white scarring on the surface of the liver we saw in the last issue is classic fluke, this – however – was much more pronounced and I thought I knew what it might be.. The liver filters the blood among other things, due to that it is also prone to being affected by contamination from external sources. I have written about several cases of liver tumours I observed on one piece of ground In the 1990s, the percentage was far too high for that small area. In…

INGREDIENTS Serves one • 140g venison loin • 6 baby chorizo • Olive oil • 6 sweet chilli peppers • 500ml orange juice • 200g feta cheese • 1tsp chilli flakes • Salt and Pepper • 2tbsp pesto Cooking method 1 Take the six baby chorizos, cook for a couple of minutes in olive oil in a saucepan. Add the orange juice. Take the sweet chilli peppers and add to the pan including the juice from the peppers and simmer for 10 minutes allowing it to reduce well. 2 Once you’ve prepared your liquor then cut the feta cheese into cubes and place on a warm plate, before adding the pesto. Next, get your venison and start to season each side of it with the chilli flakes, salt and pepper. 3 Sear the loin in a very hot pan…

Email us now to to place your FREE* gun advert or click on www.gunsforsale.shootinguk.co.uk  and have it advertised ONLINE as well! Send us an email at sportinggun_shopfront@timeinc.com and include: • Your name • Your address • Your postcode • Your daytime telephone number • And, most importantly, details about the item/s you have for sale or wish to advertise. To place your ONLINE advertisement (guns only) and add a picture of the gun you are selling go to: www.gunsforsale.shootinguk.co.uk. *There is a fee of £5 for online advertising for guns costing more than £1,000. This feature is not open to members of the gun trade If you don’t have email Alternatively, if you don’t have access to email or the Internet, you can still send your personal details…

“Some really good designs came to grief through no fault of their own” What makes a gun rare? It may seem a bit of a silly question in that the answer is obvious – scarcity; but why should one gun be that much scarcer than another? Now to clarify that statement a little further, for the purposes of this article I am talking about mass produced guns. All antique guns made before the industrial revolution were handmade and while some, especially the military types, tended to follow a pattern, they all differed slightly from each other and so all could be called rare or even unique. On the other hand, high-end sporting guns were (and still are) handmade, so each could also be considered rare or unique. No, the guns…