Shoot Pages

Together with my great mate John, we have the shooting rights over 900acres (364 hectares) of cereal crop farmland and 150 acres (60 hectares) of woods located on South Cambridgeshire borders. The shoot extends over 2 farms with some additional land on the borders of the shoot.

Previously we had shooting rights over 1000 acres on another farm close to our present shoot but because of a change in farming policy, we lost this after the 1997 season. It was unfortunate as this had been in the past one of the best partridge shoots in East Anglia and we had spent a few years rebuilding the shoot with the hopes that we could once more get it back to that position. However without the support and co-operation of the farmer, we were always going to have an uphill struggle.

We took on our present shoot in 1998 with initially 450 acres. In 1999 we added a further 700 acres to include approx 130 acres of woods which also gives us some good pheasant shooting. The shoot is syndicated to 8 guns .

On taking the shoot we were disappointed not to see more wild birds especially as the land hadn't been shot for at least 17 years. The first year, we decided that we would put down 500 French Partridges. Covers were agreed with the farmer with 5 acres as both holding and feeding covers. There is very little natural cover on the land. Our first season was a little disappointing as can be seen from the game diary.

We decided that we needed to increase the number of released birds and also to have bigger and more holding & feeding covers. The one acre blocks were increased to two acres, a six metre strip along a tree line was left uncultivated and produced some good grass tussocks as good nesting sites.Wild bird cover option under set aside has been utilised on a further sites giving a total of 28 acres of covers on the partridge shoot. Pheasant covers have been planted to utilise feeder belts leading out from the main woods.

We as always hope to see a good number of paired up birds both French and Grey Partridges and this year (2002) we maust have seen the largest number of Grey Partridges since taking on the shoot. Weather conditions during the peak breeding season were excellent. This together with conservation work on the shoot (Beetle Banks etc) has certainly encouraged the Greys. We have counted over 100 birds over 7 or 8 coveys which clearly shows that our efforts and favourable weather conditions have paid off. The Game Conservancy recommend a minimum of 20 Greys per 100 Ha before considering shooting. We are clearly in excess of this so we hope to do some wild bird drives during this season.

John and I enjoy our shooting and we hope to continue to build the shoot up as a non commercial enterprise which gives us and the syndicate members quality shooting at affordable prices. We do the keepering of the shoot between us and although at certain times of the year, this takes up a lot of time, it is a real relaxation and escape from the pressures of work.

On 5th March 1999, we took delivery of the Shoot Bus. This is a 1960 vintage ex-French Army truck built by Simca. It seats 14 people and is ideal for moving the guns around the shoot. In addition it is an excellent off road vehicle for moving equipment around the shoot. Basically the vehicle specifications are as follows :-

V8 petrol engine 4 litre side valve 100 BHP
3300 kg unladen weight
2000kg payload
2 and 4 wheel drive high ratio. 4 wheel drive low ratio with differential lock on rear axle.
Exempt from UK road tax and annual inspection

On the road fuel consumption should be in the order of 15 mpg, Off road, don't ask !!! The truck shows 9900km on the clock and there seems to be no reason to doubt that this is the original mileage. It came with 5 new tyres, new canvas , new batteries (24v system) and resprayed. If anyone is interested in acquiring similar, email me and I'm sure we can organise something.

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