Quantcast
Viewing all 2375 articles
Browse latest View live

Luxury dress slippers for the English gentleman

Luxury dress slippers can entertain leisurely at home. But they are also bang up to date and reviving as a modern alternative to the loafer.

Luxury dress slippers have several guises and multiple personalities. From summer staple in fashionable linen to state occasions in full patent shine, it can hold its own amid the Oxfords, Derbys and even the best brogues. It has its own place in the gentleman’s wardrobe and looks well with best evening wear. The Albert slipper (named after Queen Victoria’s consort) is a style statement. Put on a brogue and you join a club. Don a pair of luxury slippers and you start your own.

TRADITIONAL LUXURY DRESS SLIPPERS

Bowhill & Elliott has been making luxury slippers in Norwich since 1874 and is run today by Roger Jury, a direct descendent of the founder. “The firm started out making hand-turned slippers [soft leather] but now specialises in Albert luxury dress slippers,” says the company’s Ben Grint. “You can choose from our stock, which includes cashmere, velvet, tweed and six colours of quilting, but we can source most things.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Luxury slippers. Lasted slippers at Bowhill and Elliot's factory.

Lasted slippers at Bowhill and Elliot’s factory.

A pair of Albert luxury dress slippers made-to-order can cost from £180 to £395, and the ready-to-wear range starts at £180. “For a pair of luxury slippers to be bespoke you would have to have your own last made, and that is a much more expensive process, starting at about £1,000,” he says. “We have two lasts: one a narrower, slightly more elegant fit; the other (used for the majority of British slippers) a wider, more traditional look.”

The luxury dress slippers are bench made by hand in the small factory, which employs 10 people, and take eight to 10 weeks to make. “I go to work in my slippers every day,” says Grint. “They are navy velvet with gold quilting and binding. Our best-selling luxury slippers are the skull and sabres, plain black velvet and a customer’s own monogram.”

LUXURY DRESS SLIPPERS WITH WOW FACTOR

Fiona Dreesmann is passionate about luxury dress slippers. The author of The Gentleman’s Slipper and founder of My Slippers in 2010, she offers fantastic made-to-order and ready-to-wear ranges. “I have worn slippers for years and after I started writing the book I decided to have a pair made. I had so many positive comments I started the business,” she says.

My Slippers’ primary selling point is the sheer exuberance of colour and trim. “I love the colours,” says Dreesmann. “If you are going to wear black dress slippers, why not go for a shocking pink trim? My best seller, however, is still a traditional navy version.”

The luxury slippers are handmade in England. “There are only three companies still making these dress slippers,” she says. “I have my own last, which ensures a certain individuality.”

My Slippers offers more than 300 colours in velvet, linen, flannel or vintage fabrics. The website allows you to create your own luxury slippers temptingly easily. “The number of clients embroidering their own needlepoint and using that to create their own slippers is increasing. Alternatively, we can create the needlepoint for you. I have just created a pair for a client as a thank you for a holiday,” she says, “the embroidery showing different elements of the trip.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Luxury slippers. My Slippers spice velvet with fox's heads are a hit with the hunting crowd.

My Slippers spice velvet with fox’s heads are a hit with the hunting crowd.

From the ready-to-wear range there are some covetable choices, particularly the spice velvet with fox head (£325) and dark-green linen with lobsters and red trim (£345). So difficult is it to select a style, you will probably have to settle for a brace.

“Our Sandringham dress slipper (£165) is far more like a shoe than a slipper,” says Adrian Herring of Herring. “The tweed fabric is a bespoke design made for Herring by Fox Brothers and the slipper is handmade in England. Because it is made on a last, like a welted shoe, it has a proper shape and structure. Out of the house, it is usually worn without a sock or with a thin sock if you are going to your club.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Luxury slippers. Herring's Sandringham slippers in tweed are a country classic.

Herring’s Sandringham slippers in tweed are a country classic.

For a vibrant take on luxury dress slippers try a pair from Pammie-Jane Farquhar’s Nomad Ideas. “The company started 11 years ago and sources unique and beautiful Kilim from Turkey,” she says. “The slippers (£135) are handmade in Turkey and go with everything.” Available up to a size 14, they add a jazzy kick to any outfit and work well as a weekend shoe, too.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Luxury slippers. Nomad Ideas' Kilim designs, made in Turkey, are rather jazzy.

Nomad Ideas’ Kilim designs, made in Turkey, are rather jazzy.

Some of the traditional Northamptonshire shoemakers produce both Albert luxury dress slippers and a turned slipper. Crockett & Jones’ Lion Rampant in black velvet (£215) has a black satin quilted lining, a hard-leather sole and is available in an E-width fitting. The company also offers semi-bespoke special orders (from £215), which take from six to eight weeks. The Ritz slip-on mule (£120), an ideal house slipper, is available in black calf and dark brown suede.

“Our best-sellingstyle of luxury dress slippers is the Tumbled Calf Black Mews Moc (£298),” says Robert Switzman of Harrys of London. The luxury shoemaker combines traditional craftsmanship with the latest in footwear technology, and boasts an array of skins for its slippers. “The Kudu Suede version (£298) is a country favourite,” he says, “perfect to wear with your feet up by the fire in winter.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Luxury slippers. Harry's of London's ostrich slippers use specially sourced African ostrich leather.

Harry’s of London’s ostrich slippers use specially sourced African ostrich leather.

The slippers are handmade in Italy and take four to six weeks. “Our Ostrich (£615) luxury slippers are made with exceptional attention to detail.”

Whether you are stuck on navy or hanker after shocking pink, prefer them restrained or resplendent, be sure you buy a pair of dress slippers this season.


Macnab Challenge 2014, the adventures

The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014, in association with Glenfarclas Whisky, Hine Cognac and Champagne Pol Roger was a triumph. With 17 Macnabbers returning successful from the hill.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014 was sponsored for the first time by Glenfarclas Whisky, Hine Cognac and Champagne Pol Roger.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014 was sponsored for the first time by Glenfarclas Whisky, Hine Cognac and Champagne Pol Roger.

The Macnab Challenge 2014 was the best to date. With new sponsorship on board the Macnab Challenge was held for the first time in association with Glenfarclas Whisky, Hine Cognac and Champagne Pol Roger in its fifth year. Seventeen Macnabbers claimed success on hill and moor and river. As ever, the Gannochy estate in the Angus Glens provided a large part of the bag with seven Macnabs. Tulchan Lodge played host to another four. Most stuck to the classic interpretation but one Corinthian version made it, too. And if you feel like following in our Macnabbers footsteps make sure your grouse shooting is up to scratch, and read the following adventures for inspiration.

 GANNOCHY GREATS

Gannochy’s owner, Allan Hemmings, has created a cornucopia of sporting bliss in Glen Esk, alongside his team: David Clement, Colin Lanyon and Sam Wordingham. His son, Dean, chalked another Macnab on to the Gannochy board on 13 August after an abortive start the previous day.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Dean Hemmings

Dean Hemmings, who attended The Field’s first ever Macnab Dinner in 2010 was successful again this year.

“I started my Macnab on the 12th,” says Hemmings Junior, who managed the salmon and a brace of grouse before inadvertently shooting a pheasant. “Once that happened the game was up. I was fined and then punished by not being allowed to go for the stag,” he laughs, “which made me particularly determined to get a Macnab the following day.” He did just that, accompanied by apprentice keeper Sam Wordingham. “It was the first time Sam’s rifle had been used for a Macnab, which was great,” he says.
A newcomer to Gannochy’s hall of fame, Stuart Waring, had a ducking as he fell into the water while returning his 6lb hen salmon. “But I did have the first part of my Macnab,” he points out.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Stuart Waring

Stuart Waring with Peter Bond. Stuart’s Macnab came after a ducking in the river.

 

With dry clothes on, a brace of grouse was taken over Peter Bond’s English setter. It was Waring’s first stalk and an impressive Imperial fell to his bullet. “The heart had a bullet hole through the middle. ‘Beginner’s luck,’ said Allan Hemmings. ‘Probably right,’ I thought,” Waring says.
Joe Thompson and Stuart Hudson both re-visited their Macnab success at Gannochy this year, as did Will Appleby. “I had no expectations of a repeat of last year, not on the first day of the week again,” Appleby says. But after landing a salmon while fishing a little spot in the Gorge, he set off up the hill with Allan Hemmings’ blessing. “There is a small moor at Gannochy, Allan’s private hill, but David [Clement, headstalker] and I decided to enact the true spirit of the Macnab and do a spot of poaching. The hill duly provided the brace of grouse and a lone 10-year-old stag, a fitting culmination. As always, it is a team effort with David, Colin and Sam,” Appleby says.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge. Tom Festing and Will Appleby

Macnab mates. Festing and Appleby celebrate their Macnabs.

Tom Festing’s Macnab was a case of third time lucky, after two close misses last year. “I had a score to settle,” he says. But a repeat of last year, with Appleby bagging his Macnab on the first day of the week, made Festing twitchy.
“I was thinking, ‘Oh no, not again, please.’ Jealousy is a terrible thing. I was up at the crack of dawn every morning regardless of conditions, and I failed every morning,” he recalls. A day on the moor on Thursday resulted in a fluky right-and-left. The game was on. By 3pm a fish was hooked and a nerve-racking stalk ensued. “A Royal presented himself but was deemed too good to shoot but by 5.55pm I was in place for a shot. The beast was 200yd away, weighed 83kg and was a 10-pointer.” It rendered Festing speechless. “I had been thinking about the Macnab for a whole year. And who says you need to catch the fish first?”
The middle North Esk was at perfect fishing height when Alex Novell arrived at Gannochy in mid October. “The river had risen 10ft in a couple of hours on the previous Tuesday, leaving Allan Hemmings stranded in a tree on an island,” says Novell.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Alex Novell

A first time stag for Alex Novell at Gannochy. Some robust advice led to success on the hill.

“My eighth Esk salmon of the week, a 6lb hen, came soon after 10am on Wednesday to the Gannochy fly.” Novell was a novice at grouse and had never taken a stag but some robust advice from Lanyon saw the brace of grouse bagged. “The stag was a perfect animal to cull, 10 years old with an unbalanced 10-point head, missing one bay tine and with a cup on one side and a fork on the other,” he says.

TULCHAN LODGE PROVES FRUITFUL

Lucie Boedts is passionate about Macnabbing. “I arranged three days at Tulchan Lodge in August to do my own. My friends were intrigued and wanted to try as well,” she says. The estate in Perthshire created not just one but four Macnabbers, one of whom had a double.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Vincent Lebrun

An extraordinary double for Belgian Vincent Lebrun at Tulchan Lodge.

Vincent Lebrun, from Belgium, took a double Macnab (two salmon, two stags and two brace of grouse) in five hours on 12 August. “Hunting is my second job,” he claims. “Bad weather decided that we would leave the salmon until last, so we headed to the hill at 7.20am and, while going up, saw two young stags.” Approaching quickly Lebrun shot the first. “Bill [Mearns, headstalker] said, ‘Shoot the other one,’ so I did.” Lebrun jokingly suggested trying for a double brace of grouse. “We had time in hand as the stag had been shot early,” he says, “and by 8.45am I had shot four grouse.” What a thrilling start to the day.
The first salmon was taken on the Shee by 12.15pm. A reviving gin and tonic at lunch-time and then another try at the river landed the second salmon by 2.25pm. “It was a sort of happiness that is quite difficult to explain,” says Lebrun. The less blessed can only try to imagine it.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Lucie Boedts and Maxime de Thomaz

A different sort of double. Lucie and Maxime both claimed their Macnab on the same day at Tulchan Lodge.

The following day, Lucie Boedts and Maxime de Thomaz took up the challenge. “There are two deerstalking and grouse-moor beats, so we started at the same time in the morning,” explains Boedts. “Maxime had done by the middle of the day but I struggled a little longer and got my salmon by 6pm, just in time for dinner.” The quartet was completed by Juliette Trivier, who took the final Tulchan Macnab at the beginning of September.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Juliette Trivier

Juliette Trivier completed the quartet of Macnabs at Tulchan Lodge. And was this year’s second lady Macnabber.

 

MORE MACNAB ADVENTURES

Perthshire estate was responsible for a brace of Macnabs. “I’ve been coming to Dalnacardoch for nearly 15 years,” says John McGrory, who, at 75, is our oldest Macnabber to date. However, he crawled nearly half a mile on the stalk.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. John McGrory.

The oldest Macnabber in the competition didn’t have an easy stalk, crawling half a mile.

“It was pretty serious,” he says. “I’ve been trying for a few years and after a salmon from the Tilt and the stalk I shot a pair of grouse, both on the wing.” McGrory had invited John Robinson, a former Marine and head coach of the England Commonwealth shooting team and an all-round crack shot, up for a few days and the day after McGrory’s triumph, Robinson got his own.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. John Robinson

Robinson, head coach for the England Commonwealth shooting team, proved his mettle with rod as well as gun in Perthshire.

“It was my first time salmon fishing,” says Robinson, “and after a 7am start I landed a cock salmon at 10.10am on beat four of the Tilt.” A trip to the far end of the estate, a quick stalk and within 10 minutes the grouse was secured. Macnab done. “I coached John [McGrory] to shoot grouse going away for his Macnab, so was pleased he did it, too,” he says.
Two years ago Pelle Forss from Sweden bagged his Macnab on the Glenprosen estate. This year it was the turn of his son, Jonathan.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Jonathan Forss

Like father, like son. Jonathan Forss bagged his Macnab on the third attempt. And now joins the club alongside his father.

“The first half of the day was spoiled due to a thick and sudden fog,” says Jonathan Forss. “But a report from a group who had brought a stag down led us to a suitable group.” A good shot was pushed out to quite a distance as a group of hinds caught wind. “But my aim didn’t disappoint as the stag fell to the ground.” Forss’s shotgun skills were a little rusty but two birds were added to the bag from the same spot. “We headed to the Kerkock Fishings and I was lucky enough to catch a 7lb salmon on my third cast,” he says.
“I read too much John Buchan,” laughs Andrew Sims, who undertook the Corinthian Macnab: riding to hounds, a brace of partridges and a trout on the fly. “I saw the different types of Macnab and it was the opportunity to have some fun.” Sims hadn’t hunted for 20 years but boarded a hireling for autumn hunting with the Puckeridge. “It was a really full day’s challenge and great fun,” he says.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Andrew Sims

Sims took on hounds, horses, partridge and trout to complete the Corinthian Macnab.

After changing from breeches and boots to breeks and gumboots in a field, a couple of drives as back gun on the Pampisford estate shoot se-cured him his partridges. “I fluffed the first shot, my first shot of the season. Realising that I wouldn’t have many more chances, I re-focused and was relieved to find that I connected with two birds from the second covey that got up.” A quick lunch and on to the Pampisford estate’s stretch of the Granta. “I had a bite but the little brown trout slipped away as I struck the line. A switch to a smaller pattern did the trick and within another 30 minutes I’d managed to bag a lovely 11⁄2lb trout under an overhanging alder,” he says.
A 30th wedding anniversary present from his wife took Peter Tupper to Langwell in Caithness. “There is no real grouse moor, two small rivers but lots of deer,” he says. “My mother-in-law had bet me £10 I wouldn’t catch a salmon, so there was extra pressure.” By the second day the salmon was still elusive. “I had another exciting stalk. After I’d shot the stag the keeper told me to get back to the river, as the temperature had dropped. I didn’t take a landing net so as not to jinx myself. But then a miracle – a fish on the line.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Field's Macnab Challenge 2014. Peter Tupper

It was a hair-raising Macnab for Peter Tupper when the grouse proved elusive.

And 50,000 acres from which to find a brace of wild grouse. “I shot one grouse and then at 5.45pm one other single grouse was put up and I shot it. It was a Macnab, by the skin of my teeth. So much luck is involved, especially when the grouse are so few, but it was utterly amazing.”
Bill Dent also took his stag first, at 10.45am on the Ben Starav flats in Glen Etive. “Not the highest stalk but no less exciting for that, and it was a beast that was high on the wanted list, a long way off and I did get very wet,” he says. “Success at last – 27 years after I first flicked a fly on the Etive. A red hen, 6lb, taken on a Stoat’s Tail in a sudden squally shower and re-turned.” Up to the moor by 2.30pm and a decent walk resulted in the brace of grouse.
From fishing virgin to stalking novice, each Macnab is unique and the thrill of the sport, the excitement of the contest and the com-bination of luck and skill involved conspire
to make The Field’s Macnab Challenge, in association with the Glenfarclas Whisky, Hine Cognac and Champagne Pol Roger, the finest in its field.

Ratting with terriers. Which terrier is top?

Ratting with terriers offers a traditional check to the rise of the poison-resistant super rat. But which terrier is the best ratter?

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Ratting with terriers. Patterdale.
Rats need to be controlled, and catching and killing them with terriers is the best option as they become resistant to poison.

Ratting with terriers gives rise to the obvious question. Which breed of terrier makes the best ratter. The debate is like huntsmen discussing the merits of modern English foxhounds, Old English or a combination of the two and the subsequent hound judging. Geography often plays a part, the Border terrier holding sway in the north while Parson Jack Russell’s terrier has a loyal following in the Westcountry. The terrier may be the ultimate country house dog, but they are also the stars of the ratting world.
“Let me go into a strange kennel; let me have pick of the pack, and first and foremost, I’ll take the plain looking ones; there is sure to be good stuff in them or they would not be there,” was Russell’s view. According to David Hancock, in his authoritative Sporting Terriers: Their Form, Their Function and Their Future, Russell “favoured a terrier with length of leg, a narrow chest, a well-boned skull and a thick, hard, dense, close-lying coat”. Of the Border, Hancock writes, “There is in the expression of a Border terrier an implacable determination which is seen in no other breed.”

RATTING WITH TERRIERS. WILL ANY TERRIER DO?

What is certain, where ratting with terriers is concerned, is that any terrier may be employed so long as it is fast, agile, strong, has stamina and is quick in its work.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Ratting with terriers. Patterdale.

Patterdale terriers are fast and formidable ratting dogs.

This might include ratting with terriers such as the Lucas or Lakeland breeds to Sealyham and Skye terriers as well as whippets. Bedlington terriers, named after the Northumbrian village of their origin, were once champions of vermin control but are now more likely to be found on a metropolitan sofa.
In the 19th century, smooth-coated, black-and-tan Manchester terriers, now rare, were famous in the London rat pits frequented by Lord Byron and the Duke of Wellington. Celebrated was the 26lb bulldog Billy that, on 22 April 1823, slew 100 rats in five-and-a-half minutes in the Westminster pit. Queen Victoria had her own ratcatcher, Jack Black, who sported a coat with VR on the lapels and kept rats in his stove hat.
“Any self-respecting canine will catch rats, though terriers and small lurchers are probably the best,” says David Harcombe, editor of Earth Dog – Running Dog and several volumes of memoirs, entitled A Terrierman’s Life. “I have seen a miniature long-haired dachshund do a decent job on rats in yards and fields, and that was just a Kennel Club, toy-bred thing. They would not be good for killing rats in large numbers, however.”

THE BROWN RAT

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Ratting with terriers. A brown rat. In 1919 The Field reported on National Ratting Week. They recorded the rat population at 43 million.

A brown rat. In 1919 The Field reported on National Ratting Week. They recorded the rat population at 43 million.

The problem and profusion of brown rats (Rattus norvegicus), which took hold in mainland Britain in the early 18th century, should not be underestimated. In 1919, The Field reported on National Rat Week, promoted by the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, where it was estimated that the UK rat population was around 43 million.
Today, the position of ratcatcher has all but disappeared from the countryside. Maintaining the service and tradition on Dartmoor is Ian Brackenbury, whose business card proudly announces his intentions: Mole Control. “I can remember a day when we caught more than a thousand rats with six terriers clearing out a chicken shed,” recalls Brackenbury. “In my experience, it is the younger terriers who work best and I cannot say there is a breed type I prefer. I have even killed plenty of rats with a bearded collie dog.”
Corn barns, chicken sheds and hayricks are the traditional feeding grounds and dwelling places of the brown rat. Sometimes it is necessary to smoke them out by attaching a hose to an old motorbike exhaust or chain saw (minus the chain) and putting it down a hole.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Ratting with terriers. Smoking out the rats

Smoking out the rat so the terriers can make the kill.

Isn’t this, and the very real possibility that the rat will offer a sharp bite to the terrier and could be carrying poison – from ingested rat poison to Weil’s disease (leptospirosis) – a danger and threat to the dogs? “It is important to have antibiotics and Dettol on hand and to give the terrier a jab at the end of the day or if it is bitten,” says Brackenbury.

INVINCEIBLE VERMIN?

Rat poison has changed little since the Fifties (essentially red and blue dressed corn). “These poisons are increasingly ineffective as the rats build up immunity to them. You still can’t beat the traditional method of trapping them with terriers.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Ratting with terriers. Terrier at the ready.

A terrier at the ready for ratting.

In June, ITV’s Tonight investigated the UK rat problem. The programme estimated that there are now 80 million rats in the UK and 17 counties where rats have built up significant immunity to rat poison. It suggested that in some cities, Birmingham, for example, king rats stalk the sewers.
Tony Holdsworth, huntsman of the Duke of Beaufort’s foxhounds, recalls being left a ratting terrier called Becky when he was at the East Devon Hunt. “She was a seven-year-old Jack Russell and was amazingly quick with rats,” he remembers. “I crossed her with a Lakeland and one of her offspring, Nailer, was even better, especially on the ricks at harvest time. Anyone who thinks this is cruel should remember the saying that no human sleeps in a city more than 6ft from a rat. The numbers have to be controlled.”

WHICH TERRIER MAKES THE BEST RATTER?

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Ratting with terriers. The kill

Which terrier does it best? These terriers share the kill.

Welsh writer Brian Plummer, who made a lifelong study of rat hunting and had a terrier of his own breeding named after him, chronicled his lifelong fascination with vermin in Tales of a Rat-Hunting Man (1978). Plummer was an itinerant ratcatcher and storyteller brought up in a mining village near Bridgend in the late Forties, where his Uncle Billy kept a drift mine and fighting cocks and was a major influence on the young boy. He was soon ratting with terriers. His fox terrier/Sealyham/bull terrier cross dog was put to work in the coal slacks, rubbish tips and pigsties of the Valleys, earning money and a reputation as a rat killer.
“The Sealyham blood in them gave them strength of jaw, the Bedlington blood endowed them with incredible agility and the bull terrier blood, the real old fighting blood, gave them that little ‘extra something’ that made them impervious to pain,” he believed.
Of all the many terriers that Plummer bought or bred, one, Sam, he called the love of his life. “He was a hideous hotchpotch of every game terrier that the mining folk in my valley could lay their hands on. His ears were cropped to the head as a result of clashes with fox and badger, and his body was shredded with numerous old wounds.” Sam was the result of assorted breeding that included a great-great-grandfather that had been a fighting bull terrier, which was mated to a Bedlington terrier from the Cheviot Hills (that had once killed a half-grown pig) and this, in turn, was mated to a Sealyham. “He was the result of assorted breeding,” wrote Plummer. “Most Russell terriers of today have similar dubious ancestries.”
Plummer offers specific observations about what makes a good ratter. Borders, he says, are slow to “enter” to rat and Jack Russells work best on their own as they are jealous hunters and prone to attack strange dogs. Lakelands, he feels, make the ideal first ratting terrier, dynamic, game and quick to mature, and he once trained a dandie dinmont, the massive jaws of which reduced rats to pulp.

RATTING CLUBS

Once there was a profusion of clubs for ratting with terriers, members gathering with their terriers for a day’s ratting, but these are now in decline. One, the Icknield Ratters, recorded a day in 2005 in Earth Dog – Running Dog entitled Red Letter Ratting.The team of five assembled in a chicken shed at 9am with a combination of Jack Russells, Lakelands, Plummers and a Patterdale. By 2.30pm 407 rats had been accounted for. “The terriers were taking a lot of punishment by mid morning but their desire to be first to the kill drove them on,” wrote Scott Bedding, who had been a guest on the day with his two Plummer terriers. “This was extreme ratting at its best, a great day’s sport with great crack.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Ratting with terriers. Cornwall ratting

Red Letter Day ratting in Cornwall.

Another group of four ratters in Cornwall, in 2004, recorded killing more than 2,000 rats in a single day on a free-range chicken farm with 10 terriers, mainly Jack Russells, two Plummers and a Sealyham. Again, this day, with photographic evidence, was recorded in Earth Dog – Running Dog under the heading Ratting Galore. “Ratting may never take the place of a good day’s hunting,” says Harcombe, “but it is a very necessary activity and can produce good sport.”
The intelligence and tenacity of terriers should not be underestimated and success does not always have to be measured in numbers. “The character of the dog is all important,” says Hancock. “People can argue about length of leg and the like but, in my view, what matters is prey-drive and determination.”
Once, before the ban, our own Jack Russell had been pursuing a squirrel for some months without success. One morning, the terrier was barking in the garden. He’d managed to shut the squirrel in our daughter’s Wendy house; all I had to do was open the door for him, whereupon my daughter proclaimed, “Result.” Now for the rats in the barn.

Best safari destinations in Africa. Which country?

The best safari destinations in Africa. Which country is best for hunting, photography and for the big five? Expert Professional Hunter Robin Hurt reveals the top spots for superb safari.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destinations. South Africa
Which African country will prove the best safari destination?

Best safari destination; is it Zambia or Zimbabwe? Cameroon or the Congo? Once the British shooting and hunting seasons have drawn to a close it is time to think foreign game in warmer climes. Whether you have a hunting or photographic safari in mind the big five are becoming harder to pin-point. So which is the best safari destinaiton in Africa? The very best person to take advice from is Robin Hurt, currently enjoying his 51st season as a Professional Hunter.  Here is his expert guide on where to go and what to see.

Africa encompasses desert, rainforest, swamp and savannah. The wildlife ranges from a seven-ton elephant bull to the royal antelope, which can fit in the palm of a man’s hand.
What follows is a list of the main countries that allow safari hunting and some that don’t.

BEST SAFARI DESTINATIONS

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC (CAR)

One of the best safari destinations for hunting but in the throes of a religious civil war. Habitat consists of rain-forest and savannah woodland. At one time one of the best countries in which to hunt for a forest elephant with huge tusks. Elephant here are mostly poached out. Hunting is not closed but anyone venturing here should check with their home country as to safety. A top safari destination for bongo, Lord Derby (giant) eland and other forest and savannah game. A vast country with low human population.
Politically unstable at this time.


CAMEROON

Another of the best safari destinations for hunting. Similar to CAR with regard to wildlife and habitat. No major unrest. Excellent bongo-, forest sitatunga- and giant eland-hunting.
Politically mostly stable.


GABON

The last stronghold of the forest elephant. The elephant population has been reduced from 80,000 three years ago to half that number today. Unchecked poaching the cause. No safari hunting allowed.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destination. Forest elephant

Gabon is one of the last strongholds of the forest elephant.

Wildlife includes dwarf buffalo and elephant. Hippo are readily spotted along the Atlantic coast. A must-see for the adventurous.
Politically mostly stable.


DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO (formerly Zaire)

Has been ravished by poaching. Little wildlife remains except in extremely remote areas where, no doubt, forest animals such as bongo survive. Elephant have almost been eliminated by commercial ivory poaching while the bushmeat trade has dramatically reduced all other wildlife numbers. Home to the okapi antelope of the Ituri forest, now critically endangered.
Politically unstable.


ETHIOPIA

A top hunting safari destination. A beautiful country with a fine wildlife conservation policy. Heavily populated by humans but wildlife remains abundant in well-policed, protected areas. The diverse habitats, including forested mountains, swamps and lakes, desert plains and vast mountain ranges, lead to a wide-ranging species count. The premier trophy animal in this country is the mountain nyala. Elephant-hunting is closed (Ethiopia has some of the biggest tuskers left in Africa). Other native animals include the Simien ibex, Simien wolf and Gelada baboon – all heavily protected .

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destination. Ethiopia

The Simien mountains in Ethiopia are truly spectacular. The country has a fine wildlife and conservation policy.

Wildlife numbers remain abundant in the Danakil, Omo and other remote areas. Good choice for plains game such as gerenuk, lesser kudu and Beisa oryx. Superb giant forest hog and huge leopard. Crocodile often exceed 17ft.
Politically stable except where it borders Somalia and South Sudan.


SOUTH SUDAN

Newly independent. The wildlife has been ravished by civil war but pockets remain. The Boma plateau still has the annual white-eared kob migration numbering almost a million animals. The elephant population has been destroyed by poaching and only some thousand animals survive in the in-accessible Sudd swamp. The northern white rhino has been poached to extinction.

Habitat ranges from rainforest to savannah woodland to swamps. Closed to safari hunting.
Politically unstable.


SUDAN

Habitat consists mostly of true desert with some savannah woodland. It is a prime destination for Barbary sheep and Nubian ibex in the Nubian desert and Red Sea hills respectively.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destination. Barbary sheep

The Barbary sheep is found readily in the Sudan.

In the Sahara desert, the scimitar oryx and addax are extinct – hunted out by people using Jeeps and automatic guns.
Politically unstable.


KENYA

One of the best safari destinations for photographers. Some bird-shooting with a licensed guide but closed to hunting since 1977. Wildlife numbers have since been depleted by human encroachment on the wilderness but mostly through poaching. In the Kenya of my youth, we had islands of people surrounded by a sea of wildlife. Today the opposite is true. Game populations generally have dropped by up to 70% over the past 38 years – all in a period of no legal hunting.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destinations. Cheetah

One can photograph cheetah up close in Kenya.

Kenya had Africa’s finest wildlife numbers and species. Recently, limited user rights have been restored to landowners so they can manage and cull some species of wildlife on their own land, with quotas and under supervision of the wildlife service. This is a step in the right direction. One of the best photographic safari destinations for the “ Big Five”. The Mara, Meru, Aberdare, Samburu and Tsavo are the most popular parks but private conservancies such as Borana and Lewa Downs are growing in popularity, in particular for their rhino conservation programmes. Rhino numbers (combined black and white) are about 800 animals. Elephant numbers stand at just over 20,000. If, as rumoured, Kenya reopens safari hunting, there will be a rush of hunters wanting to hunt the biggest buffalo in Africa.
Politically northeast Kenya is unstable.


UGANDA

Another of the best safari destinations for photography and a limited amount of hunting. In this beautiful country, heavily populated by people, the game fields are restricted to small “islands” of protected areas. There are specialised hunts for plains game, Uganda kob and both East African and island sitatunga and superb viewing of mountain gorilla in the Virunga National Park. Murchison Falls is a must-see. There are significant big-game numbers in this park again, having recovered from the destruction of wildlife under Idi Amin’s reign. A rhino relocation project is up and running in Murchison Falls Park. Queen Elizabeth Park is also well worth a visit.
Politically northern Uganda is unstable.


TANZANIA

One of the best safari destinations for hunting and photography. The last of the traditional East African safari countries open to classic big-game hunting. The best country in Africa for buffalo, lion, leopard and plains game such as gerenuk, lesser kudu, sable, roan and sitatunga. Elephant trophies cannot be imported into the US. Elephant poaching has led to a large decline in numbers. The government has hugely stepped up anti-poaching efforts. Black rhino numbers remain at fewer than a hundred. There are no white rhino. Hunting areas are allocated to safari operators on a five-year basis. Hunting companies are obliged by law to have community programmes to encourage local people to steward the wildlife.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destinations. Lion.

Tanzania has more lion than the whole of the rest of Africa put together. A fantastic destination for the classic safari experience.

Tanzania has more lion than the whole of the rest of Africa put together and is one of the best countries to safari in. The country ranges from high montane rain forest to Brachystegia (Miombo) woodland to open savannah and plains and swamps. Home to some of Africa’s finest national parks and game reserves, including the Selous, Tarangire, Ngorongoro, Serengeti, Ruaha, Katavi and Rungwa, and friendly people.
Perhaps the most expensive hunting safari destination, being one of the last countries to offer remote wilderness, huge game populations and traditional safari camps under canvas. You certainly get what you pay for.
Politically stable.


MOZAMBIQUE

One of the best safari destinations for hunting. Big-game numbers were ravished by civil war although the remote Nyasa Reserve was, until recently, relatively unscathed. Civil wars and wildlife never have a happy ending, the elephant ivory being used to pay for arms and meat from other game to feed troops.

But Mozambique’s wildlife has made a remarkable recovery apart from the elephant herds in the northern areas on the Ruvuma river, where there is unchecked poaching. Habitat ranges from open gallery-type savannah woodland to coastal rainforest and swamp. A good destination to hunt for buffalo, lion, leopard and plains game such as nyala, sable and kudu.
Politically stable.


REPUBLIC OF SOUTH AFRICA

Another of the best safari destinations for hunting and photography. Has a reputation for “canned” hunting. This does occur but is by no means applicable to the whole safari industry; most operators offer fair-chase hunting. South Africa is currently the number-one safari hunting destination.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destinations. South Africa

South Africa ranks as the number one safari hunting destination in Africa.

Lots of game and diverse habitat. The wildlife conservation policy is exemplary in that it allows private ownership of wildlife. This has led to a hugely profitable wildlife industry and a dramatic increase in wildlife numbers. For example, prior to the First World War, there were only a handful of white rhino surviving south of the Limpopo river. Today there are an estimated 20,000-plus although poaching is accounting for a loss of three animals a day. One of the few African countries where all the “Big Five”can still be hunted. Good destination for kudu, nyala, gemsbok and eland.
Politically stable but crime rife in some big cities.


ZIMBABWE

A top hunting and photographic safari destination. Great elephant- hunting. Game available on licence includes elephant, buffalo, lion, leopard, hippo, crocodile and plains game. The US dollar is now the legal traded currency for the country and safari costs are reasonable when compared to other prime destinations. Victoria Falls is spectacular and a must-see.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destination. African buffalo

The buffalo is just one of the many game animals a licence is available for in Zimbabwe.

Hunting is on both government hunting blocks and private land. Varied and beautiful landscape. Wilderness is mostly unspoilt.
Politically stable in the main.


ZAMBIA

A top photographic safari destination. Limited hunting. Bordering Zimbabwe on the north side of the Zambezi river and sharing the Victoria Falls, this country has re-opened safari hunting. However, elephant, lion and leopard remain closed. Plentiful hippo and crocodile. Lots of buffalo.
The best hunting areas are in the Luangwa Valley and in the Kafue region. The Benguelu flats offer the finest sitatunga-hunting and black lechwe. The long-horned Kafue red lechwe is prolific in the Kafue flats while areas bordering the Kafue Park boast Africa’s longest horned sable antelope (apart from the endangered and protected Angolan giant sable).
A wildlife paradise, Zambia also offers great photographic safari opportunities. Relatively low human population means low encroachment by people into the wilderness.
Politically stable.


BOTSWANA

A top photographic safari destination and home to the only inland delta in the world – the Okavango.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destinations. Botswana Okavango Delta

The Okavango Delta in Botswana. Since 2013 all hunting in the country is closed, except that on private land.

Until the end of 2013, this country was one of the finest for hunting safaris. Today all hunting is closed, except for plains game-hunting on private land. However, with an elephant population of 130,000 and growing in the Okavango region, one wonders how long the ban can last. My guess is that out of management necessity elephant-hunting will be reopened within the next few years. Meanwhile, this country is intolerant of poaching and uses its well-equipped army effectively against poachers.
One can understand the putting aside of the whole Okavango delta for photographic safaris as this beautiful, waterland paradise is eminently more suited to this activity than hunting. But the surrounding Mopane woodland holds too many elephant in an area totally unsuited to photographic tourism. Let’s see what happens.
Habitat includes the Kalahari desert, the Okavango delta wetlands and the Chobe river wetlands. Wildlife is varied, ranging from the big cats to oryx and springbok in the desert and elephant and buffalo in the delta.
Politically stable.


NAMIBIA

One of the best safari destinations for photography and hunting. The most “hunter friendly” country in Africa and the continent’s new hot spot for tourism, Namibia is Africa’s leader in community wildlife conservation projects. The country is home to almost 3,000 free-ranging, desert-adapted black rhino.
Private ownership of wildlife is encouraged, resulting in huge and growing numbers. There is hunting on private land and government-allocated concession areas. The “Big Five” can be hunted, subject to CITES and local quotas.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Best safari destinations. Hunting for the big five

Hunting for the big five in Namibia.

The habitat consists of desert, savannah woodland and riverine wetlands in the Caprivi (now Zambezi district) along the Chobe and Kwando rivers.
Namibia can be justifiably proud of its conservation through wise use policy and serves as an example to other countries of how to manage wildlife for the betterment of humans.
Poaching of rhino and elephant occurs but with strict game laws and a corruption-free wildlife department, one is hopeful that this will not escalate. There are around 500 white rhino in private ownership. Elephant numbers in the Caprivi are increasing and there are more cheetah than in the rest of Africa combined. Leopard are common but shy.
As the least densely populated country in Africa with just over two million people, there is little threat to wildlife habitat through encroachment on the wilderness.
Photographic opportunities abound with the Skeleton Coast, the Atlantic seaboard, the Namib desert and the northern wetlands offering a unique African vista.
Politically stable .


ANGOLA

Another wildlife paradise ruined by civil war. Currently not one of the best safari destinations due to unmapped land-mines in the bush. Officially not open for safari hunting but not banned by law. Wildlife numbers are increasing and from what Angolan game guards told me recently on the border shared with Namibia, poaching is not tolerated. Along that border we saw a large amount of wildlife, including elephant, buffalo, sable antelope and other plains game.
Operators are seeking concessions from the government but success will also depend on CITES issuing quotas. Angola is home to the rare and magnificent giant sable antelope.
Politically stable in most parts but remote areas should be treated as risky.


OTHER COUNTRIES

Liberia, Ghana and some other western African countries allow a limited amount of hunting. Not having been there, I can’t comment.


SAFARI HUNTING OR CONSERVATION?

Robin Hurt delivers his considered opinion.

During my last 51 years as a Professional Hunter I have witnessed much change. Human populations have increased dramatically and are in conflict with wildlife while, north of the Zambezi river, poaching pressure – particularly on elephant and rhino – has led to a staggering decline in wildlife numbers. Southern African countries largely escaped this poaching menace until recently.

I have been fortunate. My business and way of life has led me to safari in most of Africa’s premier game fields. Some countries are now closed to hunting or their wildlife populations mostly poached out. On the other hand, some of the best safari destinations offer increasing wildlife numbers resulting in superb hunting opportunities.
What I have learnt is this: if people living in the bush neighbouring wildlife don’t receive financial benefit from this resource, they won’t keep it. There are many ways to achieve sustainable use and longevity of species. Safari hunting is one of the best. It has been shown that countries that do not allow hunting have simply closed the door to legitimate use only to have it replaced by illegal use through poaching. Legal hunters don’t like poachers – their livelihood depends on healthy, thriving wildlife populations. The presence of safari hunters in the bush helps discourage poaching.

Robin Hurt

Readyfield Ladies naked charity calendar 2015

The Readyfield Ladies naked charity calendar 2015 was put together in memory of equestrian Caroline Harvey who died in a hunting accident.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Readyfield Ladies Naked charity calendar 2015
Taking it in their stride. The Readyfield Ladies stripped off in memory of Caroline Harvey, who died after a hunting accident.

The Readyfield Ladies naked charity calendar 2015 was put together in memory of equestrian Caroline Harvey. Caroline died after a hunting accident in March 2014, and her fellow Dianas decided raising money for the Derbshire, Leicestershire and Rutland Air Ambulance (DLRAA) which took her to hospital was most appropriate.

The DLRAA attended the scene of the accident and with out their fantastics skills and service, Carolines family would not have had the last few precious days to say their goodbyes.

READYFIELD LADIES NAKED CHARITY CALENDAR 2015

In true hunting girls style it was a naked charity calendar that came to the fore. First a calendar full of country pursuits was mooted, but after a glass of port the naked twist came arrived. It was likely to raise most funds, and be the most fun. Various friends and girls with gusto were photographed for the Readyfield Ladies naked charity calendar by Lauren Barham.

Both the Around the Farm naked charity calendar and the WFYFC naked charity calendar 2015 also raised money for the Air Ambulance. It is a vital service for any fieldsports and one we should all support.

More information on the Readyfield Ladies naked charity calendar is available from the Readyfield calendar website.

To make a donation to the fund set up in Caroline’s memory please visit Just Giving.
Her mother Ruth, of Eagles Drive, Melton Mowbray, said:

“She was such a lovely person, she lived life to the full. We are very proud of her. She’s gone now, but she was such a wonderful person when she was here.

“We have had a letter telling us which organs were donated. We take some comfort from that.

“We would never have wanted to stop her doing what she loved, she was a very determined person and she loved her sport.”

“It was a tragic accident and we didn’t want to lose her, but she was doing what she loved. She was very well loved and an inspiration to a lot of people.

“Without the air ambulance we wouldn’t have had the time we did with her which is why we raising money for them.

The Pau Hunt. Hunting in France the Leicestershire way

The Pau Hunt was founded by Englishmen on French soil 200 years ago during a rapprochment in the Napolenoic Wars. It is still going strong today.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Pau Hunt. Bernard Cazenave
Bernard Cazenove hunting with the Pau. Banks and ditches are substantial.

The Pau Hunt in France offers a warm welcome to the English hunting contingent. The Pau Hunt started 200 years ago as the Duke of Wellington’s armies swept through south-western France pursuing Napoleon’s defeated regiments. On 27 February, 1814 the armies met at Orthez, where the French put up a hard fight before, once again, retreating. Yet, according to local tradition, an extraordinary rapprochement took place after the battle. Like-minded British and French officers put their enmity aside and decided to hunt together. They met in the vicinity of Pau, where there was such an abundance of foxes and the country was so good that many of the British officers made a mental note to return.
One of these was Sir Henry Oxenden, a keen foxhunter, whose father was a close friend of the Duke of Wellington. He took the view that the local region, the Béarn, would make a splendid foxhunting country. After Waterloo, he returned to England, where he took on the Mastership of the East Kent.
Sir Henry did not forget the promise of the Pau region, however. More than a quarter of a century later, ill health forced him to seek warmer climes. Pau had already become a re-treat for English high society and in 1840 Sir Henry joined a growing group of English and Irish aristocrats. These early ex-pats were determined to establish a sporting home-from-home par excellence and it was not long until they had set up a golf club (the first on the Continent), a steeplechase course and, with Sir Henry’s help, a foxhunt. Their new club came to be known as “le Cercle Anglais”.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Pau Hunt. Following hounds

The English ex-pats established a sporting home from home in Pau with horses and hounds.

The Pau Hunt quickly became an integral part of the life of the men of le Cercle Anglais. By the late 19th century it attracted fields of 200-plus, comprised of English, Irish, French and American followers, as well as various European princes and princesses. Its Masters included the newspaper magnate J Gordon Bennett and Sir Victor Brooke, father of Viscount Alanbrooke (Chief of the Imperial General Staff during the Second World War).
Lord Howth, Master in 1878-1879, dubbed it “Leicestershire en France”. His account of his Mastership, Leicestershire en France, or the Pau Hunting Field, demonstrates what an extraordinary set-up it was. Hunting was carried out in the open rather than in forests, at racing pace, across a country that included banks and ditches. Howth tried to replicate Leicestershire by constructing post-and-rail fences, cut-and-laid hedges, brooks and oxers. He even arranged for tracks to be cut through the rougher country, so that his followers wouldn’t have to slacken their pace.

THE PAU HUNT IN THE 20th CENTURY

The Pau Hunt’s popularity continued well into the 20th century. Yet as the century wore on, its glories faded. A second English exodus to Pau was mooted in 2005 when the Hunting Act came into force but it didn’t transpire.
The Pau is almost entirely French now, with French Masters and French subscribers. Yet in defiant contrast to traditional French hunting, with its emphasis on vénerie, forests and fanfares, the Pau retains its Anglo-Irish flavour, and continues to offer exciting rides over an open country of banks, ditches and brooks. I had long looked for an excuse to visit this vestige of le Cercle Anglais and the 200th anniversary of that extraordinary Anglo-French foxhunt in 1814 gave me the perfect excuse.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Pau Hunt. Master George Moutet

Master George Moutet advised the writer when to visit.

I chose a weekend in early December for my visit on the advice of Georges Moutet, the Pau’s Master since 2000, who promised to lay on a day that would have delighted members of le Cercle Anglais. “We will meet at 10, hunt until one, have lunch in the clubhouse, then go to the Pau races, after which we will visit le Cercle Anglais itself,” Moutet informed me.
I flew to Toulouse on a Friday evening and drove 100 miles south to Pau. The following morning I met Moutet at the hunt’s clubhouse near the village of Morlaàs, just north of Pau.
The idea of a hunt being a club is alien to English hunting but it reflects French tradition and the sociable spirit of le Cercle Anglais. The clubhouse is a grand but slightly dilapidated building dating back to 1890 and is a veritable emporium of hunting memorabilia. Dozens of paintings and pictures adorn the walls, ranging from paintings depicting the Pau in its heyday to recent photographs showing members tackling huge banks and ditches.
The kennels, home to 121⁄2 couple of hounds, is next door. “Our hounds are a mixture of French deerhound, beagle and English foxhound. Recently we were given an English bitch called Balcony,” explained Moutet as we looked around. Balcony and her sons, Idalgo and Imanol, were easily identifiable, their pale colouring setting them apart from the black-and-tan of the French hounds.
These hounds hunt “le drag”, the only hunt in France to do so. “Until 40 years ago, we hunted the fox but, sadly, there are not enough around now to hunt,” Moutet told me. In fact, the Pau experimented with draghunting long before this. In Lord Howth’s time it hunted a drag in certain parts of its country because there were so many holes and so much gorse, that it was impossible to get a decent run.
Moutet introduced me to my horse but because no one plaits here, all I had to do was pass a brush over him and throw on the tack. When we had all scrambled on, we immediately moved off. “Don’t worry, you’ll get your stirrup cup at the end of the hunt,” joked Moutet as he saw my look of surprise.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Pau Hunt. Muriel Cassagne

The ditches can be daunting, but Muriel Cassagne takes it in her stride.

We were soon cantering across the open country just below the village of Serre-Morlaàs and before long I spotted huntsman Bernard Baylac’s horse put in a huge leap over a seemingly invisible obstacle. “Fossé!” came a shout from ahead and as I got closer I realised that I was approaching my first French ditch. You need a clever, experienced horse to negotiate this country. The ditches are substantial and at this time of year they are hidden by undergrowth, making them almost blind. You can see that they are there but it is almost impos-sible to gauge their width or depth. The same can be said for the banks. They are covered in thick bracken and undergrowth and it is difficult to distinguish solid bank from undergrowth. There are often water-filled ditches on take-off or landing, which your horse will not see until the last second.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Pau Hunt. Agathe Lafont

Agathe Lafont leant the writer a horse for the day.

Luckily, I was riding a superb old campaigner called Dady Marjyb, lent to me by Moutet’s granddaughter, Agathe Lafont. Dady had been a successful steeplechaser, winning cross-country races at Pau and Auteuil. He is now an experienced hunter and he gave me a superb ride over the ditches and banks that we tackled over the following half-hour or so.

After a brief check we crossed a bridge over the A64 and hunted through the country to the west of Sendets. Scent was poor, so the pace was fairly steady but there was plenty of jumping. I had a merry time as Moutet guided me over innumerable banks, ditches, road-crossings and streams. He would occasionally shout “Derrière!”, which I initially thought meant that I should keep behind but actually meant that there was a whopping ditch behind. At one point we jumped a large bank into what looked like somebody’s backyard. We jumped out again pretty quickly.
It was magnificent fun and reminded me of hunting in Ireland, even down to the friendliness of the field. Despite the language barrier, everyone was very keen to chat (and share hip flasks of armagnac), and I was helped immeasurably by Lieutenant-Colonel Louis Laval, a former special forces officer who now works in London, who took time to explain everything to me in impeccable English.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The Pau Hunt. Bernard Cazenave

The hunting in Pau has an Irish flavour.

Whereas the hunting had an Irish flavour, the déjeuner that followed was distinctly French. We finished hunting at about one o’clock and cantered back to the clubhouse, where a four-course meal awaited us: la garbure (a hunters’ soup), cold meats, roast pork and then a very fine custard tart, all washed down with Béarnais wines. My contribution to the meal was a Cropwell Bishop Stilton, which was well received by our French hosts.
By the time we had finished it was nearly four o’clock but we still had time to pay a visit to the Pau steeplechases, which are held at Pont-Long, five minutes down the road from the Pau’s kennels. In its heyday the Pau Hunt was inextricably linked with the steeplechasing and the ties remain strong. Jean-Loup Valentin, a hunt member and former director of the French National Stud at Pau, whisked us up to the stewards’ box, where we watched the cross-country race over a glass of armagnac. As horses and jockeys raced over banks, ditches, rails and hedges, it was easy to see how these races had evolved from hunting.
My trip would not have been complete without a visit to “le Cercle Anglais”, and so it was fitting that we finished off our day with a visit to the club itself. As we sipped a glass of whisky, I admired one of the many paintings on the walls, showing Henry Ridgway, Master of the Pau from 1901 to 1910, at the head of an enormous and impeccably turned-out field. The Pau Hunt and its country may have changed tremendously since then but it is remarkable that the spirit of the hunt has been so well preserved.
The Pau Hunt welcomes visitors: call Georges Moutet on 00 33 6 23 97 92 78.
.

Point to point fixtures: March 2015

Point to point fixtures for March 2015. The calendar is filling up with point to point racing dates countrywide.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Point-to-Point fictures in March 2015 will show some great sport.
Stay a nose in front this season with our point to point fixtures list.

Point to point fixtures for March 2015 are brought together in one place so you can plan your sporting weekends. If you are missing your hunting in the off season be sure to lend support to your local pack by tipping up, rain or shine, with enough readies for £2 each way and a boot full of goodies. If you need inspiration try our pheasant stock recipe pepped up with a dash of sherry, or delicious (and terribly moreish) venison sausage rolls recipe.

WHERE TO GO POINT TO POINTING IN MARCH 2015

Sunday 1st March

Brocklesby point to point

Brocklesby Park, Lincolnshire. Nr A18 10m W of Grimsby.

Quantock Staghounds

Cothelstone, Somerset. 2m NE of Bishops Lydeard off A358

South Herefordshire

Garnons, 8m W of Hereford. HR4 7JX.

South Midlands Area Club

Cocklebarrow, Gloucestershire. Approx. 1.5 miles south of the A40.

Tynedale

Corbridge, Northumberland. NE45 5QD.


Saturday 7th March 2015

Brecon & Talybont point to point

Llanfrynach, Brecon. LD3 7AX.

Duke of Beaufort’s

Didmarton, Gloucestershire. GL9 1EA.

Kingston Blount Racing Club

Kingston Blount, Oxfordshire. OX39 4SG.


 

Sunday 8th March 2015

Blackmore & Sparkford Vale point to point

Charlton Horethorne, Somerset. DT9 4LJ.

College Valley & North Northumberland

Alnwick, Northumberland. NE66 3AE.

Cottesmore

Garthorpe, Leicestershire. LE14 2RS.

Derwent

Charm Park, Yorkshire. YO13 9QU.

Mid Surrey Farmers Drag

Godstone, Surrey. RH9 8DB.

Sir W W Wynn’s

Bangor-on-Dee, Clwyd. LL13 0DA.

Suffolk

Ampstone, Suffolk. IP31 1NS.


Sunday 14th March 2015

Crawley & Horsham point to point

Parham, Sussex. RH20 2ER.

Buke of Buccleuch’s

Friars Haugh, Borders. TD5 8LS.

East Essex

Mark’s Tey, Essex. CO5 9EZ.

New Forest

Larkhill, Wiltshire. 5m NW of Amesbury.


Sunday 15th March 2015

Bicester with Whaddon Chase point to point

Whitfield, Northamptonshire. NN13 5TQ.

Curre & Llangibby

Howick, Gwent. NP16 6BL.

Hampshire

Hackwood Park, Hampshire. RG25 2JZ.

Holderness

Dalton Park, Yorkshire. HU17 7PW.

Ross Harriers

Garnons, 8m W of Hereford. HR4 7JX.

Dart Vale & Haldon Harriers

Buckfastleigh, Devon. TQ11 0LT.


Saturday 21st March 2015

Hurworth point to point

Hutton Rudby, Yorkshire. TS15 0JL.

Lanarkshire & Renfrewshire and Eglinton

Overton. Lanarkshire. ML8 5QF.

V. W. H.

Siddington, Wiltshire. 2m S of Cirencester

Wilton

Milborne St Andrew, Dorset. Nr A354 ½m SE of village.


Sunday, 22nd March 2015

Holcombe point to point

Whittington, Lancashire. 2m SW of Kirkby Lonsdale.

Lamerton

Kilworthy, Devon. PL19 0JZ.

Mendip Farmers

Ston Easton, Somerset. 8m N of Shepton Mallet.

North Ledbury

Hereford Racecourse, Hereford.

Oakley

Brafield-on-the-Green, Northamptonshire. 1m S of village.

Old Surrey, Burstow & West Kent

Penshurst, Kent. 3m SW of Penshurst.


Saturday, 28th March 2015

Avon Vale point to point

Larkhill, Wiltshire. 5m NW of Amesbury.

Berwickshire

Friars Haugh, Borders. TD5 8LS.

Glamorgan

Ystradowen, Vale of Glamorgan. CF71 7TA.

Puckeridge

Horseheath, Cambridgeshire. CB21 4QF.

United Pack

Brampton Bryan, Hereford and Worcester. 11m W of Ludlow.


Sunday, 29th March 2015

Badsworth & Bramham Moor

Askham Bryan College

Belvoir

Garthorpe, Leicestershire. LE14 2RS.

Cotley

Cotley, Somerset. 2m SW of Chard.

East Cornwall

Great Trethew, Cornwall. PL14 3PZ.

Flint & Denbigh

Bangor-on-Dee, Clwyd. LL13 0DA.

Ledbury

Maisemore Park, Gloucestershire. 3m NW of Gloucester.

Southdown & Eridge

Godstone, Surrey. RH9 8DB.

 

Hunt Rides. Do you have the gumption to give it a go?

Hunt rides. For the intrepid riders who take them on, courage is not in question. But what does it take to win? Or is simply staying the course worthy of the laurels? And which hunt ride takes most mettle?

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Hunt rides. Riding a good old fasioned finish
Riding an old-fashioned finish is fun for local farmers John Shaw and Anthony Anson.

Hunt rides are the last bastion of the old-fashioned point-to-point: man and horse crossing country in its purest form. You race with your heart and your head, riding intelligently and understanding the country, putting skills gained on hunting black runs to use. You may have hunted all your life, but have you done the Melton? You may have the best hunting horse, but will it help you to the racing spoils.

LEICESTERSHIRE THE HOME OF HUNT RIDES

Leicestershire plays host to the Melton, Harborough and Household Cavalry rides, all over first-rate hunting country. The oldest and most revered is the Melton, run by the Melton Hunt Club (MHC). “The original purpose was to open up new hunting country,” says Joey Newton, MHC chairman. Since 1956 it has operated on a three-year cycle between Belvoir, Quorn and Cottesmore country. “This meant that every year more country could be opened up and infrastructure put in that would make it better to hunt across,” explains Newton. The Masters plan the course which is then meticulously inspected and sanctioned by the MHC.

As mechanical hedge-cutters were introduced crossing the country became harder and the Melton achieved mythical status among aficionados. “Doing the Melton” has become a byword of the hunting elite, and most of those who enter a hunt ride will have it at the back of their minds. “What makes it so special is the unfettered and constantly changing course,” says Newton. “If we put up more than eight red or white flags then we would be upset. Hopefully, this year will see just four.” He is keen to point out that the Melton Ride is for everyone. “We have an inside and outside route so everyone can get round,” he says. “The inside route is quite big but you can get round the 31⁄2 miles by taking the outer route.” And his advice? “Take the first 10 fences as slowly as you can and stay out of the mêlèe.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Hunt rides. Drama at the first fence.

Take heed of some good advice and stay out of trouble at the first.

“If you can sleep the night before the Melton then there must be something wrong,” says Zoe Gibson, who last season won the Harborough, Wynnstay, Ossman’s and the Golden Button. (She couldn’t compete in the Melton due to injury.) “Hunt rides are an in-credible opportunity to gallop and jump in a way that you can’t out hunting,” she enthuses. She has competed in numerous rides. “The first Melton I saw I was gripped and I knew I had to do it.”She did and is now the un-crowned queen of the circuit, a title she modestly eschews. “There is a huge element of luck in winning all four last season,” she admits, “but it is an amazing opportunity to ride in its rawest and freest form. It is like off-roading instead of using the motorway,” she laughs.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Hunt rides. Zoe Gibson leading the Ossman's ride.

The doyenne of the hunt ride circuit, Zoe Gibson leads the Cheshire Hunt’s ‘Ossman’s Hunt Scurry.

Frances Moulaert recalls completing the Melton side-saddle. “My best moments happened as I came towards each hedge. I could hear the crowds shouting, ‘she is still coming’, and when I went past the encouragement was just amazing.” Having completed the course sideways, next time, if there is one, she will plump for astride.

Quorn farmer Edward Packe-Drury-Lowe, a Melton Ride regular, is grateful for the heavy-weight division for riders who can’t make pointing weight. “My wife calls it the First Fat Farmer prize,” he jokes. “Every time I do one, I say never again,” he continues, “but when that time of year comes round I often have a change of heart.” He is adamant that fitness is the key. “Your horse should be really fit; so should the rider,” he cautions. “I train before I take part.” A Cresta Runner, he reveals: “The moments before the flag drops at the start of the Melton ride are more nerve-racking than waiting in the start box at the top of the Cresta.”

THE HARBOROUGH HUNT RIDE

Chloe Shann, a regular on the hunting field, rode in the Melton and was ecstatic to jump a double of hedges that, “put us in the lead for the first and last time”. Shann now rides the Harborough annually.” It is the absolute highlight of my year,” she says.
Founded in 1971 by the late Lord Paget, the Harborough Hunts Club (HHC) Ride was in-tended as an end-of-season jolly. The HHC’s chairman Joe Cowen recalls, “The early races saw the heavyweights sent off first, then the middleweights and then the lightweights, a tactic that the heavyweight Reggie Paget thought might give him a chance to win.” He never did win, although he was third to two other heavyweights in 1972. The Harborough is now renowned for the speed of its course, over “good galloping grassland covering an extended three miles and about 25 fences”, says Cowen. “You need a high-class blood horse that jumps properly at speed,” he cautions. Entries are limited to 50 in the main ride.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Hunt rides. Olivia Pember has competed in hunt rides across the country.

A thoroughbred is essential in hunt rides today, if you want to be in the plate.

Olivia Pember won the Farmer’s Cup (for Fernie or Pytchley members) in 2010 at her first Harborough. “I don’t think I have ever been so fast over fences,” she says. “By the fifth fence I had to remind myself to breathe. I’ve tracked Zoe Gibson round a couple of rides. She’s seriously rapid and I’ve yet to see her or her horse make a mistake.” Dominic Gwyn-Jones has ridden in the Harborough a couple of times and advises, “Get some schooling with a racehorse trainer and work on your fitness if you are not hunting regularly.”

MILITARY HUNT RIDES

The Wessex Yeomanry Ride, which takes place on part of the Badminton estate, is followed by a day’s hunting with the Beaufort and is “a great proving ground but not as hairy as Leicestershire”, reveals Major Neil Cross, Commanding Officer of the King’s Troop. “Officers are expected to take part. It is great training for soldiers to develop courage and keep their nerve, and a practical lesson in the dangerous and exhausting work of pulling guns at high speed.” Cross always rides his Troop horses in hunt rides. “We are dressed for comfort not for speed,” he laughs as he recalls the hunt rides he has under his belt, including the Melton. “And sharing a bottle of cherry brandy when walking the course can often make the hedges look smaller.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Hunt rides. Riding a good old fasioned finish

Riding an old-fashioned finish is fun for local farmers John Shaw and Anthony Anson.

 HUNT RIDES IN CHESHIRE

“They might think they are the bee’s knees in Leicestershire but the Cheshire crowd are wild,” claims William Grant, a successful presence at many hunt rides. The Ossman’s Hunt Ride has been running for about five years, over 23⁄4 miles at Robin Williams’s farm. Organiser Charlie Barlow says, “We are dairy-farming country – small fields and hedges. Eighty per cent of our hunting country is good grass.” Barlow delights in how these rides bring people together. “Visitors get to meet the locals. It is a great way of fostering the grass-roots element of hunting that has become lost in modern point-to-pointing.” The Ossman’s ride is widely regarded as one of the friendliest.
“The Ossman’s has big wide hedges,” says Cottesmore farmer Richard Walker, who came second last season, “but the Wynnstay has big, tall ones.” The Wynnstay ride has been going “for nearly 10 years,” says event rider Emily Gilruth. Her enthusiasm played a large part in setting it up. “I had an eventer who wouldn’t cross country alone, so I entered him in the Melton and although I fell twice on the flat I still managed third place, a best and worst moment combined,” she says. The ride is styled on the Melton. “There are only a few turning boards and lots of decent hedges.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Hunt rides. Mouse Barlow flies over a hedge

There’s still room for proper hunting types to take on the hunt ride.

GOING FOR THE GOLDEN BUTTON

In the array of hunt rides there is a new(ish) kid on the block. The Golden Button Challenge is the brainchild of David Redvers. The ride, set in Ledbury Hunt country, was put to-gether as a weekend of fun and frolics over New Year. “It is fantastic country that lends it-self perfectly,” Redvers says. “It is an old-style point-to-point in a pretty straight line over 31⁄2 miles of wonderful turf and hedges along the banks of the Severn.” The ride is followed by a Hunt Ball on New Year’s Eve and hunting over their best country on New Year’s Day.

Challenge secretary Louise Daly says, “We started the ride as a fund-raiser. We have a foot race and an inter-hunt challenge too.” The ride is run over the same course every year, and flagged more than some hunt rides. “The course can be taken on by everyone from a brave person on their fat hunter to professionals. We try to make the whole weekend a special event.” Iona Sinclair rode the Button in 2009. “You need to be quite fit and the horse extremely fit to make the distance,” she says.

When Paul Carberry won in 2009 his friend David Geraghty was doing a “steady clear round on my hunter. We realised there was nothing like it in Ireland,” says Geraghty. This led to The Antler Challenge, only half an hour from Dublin in the Ward Union country. “We styled it on the Golden Button,” he says. “It gives the ordinary hunting man a chance to ride with people like Carberry and an adren-alin rush you can’t get from hunting. It’s all about the thrill of the race.” The inaugural ride saw old pasture and big, Irish ditches. “You could fit a bus into one. It is as much a jumping test as a speed test,” he says. The organisers are keen to encourage visitors from England for the next ride, and offer a first prize of ¤1,000, plus a set of antlers for category winners.

Amateur whip of the Laois, Dermot Hanniffy, has a horse called Melton, christened after a bottle of whiskey, a bottle of port and a promise to do the actual ride. “With few hedges in Laois country, the third one he saw was in the Melton,” laughs Hanniffy. “Even though we tipped up halfway round I still walked him over the line.” He is keen to start a ride in the Laois country, “to keep up the amateur spirit of the old-fashioned point-to-point”.
There are a numerous smaller hunt rides and scurries. The East Sussex and Romney Marsh Scurry is run over timber and hedges in hilly country. Hannah Taylor has taken part numerous times. “Successful point-to-point jockeys can come unstuck in a hunt ride. You need to use your head. It is a different type of racing,” she says. The course for the Isle of Wight Grand National at West Ashy Farm, Ryde, “is not for the faint-hearted and needs serious riding,” claims organiser Caroline Cooper, but it is “a real Island event, with people coming over from the mainland to compete, too”. William Grant won in 2010 and has travelled countrywide taking part in rides on his “big, red and fast” horse Ferrari. “Hunt rides are fabulous. Everyone can have a go and get round,” he says. “I am absolutely passionate about it. Things may often look unjumpable but the more experience you have the easier it is to pick your route.”

These rides require courage, ability and nerve from the rider, who has honed his skills and understanding of the country on the hunting field. The biggest and quickest routes need the bravest of jockeys and kick-on courage. Unfettered, unhindered and unchecked… it is the only way to cross country.

This feature was first published in September 2011.


History of the shotgun and shooting

The history of the shotgun and shooting, from the reign of Henry VIII to 1800. How bird shooting went from its infancy to the eve of the sport we know today

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of the shotgun and shooting. Duck being shot 1609. Duck being shot pictured in the Habiti d'huomini, 1609
Duck being shot pictured in the Habiti d'huomini, 1609

The history of the shotgun and shooting doesn’t start with Colonel Parker, or Edward VIII, or Holkham Coke’s. The shooting of game in England started during the reign of Henry VIII, the six-time married colussus whose predilections changed the fate of England. Henry owned a collection of breech-loaders, although in the sixteenth century it was the crossbow that found favour above the shotgun.

The history of these early weapons, before the advent of breech-loading, is a fascinating business. There are some exceptional historical pieces on display from the Royal Armouries archives. The current inclination for shotguns may hanker towards the 10 most expensive gun’s in the world, a list of the most exceptional guns you will find anywhere. Or perhaps the world’s 20 best shotguns are what one covets most. But each of these exceptional modern shotguns owes their development to what came before.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of the shotgun and shooting. Breech-loader, c1537. The hinged breech allowed a reuseable iron cartridge to be inserted.

Breech-loader, c1537. The hinged breech allowed a reuseable iron cartridge to be inserted.

HISTORY OF THE SHOTGUN AND SHOOTING: HENRICIAN ‘HAILE SHOTTE’

Most sporting weapons, however, were essentially a more lavish version of the military matchlock or arquebus, with muzzle-loaded barrels mounted on rudimentary but highly decorated stocks. Ignition was achieved by a trigger that pressed a glowing slow-match (a cord treated with saltpetre) on to a priming pan, from which the charge was ignited through the touch hole.

At first, single shot was used for target-shooting and four-footed game; by the 1540s multiple shot was also used, at this date cut from lead sheet. By the end of his life Henry possessed 41 such “Haile Shotte peics”, clearly used for birds. These were obviously pretty deadly, as an Act of 1548 at-tempted to ban the “shoting of hayle-shot wherby an infinite sort of fowle is killed and much gaym therby distroyed” and lamented their uselessness to military training. These weapons, loaded with shot, can be regarded as the remote ancestors of the modern shotgun.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of the shotgun and shooting. An English ancestor, the English snaphance, 1584.

An English ancestor, the English snaphance, 1584.

As for fieldcraft, 16th-century and most 17th-century shooting consisted of approaching birds from cover and taking them on the ground or, more commonly, on water.

 

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of the shotgun and shooting. Flemish engraving. Birds must sometimes have been shot as they rose, either when flushed by mistake or brought down by a companion taking another shot.

Birds must sometimes have been shot as they rose, either when flushed by mistake or brought down by a companion taking another shot.

A tantalising reference in the mid 16th century to “persons as dayly do shoote in handegonnes, and beat at the fowles in rivers and pyttes” hints that walking-up of a sort was also feasible. High-angle shots, however, were impossible with matchlocks, as there was nothing to hold the priming powder in the pan and, anyway, the weight of many guns required the use of rests. Black powder can kick like fury and the butt was normally pressed into the shoulder, although some were held to the cheek, the recoil being partly absorbed by the weapon’s inertia.

The slow pace of the operation kept bags relatively small. But the range of “fair game” was far wider than now – a certain Henry Macwilliam was licensed in 1567 to shoot 37 varieties of bird, including swan, chough, cormorant and (yes) “chickens”. In addition to variety, the sheer abundance of birdlife in the English countryside, most of it centuries from enclosure and further still from pesticides and other pressures, must have made for an exciting and rewarding exercise.

SHOOTING WAS A MINOR PURSUIT

The history of the shotgun and shooting demonstrates that shooting remained a relatively minor pursuit both as a fieldsport and as a way of taking birds on any scale for the table or for sale: the latter depended on a different armoury of equipment, including nets, lime and traps. In the 16th century shooting was also specifically restricted (however ineffectively) by successive statutes and, since the late 14th century, taking any game had been permitted only to men worth £2 a year. By the 17th century, inflation had widened the franchise, although shooting was limited by equipment costs, but an important Act of 1671 limited the taking of game to those with a landed income of £100 per year. Nor was shooting universally popular among sportsmen. In the 16th century, when still a rarity, it was violently opposed, particularly by falconers, as the noise and smoke scared off their quarry.

TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCES IN THE SHOTGUN

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of the shotgun and shooting. Engraved German wheellock by Nicholas Keucks, c1620. The matchlock was superseded by the wheellock.

Engraved German wheellock by Nicholas Keucks, c1620. The matchlock was superseded by the wheellock.

Meanwhile, the technology was changing, driven by the shortcomings of the matchlock. A more advanced and more weather-proof system – the wheellock – was already in existence by around 1500 and was first depicted by Leonardo da Vinci, no less. This used a complex arrangement whereby the trigger released a spring-driven wheel, wound up with a spanner (the first use of this term) that struck sparks off a piece of iron pyrites, held in a “dog” (similar to the cock of a flintlock). Such weapons could be afforded only by the rich, noble and royal, and many examples are fabulously ornate.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of shotgun.. Double-barrelled flintlock fowling piece by William Bailes, 1764-5.

Double-barrelled flintlock fowling piece by William Bailes, 1764-5.

Overlapping chronologically with both matchlock and wheellock, however, was the flintlock, the best-known, most commonly used and longest-lived of the pre-percussion ignition systems. This was not only a considerable technological advance but was cheaper than the wheellock to produce. A piece of flint was mechanically struck by a supporting “cock” against a “steel” or “frizzen”, igniting the priming powder and then the main charge. Guns with these locks or, technically speaking their precursor the “snaphance” lock, are first referred to in the 1540s and examples survive from the 1570s.
New technologies had little immediate impact on shooting techniques but certainly made things easier. The soldier/sportsman Gervase Markham (died 1637), wrote in 1621, “’Tis better it be a fier Locke or Snaphaunce [than a matchlock], for it is safe and better for carriage, readier for use, and keepes the powder dryer.”
The art of shooting flying began with stalked or walked-up birds shot taking off, akin to rough-shooting today, although the typically low shots would now seem unsporting. Shooting overhead or at gamebirds in full, fast flight could be attempted with the new guns but was rare before 1600. The earliest reference to the practice may be the illustration in the Venetian Giacomo Franco’s Habiti d’huomini (Gentlemen’s Attire) of 1609, which shows flying duck being shot going away, from boats, with retrievers busy in the water.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of the shotgun and shooting. Duck being shot 1609. Duck being shot pictured in the Habiti d'huomini, 1609

Duck being shot pictured in the Habiti d’huomini, 1609

Tellingly, in England the practice was omitted from a textbook of 1644 and may have been a recent introduction when Richard Blome published The Gentleman’s Recreation – the first English book to deal with shooting flying birds – in 1686. Blome included an engraving showing a pair of duck well up in the air being fired at by one gun with a second taking aim and a third waiting to bring his piece to the shoulder; a spaniel bounds forward to pick the still airborne birds.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
History of the shotgun and shooting . Shooting scene from The Gentleman's Recreation, 1686, the first English book to deal with flying birds.

Shooting scene from The Gentleman’s Recreation, 1686, the first English book to deal with flying birds.

The 1696 edition contains a remarkable picture of men shooting and bringing down birds (probably pigeon, perhaps partridges) from the saddle; shooting pistols and carbines from horseback was standard military practice.

HISTORY OF THE SHOTGUN AND SHOOTING BIRDS ON THE WING

Shooting at birds on the wing was not wholly about better sport but about results, as Blome explained:

“When your Game is on the Wing, it is more exposed to Danger; for if but one shot hits any Part of its Wings so expanded it will occasion its Fall.”

He also advised on how to hit the target, introducing but dismissing the concept of lead:

“Some are of the Opinion that must Shoot something before the Fowl, otherwise it will be past before the Shot can come to it: but that is a vulgar Error, for no Game can fly so quick, but that the Shot will meet it,” citing the breadth of pattern.

He then introduced the idea of overhead shots:

“I am of the opinion, if the Game flyeth as it were over your Head, that ’tis best to aim at the Head; and… from you, to aim as it were under its Belly.”

By the early 18th century overhead shots were being attempted more widely, suggesting the flighting of wildfowl and, perhaps, the driving of other birds. This is illustrated in Pteryplegia: or, the Art of Shooting Flying of 1717, a long and fascinating poem and prose Dedication by the Oxford Don George Markland. Clearly an experienced shot, he notes that: Five gen’ral sorts of Flying Marks there are;/The Lineals two, Traverse and Circular;/The Fifth Oblique, which I may vainly teach;/But practice only Perfectly can teach. The novelty of the practice in England, however, is shown by his admiration for the French, “so expert at the gun”, reflecting their longer experience.

SHOOTING DEVELOPMENTS PROMTED SHOTGUN DEVELOPMENTS

Prompted by developments in the sport, guns, too, evolved both mechanically and in lightness and handling. Blome recommended a shorter barrel than was customary in the 1680s, “about Four foot and a half in the Barrel, and of pretty wide Bore something under a musket” (a 12-bore). A superb example of such a gun, made by John Shaw (best-known pieces 1674-1702) exists in the Royal Armouries’ collection. It weighs slightly more than 11lb and, as the writers can attest, comes superbly to the shoulder. Over time, barrels got shorter still. Thomas Page’s The Art of Shooting Flying Explained of 1767 (a longer and more technical work than those of Blome and Markland) recommended 32in for early season work and, for “after Michaelmas, the birds by that time… grown so shy, that your shoots must be at longer distances”, 39in, adding, “if you intend one gun to serve for all purposes… a three feet barrel or thereabouts” would be ad-visable. Such guns anticipated the range and killing power of a modern shotgun, Markland recommending Full forty Yards permit the Bird to go/The spreading Gun will surer Mischief show.
While the flintlock and trigger-to-bang time continually improved, the next major innovation was the addition of a second barrel. The earliest examples of guns with barrels held together by soldering rather than the stock were French side-by-sides of the 1730s. However, these were slow to catch on in England, the Shooting Directory of 1804 dep-recating their usefulness and equating their French origin with “a great many other foolish things”. Nevertheless, the great English gunmakers Ezekiel Baker, Henry Nock and the Mantons were already producing superb examples, which, with the formerly full-length stock (as long as the barrels) reduced to a “half-stock” (resembling a fore-end), looked much like modern guns.
Rapidity of fire increased with the application of percussion ignition early in the 19th century, especially with the perfected percussion cap of about 1830. However, it was the introduction of a fully functional hinged breech in the 1830s and then of cartridges containing primer, propellant and projectile – and reliable firing pins – that saw the birth of the modern shotgun.
The rest is another story: rapid rates of fire led to driven shooting as we know it, swaths of countryside transformed and, through English technology, craftsmanship and wealth, the unrivalled excellence of the English gun.

By Mark Murray-Flutter and Edward Impey

Mark Murray -Flutter is senior curator, firearms at the Royal Armouries and Edward Impey is the director-general and master. The Keucks, Bales and Greener guns and the Southwell portrait are among the 630 items on display in the Hunting Gallery at the Royal Armouries Museum, Leeds, the national museum of arms and armour. The museum is open daily from 10am until 5pm. Entry is free.

Guide to shotgun choke. Everything you need to know.

What a shotgun choke is, what the choke does, how it affects your shooting and how to both choose and measure your shotgun choke.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Make sure you have the best barrels and the correct shotgun choke
Make sure you have the best barrels and the correct shotgun choke

Shotgun choke. Does it really matter that much? The answer for anyone who is keen to shoot well is yes. From beginners to the experienced shot alike, choke can be a thorny issue. When to use more or less, how to fit the choke to your chosen quarry, and how to judge just when to use what.

The Field’s comprehensive guide to shotgun choke will dispel any problems you might have. From the novice gun unsure where to start to the experienced gun looking for the final finesses. But be warned, tinkering with the choke can become something of an obsession.

So what is the correct shotgun choke for grouse shooting? And if you find the gun of your dreams in our gun reviews section, what choke would suit best?

WHAT IS SHOTGUN CHOKE?

Shotgun choke is the constriction at the muzzle end of the gun that tightens the pattern of pellets. In an average cartridge there are approximately 300 pellets, so how wide the shot pattern or how restricted is a matter than will make all the difference to your shooting.

There is no need to become neurotic about shotgun choke, even though some people do. What is most important is that regular misses in the field are rarely down to choke. The cause is far more likely to be the direction the barrels are pointing.

Choke is one of those things, like gunfit, that should be visited occasionally and put out of mind once an informed decision has been reached concerning what best suits your needs.

With that on record, let us move forward.

DOES YOUR SHOTGUN CHOKE WORK FOR YOU?

You should take your gun to a pattern plate (or improvise one with paper or card sheets and a suitable frame and safe back-drop) and shoot it at different ranges – 20yd, 30yd and 40yd – using the cartridge you prefer. You hope to see an even pattern without too many clusters, gaps or excessive central concentration.

If there are holes a bird could fly through – a 5in circle test is sometimes applied – or if the pattern is obviously too tight, your shotgun and its chokes may be working against you.

Once you have tested with your usual ammunition, experiment with different cartridges. You might, for example, try to observe the terminal effects of switching between fibre and plastic wads (the former often throw more open patterns) or increasing pellet payload (which may be an alternative to increasing choke). If your gun has multi-chokes, try different tubes.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The tools of the trade for measuring shotgun choke

The tools of the trade for measuring shotgun choke

REVERSE CHOKE

Sportsmen develop strange prejudices concerning shotgun choke. My approach, and I happily admit to passing through the stage of confusion, is practical. I have discovered what works for me in different situations and now stick with it. For general game-shooting, I like a bit of choke in the first barrel but not too much – it is the first few thou that makes the most obvious difference. A slightly choked barrel is much more efficient than a true cylinder and inspires confidence, too.

Many 12- and 20-bore game guns are over-choked for their task. Tight patterns may be a means to cleaner kills at longer range but they are an impediment at shorter distances because they demand more accuracy.

There seems to be something in many sportsman’s psychology that erroneously suggests more choke good, less choke bad. If you are going out on the average driven day or walking-up, you do not need much choke in a 12-bore. The first few thou does make a real difference; thereafter the law of diminishing returns takes effect. Those who can see shot will confirm this. You can often observe what looks like a tennis ball-sized cluster of shot moving past the bird at short range. I have seen this many times and thought: “It’s much tighter than I expected, one might as well be using a rifle.”

Some years ago, I put together what came to be called my “duffer’s gun” based on an old, plain-Jane Beretta Essential over-and-under. The initial idea was to create a workhorse without regard to aesthetics that would be as forgiving to shoot as possible on normal days. It was based on an over-and-under because, though I love side-by sides, over-and-unders are usually easier to control and easier to point. The Beretta action is supremely reliable, moreover, and the Essential, though a budget gun, had livelier barrels than the average because it dispensed with side ribs.

The gun was a multi-choked model and this allowed for much experiment with shotgun chokes at the pattern plates and, later, in hides and on the shooting field. After some months of experiment, I determined that I had the most consistent first-shot success with something called a Seminole spreader choke. This device is made in the USA. It might be described as a reverse choke: it has a section that extends from the muzzles and trumpets out to a greater size than the bore.

The form of this section is conical. The concept of reverse constriction is not new. In the muzzle-loading era, before the general adoption of choke boring, many guns were “relieved” at the muzzles because it was found that they shot better than a true cylinder. My experience would seem to confirm this; the Seminole choke still works on clay birds 50yd out, yet it is very forgiving close in.

The second shotgun choke that worked really well in the field – in that it was effective and forgiving in use – was a standard Beretta Improved Cylinder Mobilchoke tube. This is a conventional shotgun choke with about five thou of constriction. With the duffer’s gun, I once accounted for 18 average pheasants for 17 shots. They were not testing, but it really was quite difficult to miss with it. I have since lent it to friends in distress and they have always shot it better than other, more traditional weapons. I have had similar unnatural success with another open-choked Beretta over-and-under using mid-velocity, heavy payload cartridges (11⁄4oz, No 6).

The gun and the cartridges were lent to me in Italy. It was extremely effective on easy birds but the experience was notable because the 36g cartridges had a lot of shot in them but did not recoil excessively (the lower velocity, heavy-payload cartridge was explored by the wildfowler Dr Charles Heath years ago).

OPEN CHOKES?

Does this mean that everyone should open up their chokes? No, not unless one is shooting at close- to mid-range birds routinely. Shotgun choke can certainly be useful when shooting at longer range its effects break down at extreme range and if birds are especially tough – such as wild guineafowl in Africa. A bit more choke than is really required may also in-crease confidence – no small factor in shooting – and give one the sense if not the actual ability to pick one’s birds better. If your confidence slips because of concerns about choke, or anything else, your focus may come off the bird and your movements may be hesitant (resulting in misses behind).

WHAT CHOKE FOR HIGH BIRDS?

Nigel Teague, a man who has experimented more with shotgun choke than perhaps anyone else in Britain today, advocates 7⁄8ths of choke – about 35 thou – in both barrels for the really tall stuff. This concurs with my high-bird experience where I have found three-quarters and three-quarters works well in a 12, better than full and full. With many modern cartridges optimum pattern performance requires less than full constriction; excessive choke can blow a pattern.

Many foreign guns, especially small bores, may be ridiculously over-choked. This stated, I think 20s and, especially, 28s perform a bit better with a little more shotgun choke than I would advocate for a 12. My 30in Beretta EELL 28-bore, for example, shoots particularly well with two three-quarter chokes fitted (about 20 thou constriction in a 28).

Although, one can try to state general principles concerning choke, I find that some guns just seem to shoot well with a particular constriction and there is no real science – none that is available at least – to support why this should be.

Shotgun ballistics are much more complex than one might think because there are so many variables: atmospheric conditions; shot size; shot density; shot coating; wad, primer, powder and case type; barrel diameter (a nominal 12 might be anything from .710 to .740 in internal diameter) and internal geometric form; barrel steel and wall thickness; and, not least, the length and form of the choke constrictions themselves. Some chokes are short, others long. Some are simple conic constrictions, others have a cone that leads into a parallel section, yet others have complex forms, including features such as radiused walls, relieved sections or expansion chambers.

While we are getting technical, let me note that tight shotgun choke increase pressures, and hence velocity. A point of choke is worth about 1ft per second on velocity.

As barrel length has a small effect on velocity too – about 5fps per inch in a 12-bore – this may become more significant when extremes of choke and barrel length are combined. For example, it is interesting to note that a 32in full-choke gun might have a velocity as much as 100fps faster than a 25in open-bored one, all other things being equal.

Most intriguingly, constriction of the muzzles also has the effect of reducing the stringing of shot once it is significantly forward of the muzzles (just forward of the muzzles there may some elongation of the shot column, but the terminal effect of choke is to reduce the length of the shot string and thus improve its efficiency). This may seem counter intuitive but it was neatly demonstrated by Mr Griffiths of the Schultz Powder Company more than a hundred years ago by means of shooting choked and unchoked guns at a spinning disc. The results were published in The Field, like much else concerning choke and shotgun ballistics in the Golden Age.

CHOOSE YOUR SHOTGUN CHOKE AND FORGET IT

Cutting to the chase and avoiding the danger of getting too complicated, my all-round choice in a 12-bore game-gun would usually be improved and half or improved and three-quarters (a useful choking if combined with the instant selection of a double trigger). I would not argue with those, such as my friend and former Olympian Kevin Gill, who advocate quarter and half for all-round shooting. (Kevin shifts to half and three-quarters for higher birds.) My rationale is that I like to engage average birds instinctively but it is also good to have the option of a more precise approach at range.

CHOKE FOR HIGH BIRDS

Two tight but not extreme shotgun chokes are in order (teamed with a high-performance cartridge; the choke may never be separated from the cartridge used with it).

CHOKE FOR PIGEON

Quarter and quarter or half and half usually works well. For smaller bores my preference is a bit more choke than commonly advised. I have to say, though, that I have not a clue what is in my 32in Guerini 20s, the guns I use most for game. I put the chokes in some while back after playing at the plates and have not looked at them since. They work.

MEASURING SHOTGUN CHOKE

Commonly, one refers to the choke in a barrel as being true cylinder, improved, quarter, half, three-quarter or full. Gunmakers talk about “points” of choke. They measure shotgun choke relative to the bore diameter (which may vary considerably within any designated bore size rather than at the muzzle alone).
One point equates to a constriction of one thousandth of an inch. Below is what one would expect in a 12-bore gun.

  • True Cylinder 0-1 points
  • Improved cylinder 3-6
  • Quarter (American Improved) 8-12
  • Half (American Modified) 17-23
  • Three-quarters (Improved Modified) 25-30
  • Full 35-40
  • Super full 40+

These descriptions should not be appraised in isolation of their observed effects, though. Properly considered, choke concerns the number of pellets any given barrel/constriction throws into a 30in circle at40yd. The quality of shot, the type of wad and other factors such as precise bore diameter and the form of choke – short or long, simple conic or conic cone plus parallel section (the favourite of British gunmakers) may all be significant.

Percentage of pellets inside
30in circle at 40yd

  • True Cylinder     30-40
  • Improved           50
  • Quarter             55
  • Half                  60
  • Three-quarters   65
  • Full                   70-75
  • Super full           76+

Shotgun choke can be definitively determined only at the pattern plates and in relation to a specific cartridge. Measurement of constriction alone can be misleading. In days past, a gunmaker would always ask his client what cartridges he intended to use and then regulate the chokes according to the desired percentage. If the client opted for the gunsmith’s own brand, he would have to continue to use the gunmaker’s cartridges to ensure consistency of performance.

Now you have your gun ready to go, make sure your shots are up to it with our essential 11 pheasant shooting tips.

Man-eaters. When man is on the menu.

Man-eaters hold a distinct fascination for those usually at the top of the food chain. Blofeld's piranhas may have a vicious bite, but it is the hippos one needs to watch out for.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
A snarling man-eater is not the best thing to encounter on the way to the shower block.
A South African lion stands his ground.

Man-eaters are not just a category of monsters consigned to schlock horror films. They are a very real danger, particularly if one finds oneself on safari (for expert advice see our best safari destinations in Africa guide) and forgets to follow the rules.

During your first evening as a guest at Ngala Safari Lodge, on the edge of Kruger National Park, they warn you not to go back to your cabin without an armed guide. Apparently, a lady popped out for her cardigan during dinner one night and was attacked. They know she was on the way back from her cabin because they found a sleeve of the cardigan with her arm in it.
All the same, it’s not until about day three on safari, when you are bitten, bruised, burnt and blistered, that you realise you are so far down the food chain that even the vegetation regards you as easy meat. And that’s just what we are to a lion: easy meat. “Even an impala is a more fierce opponent than an unarmed man. I’ve seen a big buck impala kill a lioness before now,” points out Dr Don Heath, a scientist, professional hunter and examiner of hunters, formerly with Zimbabwe’s Parks and Wildlife Management Authority. He is well placed to tell the story of man-eaters. “With one hat on I am a professional biologist who has had to shoot a pile of lion in the course of my duties but I started taking clients out hunting when I was 15 and since then I’ve tracked and killed cattle-eaters and man-eaters.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Man-eaters. A terrified woman treed by a Lion in 1930.

Man-eaters. A terrified woman treed by a Lion in 1930. Man is particularly attractive to lions in poor health.

He explains that our softness makes man particularly attractive to lions who are in poor health, have bad teeth or are stressed in some way – rather like rice pudding for an invalid. “The last man-eater I had to take, in 2007, was a typical example of that, what I call a good lion gone bad. She had FIV (feline AIDS) and broken teeth. It was at a professional hunter training camp on the Zambezi, where I was chief examiner. The candidates had to show a hyena for a client, among other things – it’s quite a complex exam, depending on which licence you are going for. Anyway, we decided we were going to try to bait for a lion while we were at it, which I guess worked rather too well. The lioness came into the bait and I could see she was in a bad way. Had I still been in charge of the area I would have shot her immediately but I had to wait for permission from the warden. By the time we got that it was fully dark, so we went back to camp.
“At seven o’clock that evening she came into camp and attacked one of the students in the shower; he got away and she seemed to disappear. Then, at midnight, she attacked one of the camp workers and managed to pull the canvas off his tent. We don’t know what happened next but a couple of the students had got up early next morning to do aspects of their practical examination. It was just after dawn that the game warden and I saw lion tracks going into the tent and we found an arm and a lot of blood. By 6.30am I had shot her.”
In many areas of sub-Saharan Africa, man-eating has decreased since the Sixties due to changes in political management of both lions and people. Even so, says Heath, “It is still quite common. While I was working in Zimbabwe’s national parks we had 47 people killed by lions, including three of our own staff. There was one professional hunter who was killed by a lion that had rabies. That was absolutely harrowing. The lion couldn’t actually eat him because it had rabies and couldn’t swallow, so it was desperately thirsty and hungry.”
Man-eaters don’t always have the excuse of poor health. “I would say most of the others I have been involved with have been healthy lions. There was a group of lionesses who ate our camp cook and I got the actual killer – the man-eater- she was the one with most blood on her face.”

Pigeon shooting calendar

This pigeon shooting calendar tells you when to go and where to go for the best chance of a good bag.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The pigeon shooting calendar tells you when and where to shoot the grey grouse.
The pigeon shooting calendar tells you when and where to shoot the grey grouse.

This pigeon shooting calendar will help you plan your pest control. Pigeon shooting is popular all year round, although the spring months are often the best for those seeking sport after the end of the game bird season. The most important factor is knowing when to shoot pigeon, and over which crops. This useful pigeon shooting calendar will guide you through the year.

PIGEON SHOOTING CALENDAR

January

Go pigeon shooting over rape and any frosted root crops such as potatoes, carrots, sugar beet and turnips if you have them.

February 

Rape, again, is a strong draw as the pigeon’s core diet. Maize and other cover crops if chopped or ploughed in. And in hard weather, frosted crops such as cabbages, cauliflower and sprouts work well. Early spring clover can
be a big draw.

March

Rape will more or less sustain pigeon this month. As the soil warms, watch all spring drillings. Clover should be dragging them in by now for some sustained pigeon shooting.

April

Late spring drillings and peas can prove fruitful for pigeon shooting. Tree buds, especially ash, can be great this month.

May

A tricky month in the pigeon shooting calendar, with a lot around to tempt them. Peas and spring-sown rape, which will just be showing. Barring surprises, a sticky month to get under the tap.

June

Again, this month can be a difficult one in the pigeon shooting calendar, unless they’re belting the peas or seeds. That said, last June produced
some amazing bags over fields of failed rape, an opportunity not to be missed.

July

Once again, peas, either growing or harvested, but also laid cereal crops, especially barley or wheat at that milky stage.

August

Harvest time. Breeding pigeon will be on rape and almost any harvested crop. If hot and dry, remote drinking areas can be good places to find pigeon not busily engaged in attacking the crops.

September

Similar to August, so don’t overlook any freshly ploughed and harrowed land.

October

A difficult month in the pigeonshooting calendar owing to the weather. Be vigilant with autumn drill but also with wild foods such as acorns and beech masts.

November

A lot depends on how much wild food is on offer, how well any autumn drilling crops have grown and the timing of harvests such as beet. If wild food is bountiful they seldom leave it.

December

Rape, mainly towards the month end, as other offers will exist. The odd stubble field may still drag a few in.

Oldest fishing book in the world? Watch the report.

Oldest fishing book in the world. Did a 15th century Benedictine monk while away his hours making notes on fishing techniques?

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The oldest fishing book. A Benedictine monk whiled away his hours writing about fishing in the back of his Latin breviary.
A Benedictine monk whiled away his hours writing about fishing in the back of his Latin breviary.

The oldest fishing book in the world may have been discovered. Nestling in the back of an ancient mid-fifteenth century prayer book, hand written in obscure dialect, were notes relating to what was initially thought to be comment on feathers and colours. An unusual supplement to the latin breviary of a Benedictine monk.

The chance discovery has revealed that these notes are the oldest known reference to fly fishing and perhaps the oldest fishing book we know of. With an aptitude to be admired the monk noted down his fly tying techniques. For a modern version see our feature on salmon flys and fly-tying.

The handwritten prayer book was initially accquired by Maggs Brothers in Berkeley Square. It belonged to a 15th century Benedictine monk from Admont Abbey in Austria, but on closer inspection there was an added surprise.

It was discovered that although the main section of the prayer book was written in traditional Latin, the last few were written in middle/high German with an obscure Austrian dialect. It was in these last pages that the fishing notes were found.

The notes included recipes for fly patterns, which feathers to use and how to put them together, bait recipes and notes on traps and nets. The bait recipes include flying worms, ox meat and chopped eggs. There is reference to grayling, trout and the crucian carp.

OLDEST FISHING BOOK IN THE WORLD

“Maggs’ experts have dated the script around 1560 predating the “Tegernsee Fishing Advice” (Tegernsee Angel und Fishbacklein) written by another Benedictine monk at Tegernsee in Bavaria in the late 15th century, and making it possibly the earliest recorded reference to fly fishing anywhere in the world” says Richard Lisney of Fishing TV.

“Fishing TV was given exclusive access to this unique find and has made a short film with presenter Rae Borras talking to Jonathan Riley from Maggs about the book and taking a closer look between the pages” he says.

 

The CLA Game Chef of the Year competition 2015

The CLA Game Chef of the Year competition, in association with The Field, wants chefs, cooks, professionals and talented amateurs to enter this year's competition. If you are good with game then give it a go.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
The final hots up at the CLA Game Chef of the Year competition 2014.
Are you ready to throw your chef's hat in to the ring? Enter this year's competition.

The CLA Game Chef of the Year competition, in association with The Field, will retun for the second time at the CLA Game Fair at Harewood House in Yorkshire this year, 31 July – 2 August, 2015.

The Field has a passion for good food and great game cookery. By joining forces with the CLA to launch the hugely popular Game Chef of the Year competition we hope to find a brace of exceptional chefs.

This year the competition is divided into two categories: amateur cooks and professional chefs, who will compete within their category.

The aim is to seek out the best professional and best amateur game chefs in the country.

So if your pigeon pasties receive regular thumbs up, or your talent at making pheasant flavoursome draws a crowd then it is time to put your skills to the test and enter our competition. Perhaps you think you can best our top 10 best pheasant recipes?

The competition is designed to find two unrecognised chefs who relish cooking with game meats and embrace the Great British Countryside through their food.

Four finalists will be chosen from entries to cook in front of a live audience in the CLA Game Fair Cookery Theatre. The competition will be judged by the editor of The Field Jonathan Young and Mike Robinson, the UK’s leading game chef and owner of the Pot Kiln in Berkshire and the Michelin-starred Harwood Arms in London.

To enter visit the CLA’s website.

And if you need a little inspiration then here is last year’s winner, Guy Paterson’s winning recipe.

CLA GAME CHEF OF THE YEAR COMPETITION – WINNER’S RECIPE

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
CLA Game Chef of the Year. The 2014 winning dish.

Guy Paterson, a Norfolk farmer and amateur chef, took the laurels with his pigeon dish in 2014.

■ 2 whole pigeon
■ Oil for frying
■ Butter
■ 4 shallots, sliced
■ 50ml (2fl oz) whisky
■ Chicken stock
■ 500g (18lb) new potatoes
■ 2 pheasant and
pear sausages
■ Seasoning
■ 1 tsp horseradish sauce
■ Bag of kale
Brown the pigeon legs in a pan in a little oil. Add the butter and shallots, soften for a minute then add the whisky. Add enough stock to cover and reduce by half. Simmer potatoes until cooked. Remove pigeon breasts and sausage meat from skin and roll the sausage meat into patties (four per sausage) and fry for 2-3 minutes on each side then rest. Season the breasts then fry on both sides, keeping hot in oven. Sieve sauce, season and thicken if preferred. Mash the potatoes with skins on, add a knob of butter, horseradish sauce and season. Wash kale and wilt in a little butter. Serve the
sliced breast on the mash surrounded by the kale and patties; pour the sauce over.

 

Jeremy Houghton, sporting artist

Jeremy Houghton has produced a wealth of vibrant and exciting work. His sporting pictures are wonderfully evocative.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Early Morning Light in the Cotswolds by sporting artist Jeremy Houghton
Early Morning Light in the Cotswolds by Jeremy Houghton

Jeremy Houghton’s work is all about the spaces in between, which somehow convey the realities of the sports he depicts more convincingly than any amount of photographic detail. The forbidding black birch of a Grand National fence thrown into menacing relief; a pale winter sky filled with the dark punctuation marks of geese; hunters steaming at the end of a best hunting day over hedge or moor. Houghton has developed his own technique for creating those telling, light-filled gaps.

JEREMY HOUGHTON SPORTING ARTIST

“I paint in watercolour but the white that you see is the white of the paper. To make that happen I use masking fluid, which I paint precisely on to the areas of the paper that I want to leave white. This provides a seal against the watercolour paint and then it is a laborious task to paint what is really a negative image using a very fine brush, covering the paper. I tend to think in the negative – all of my paintings, even those that are not monochrome, are always like this. I never actually paint the positive form.
“This has been instinctive for me right from the beginning at school,” he remembers. “I have always painted the edges. It just feels like a very natural process for solving that challenge of turning the three dimensions we see into two dimensions on paper. The irony with the paintings is that once they are finished, and you rub off the masking fluid, the white bits then revealed are the most important elements though they haven’t actually been painted. They provide the viewer with all the interest and all the answers.”

TRAINING AT THE SLADE

Houghton trained at the Slade School of Art and the Université de Provence before teaching art in South Africa. But it was coming back home to Broadway in the Cotswolds that inspired his distinctive work. “I live in the little cottage that I was born in and my grandfather lived here,” explains Jeremy Houghton. “He was the village doctor in Broadway from the Thirties so of course he visited all the local houses and he was fascinated by the history of the village. He used to collect old photographs and when his patients heard about that he would get given all these lovely old photographs and memorabilia, which he put into albums and scrapbooks and compiled a history of Broadway. I have now got his collections, 12 volumes of old photographs and cuttings, and I think they are wonderful things to have, not just because they are from my grandfather but because they are interesting in their own right. These images have influenced my work; they add a strong sense of place. They suggest the continuity of this way of life, which is very much part of who I am.”

ARTIST IN RESIDENCE

This philosophy made Jeremy Houghton the obvious choice to undertake a project for Prince Charles, as artist in residence at Highgrove, which he completed last year. “Highgrove was amazing and I was allowed to take my easel wherever I wanted. Having done a fair amount of wandering around I decided to go beyond the garden fence and look at the farming and the rare breeds and all the characters and tell that part of the story, which is so important because through his traditional farming methods Prince Charles is showing how you can have a farm in the 21st century and how it can be successful whatever scale. It worked for me because my paintings are about time and history. I try and evoke a feeling of timelessness in the paintings so you look at them and think, ‘Is this today or is it 100 years ago?’ This was particularly important for my work with the 2012 Olympics. You can’t beat the sporting legacy that we have in this country, the rural sports, and it is wonderful to be in the countryside and participate in these activities, which are part of the fabric of the countryside.
“When I go out for a day hunting or fishing I will take as many photos as possible but I am very keen not to be seen because I don’t want people to pose, I want them just to carry on doing what they do. I don’t want to be the focal point, I’m just in the shadows observing from a distance. It is the exact opposite of a selfie.”
Jeremy Houghton is the artist in residence at Goodwood during 2015.


Braised grouse with tomato, parmesan and wet polenta

Braised grouse is the perfect way to use up your freezer birds. Team with polenta and tomato for a fresh, yet hearty, lunch.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Braised grouse with polenta
A gutsy grouse recipe to use up the freezer birds.

Braised grouse with tomato, Parmesan and polenta is a delicious game recipe that will use up any tough old birds you may have lurking in the freezer. A braised grouse recipe gives the bird a chance to tenderise as it cooks, an important facet of any game recipe that deals with older birds. So if your grouse shooting yields a healthy bag, too many to keep making the traditional roast grouse recipe, then keep them in the freezer and use to brighten the winter months as follows.

Braised grouse with tomato, Parmesan and wet polenta

Serves 12

For the braised grouse

6 grouse (defrosted)

6 tbsp olive oil

3 red onions, finely diced

3 heads fennel, finely diced

6 cloves garlic, finely chopped

Salt and pepper

1.2kg (2lb 10oz) chopped, tinned tomatoes

4 tsp dried oregano

300ml (101⁄2fl oz) red wine

400ml (131⁄2fl oz) game stock (or beef/chicken)

 

For the wet polenta

1.5 litres (21⁄2 pints) water

900g (2lb) polenta

150g (5oz) butter

150g (5oz) parmesan, grated

4 tbsp finely chopped parsleyThis braised grouse makes a wonderful starter or a warming lunch.

In a saucepan, sear the grouse on a medium heat in four tablespoons of the olive oil. Once browned, remove from the pan and put in the onions, fennel, garlic and the remaining oil.

Season the vegetables with salt and cook until starting to soften (about five minutes). Then add the tomatoes, oregano, wine, 300ml (101⁄2fl oz) of the stock and a few twists of black pepper. Give it a good stir then return the grouse, breast side down.

Cook on a low heat with the lid on for about 1½ hours, occasionally basting the grouse with the sauce. You want the meat to be tender.

Remove the grouse from the sauce and when cool enough to handle remove the skin and shred the meat off the bone.

Once shredded, put the meat back into the sauce and check the seasoning (you may want to add the remaining stock if the sauce looks a little dry). Keep hot.

To cook the polenta, bring the water to the boil in a heavy-bottomed saucepan. Add a pinch of salt then slowly pour in the polenta in a steady stream, whisking the whole time. Cook on a low heat for 10 minutes, stirring constantly, until the polenta is no longer grainy.

Finally, whisk in all the butter and 100g (4oz) of the parmesan.

When you are ready to serve it, put a pool of polenta on a plate and top it with a ladle of the shredded grouse in its sauce.

Finally, add a sprinkle of the remaining parmesan and the chopped parsley.

Expert guide to pigeon shooting

This expert guide to pigeon shooting sees Roberth Cuthbert talk to the team who shoot wood pigeon in their thousands.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Expert guide to pigeon shooting. Taking aim at the grey grouse.
Taking aim at the grey grouse.

An expert guide to pigeon shooting is particularly useful when it comes from a team that down the grey grouse in their thousands. But before the advice on telling you how to, ensure you know where to be. Our month by month pigeon shooting calendar provides a quick guide to which crops you shooting be shooting over for the best results.

EXPERT GUIDE TO PIGEON SHOOTING

“Rather than completely obscuring yourself, you need to break up outlines, while, vitally, being able to see out. There’s no point building a fortress only to have to pop your head over the top every five minutes, scaring off anything on its way to you.”Sound advice from Peter Schwerdt, renowned game-shot and woodpigeon nemesis.

I spent a day with him in a hide close to Andover. As I studiously noted the technical aspects to his approach, multi-layered hide with old-fashioned Army scrim netting and Advantage mesh forming its bulk, a pattern of 15 real pigeon decoys breasted out, I was quite surprised to see a pigeon magnet rigged up. As Richard Lovell, Peter’s friend and guide attended to a gently nodding flapper, provocatively I ventured that pigeon magnets were the work of the Devil, surely, and frowned upon by most traditionalists.
“Look,” he said, not quite rising to a fairly cheap shot, “there are a few purists who see pigeon as a game, not in a gamebird sense, but in a proffered chance sort of way. They feel that using a whirly is not quite the done thing. Of course, they’re sport, tremendous sport, the finest perhaps, but we are here to control vermin.” It was far from a hollow boast. In late November last year, Peter and a friend shot 1,082 in five hours in two hides three miles apart.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Expert guide to pigeon shooting. Another pigeon to add to the bag.

Another pigeon to add to the bag.

Lovell, who provided these photographs, is a Wiltshire-based pigeon guide. He doesn’t advertise; he doesn’t need to. Before he left us, to set up his own hide, I asked him precisely what made him and Peter such a devastating combination. “Honestly? I suppose it’s because we’ve been doing it for 18 years or so. I spend over 300 days a year looking at pigeon and their movements. I’m good at getting him under them; he’s great at shooting them. It’s that simple.”
I studied his decoy pattern and asked whether they were always positioned in an L shape. “Lord, no. Jumble it all up a little. L shapes work well, but then U shapes do, too; facing into the wind, of course. I tend to put the whirly at the rear of the pattern, inside the U if you like.”

Hare ragout with pappardelle pasta

Hare ragout makes a meal in March. Serve with pappardelle pasta and parmesan to lighten the flavour.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Create legions of hare converts with this delicious take on hare ragout.
Create legions of hare converts with this delicious take on hare ragout.

Hare ragout can pack a game laden punch, and is as rich as a Chelsea Russian. Lighten the taste by making a hare ragout with lashings of parmesan and white wine. The Italian elements of the dish make it one of our supremely edible recipes, and serving it with pappardelle pasta will feed a crowd and make converts. For more Italian game recipes try the following…

HARE RAGOUT WITH PAPPARDELLE PASTA

Serves 12
■ 12 hare haunches (defrosted)
■ Salt
■ 5 tbsp olive oil
■ 6 sticks celery
■ 3 white onions
■ 6 cloves garlic
■ 6 sprigs thyme
■ 2 tbsp finely chopped rosemary
■ 8 juniper berries, crushed
■ 6 cloves, crushed
■ 2 tbsp fennel seeds, crushed
■ 600ml (21fl oz) dry white wine
■ 1kg (2.2lb) pappardelle pasta
■ 100g (31⁄2oz) salted butter
■ 75g (3oz) pinenuts, toasted
■ 200g (7oz) rocket, chopped
■ 150g (5oz) parmesan, grated
Although hare can be regarded as a strong meat, cooking it with white wine and serving it with buttery pasta and parmesan lightens the flavour of this hare ragout. I have found that once people have tried this dish they are hare converts.
Preheat the oven to 160°C/320°F/Gas Mark 21⁄2.
To make the hare ragout, season the hare with salt then sear in batches in a frying pan using four tablespoons of the olive oil. Transfer the hare to a large roasting dish.
Finely chop the celery, onions and garlic; fry them in the same pan using the rest of the olive oil (you don’t need to soften the vegetables, only lightly caramelise them). Once they have started to take on a little colour, add the herbs and spices and the wine.
Pour all of this on to the hare, cover with baking parchment and tightly seal with foil. Bake in the preheated oven for three to four hours, or until the hare is tender and falling off the bone.
Remove from the oven and take off the foil and parchment.
When cool enough to handle, carefully pull all the meat off the bones. Stir the shredded meat back into the cooked vegetables and sauce.
When you are ready to eat, heat the hare ragout until piping hot and cook the pasta until al dente then drain. Mix in the butter. Stir the hot hare ragout into the cooked pasta and add most of the pinenuts, rocket and parmesan.
Once plated, scatter on the remaining parmesan, pinenuts and rocket.

Fruit and almond tart

A fruit and almond tart that makes the perfect Sunday lunch pud. Use what ever fruit you have to hand, or stashed in the freezer.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Use up your stocks of freezer fruit with this incredibly easy fruit and almond tart recipe.
Use up your stocks of freezer fruit with this incredibly easy tart recipe.

Fruit and almond tart is a failsafe recipe. Make the fruit and almond tart with whatever fruit you have to hand. And frozen fruit works well too. Now is the time to unload the freezer of last season’s plums, or the season’s before, or the one before that. Combine the somewhat squishy fruit with a fudgy almond filling and dollop of cream. This fruit and almond tart recipe is simplicity itself.

But if you want something more distinctly seasonal try our Basque cake with Easter spices, or for a chocolate fix our pear brownies with hazelnuts.

FRUIT AND ALMOND TART

Serves 12
■ 450g (1lb) sweet pastry
■ 220g (73⁄4oz) ground almonds
■ 220g (73⁄4oz) caster sugar
■ 220g (73⁄4oz) butter, at
room temperature
■ 4 free-range, organic eggs
■ 2 tsp vanilla extract
■ 50g (2oz) plain flour
■ 1 tsp baking powder
■ 300g (101⁄2oz) frozen
blackberries, or other fruit

This fruit and almond tart recipe is a template, so although I have used blackberries the fruit type is interchangeable depending on what you have in the freezer (figs, apricots, redcurrants, blackcurrants, and more).
Preheat the oven to 160°C/320°F/Gas Mark 21⁄2. Line a 30cm (12in) wide and 4cm (11⁄2in) deep loose-bottom, fluted tart tin with the sweet pastry.
In a mixer, beat the almonds, sugar, butter, eggs and vanilla until light and fluffy. Add the flour and baking powder and combine. Scoop the almond mix into the pastry case then dot the frozen blackberries on top.
Bake for 60 to 80 minutes or until lightly golden (when it has lost its wobble). Remove from the oven and leave the fruit and almond tart to cool slightly.
When you are ready to serve it, take out of the tart tin and serve warm or cold with a spoonful of crème fraîche.

How to save British wildlife – with love, not sentiment

To save British wildlife we need to understand and appreciate those who own and manage the land, says Teresa Dent, chief executive of the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
How to save British wildlife. Grey Partridge Perdix perdix North Norfolk February
We can save British wildlife by taking a sensible approach and including the landowners and managers.

How to save British wildlife. It is one of the biggest challenges facing those who live and work in the countryside. And those who enjoy everything the field can offer, hunting, shooting and fishing, are in the vanguard.

Imagine our countryside alive with wildlife. Green lanes erupting in clouds of butterflies as you pass, water-meadows dappled with the flight of lapwings and moorlands filled with the cries of curlew, plover and other birds; the sort of richness we see only in documentaries about remote rainforests and tropical reefs.

There really were such times in Britain. The first naturalists in the world lived here and in the 18th century, just before the population boom and Industrial Revolution, the journals and letters of people such as Gilbert White captured a Britain abundant in natural diversity, long before the need to save British wildlife became so pressing. Most of it has gone.

In the past 50 years alone, 60% of 3,148 species studied in Britain have declined, one-third of them seriously, and it’s not just the iconic birds and butterflies that have diminished. From bats to beetles, much of what once made our countryside so rich and rewarding is in a dismal state.

Even where the job of producing wildlife has been taken on by the large conservation charities, the results have been little better, as was acknowledged in the State of Nature report last year.

CAN AGRI-ENVIRONMENT SCHEMES HELP SAVE BRITISH WILDLIFE?

It is not as though we are not trying. The UK’s agri-environment schemes offer a way to save British wildlife, designed to make farmland more environmentally friendly, are the envy of Europe; £480 million a year of EU money is spent and more than 70% of English farmers participate. In the past 30 years these schemes have poured more than a hundred billion pounds into the creation of wildlife habitats with £100 million of this targeted at lapwing recovery. Even this has seen a poor return as lapwings declined by 49% in England and Wales between 1987 and 1995.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
How to save British wildlife. The lapwing.

Even when trying to save British wildlife, the lapwing population has still declined.

Taxpayers’ money goes into environmental agencies in England and all the devolved areas, notably: Natural England, Scottish Natural Heritage, Natural Resources Wales and their “watery” equivalents. The Environment Agency, for example, employs around 11,300 people and is responsible for a budget of about £1 billion; Natural England employs around 2,000 and has a budget of £193 million. Then there’s the voluntary sector, of which my organisation, the GWCT, is a proud member. The British people are immensely generous to our wildlife charities; the two biggest – the RSPB and the county Wildlife Trusts – have a combined annual income of £260 million. The RSPB has as many staff as Natural England.

Viewing all 2375 articles
Browse latest View live