I'd concede lead free fullbore (>22) hunting ammo as I think we've got good alternatives, but this round of lead banning seems to be the opposite and trying to ban the ammo that has no alternative with limited evidence for it being harmful in the first place.
HSE final lead ammunition consultation launched
- Thread starter Conor O'Gorman
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Then you have the issues with so called biodegradable wads, all but the water soluble type take years to degrade which is not a replacement for the fibre wads that are used at many clay grounds or live quarry venues.
Water soluble is not without it’s issues it is a softer plastic hence limits it’s use to ensure steel pellets do not protrude through the cup to reach the guns bore, it is very hygroscopic hence Eley weld the case petals on closing together to try and limit water ingress and we’re apparently manufactured in Spain to reduce humidity being an issue, but Eley are no longer owned by the Spanish. Shelf life of these cartridges will be interesting, the material is also expensive.
However no legal reason to use biodegradable wads so where fibre, soon to be water soluble biodegradable, is not necessarily we will just use single use plastic, which is an issue that is already in public focus, hence plastic packaging TAX and other initiatives to reduce plastic in the environment.
Then the issue of supply, will their be enough steel shot (all made in China) and “proper” biodegradable wads to meet demand.
Challenging times ahead.
edit to add, or as has been suggested to me, home load, use fibre wads with steel shot, and buy a new cheap semi auto brand (or their will be lots available second hand) every couple of years. What you save on cartridges will probably pay for a replacement gun.
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As I read the HS draft position statement, zeroing is still fine. See attached which is a lift from their document.
They acknowledge that you need to do so to humanely engage live quarry.
Load development is probably covered too if it’s done exclusively for quarry; but not that clear from the attached. I assume it will be different if load development is just for target use.
Attachments
Zeroing and practice typically on shooting ranges!!!!!!!!!!!! BIG PROBLEM!!!!
If a rifle is held for 'approved ranges only', then it can't be used on private land anyway.
Heym SR20
Well-Known Member
I saw this and rather tells us that whoever drafted has not a fecking clue as to what actually goes on.
I suspect / suggest very little load development happens on target shooting ranges for hunting ammo.
Most of us have a little corner somewhere on our permissions which we use for zeroing, load development etc.
And in the reference cited they state that many ranges prohibit non toxic ammo on grounds of safety due to ricochet.
Yet elsewhere they are proposing to prohibit all use of lead cored ammunition for target shooting and instead they will have to use non toxic bullets.
And going to target shooting, most bullets end up in a sandtrap so all the lead is contained. Indeed every now and then the sand is seived, lead and copper recovered and sent off to be recycled. So actually risk of lead getting into wider environment from outdoor target shooting is minimal.
Surely the biggest concerns for health has to be lead in game that will end up on the table, or use of lead in an indoor environment where lead particles can be breathed in. (And there were recent cases were employees of an indoor range fell ill to lead poisoning). Yet they also proposing that .22 and gallery rifles used indoors will also be exempt.
At the moment, YES!
Conor O'Gorman
Well-Known Member
timbrayford
Well-Known Member
Thanks Conor. To ask a question that appears to not have been addressed in this whole anti lead debate is whether plated shot can or does mitigate the concerns that the antis have raised? Anyone know of any genuine peer reviewed research on this?
palmer_mike
Well-Known Member
Isn’t that a very similar thing to copper jacketed lead bullets? Ie, on impact with something hard the lead will become exposed etc etc
Conor re BASC statement copied below for clay pigeon shooting;
for the majority if not all of english sporting and FITAS grounds (the most popular form of clay pigeon shooting in the uk) I doubt could put in place lead shot removal, due to shooting over scrub and or wooded areas.
I also doubt that any small clubs that are fortunate enough to shoot over mainly or all grassed areas could afford the cost of lead recovery, once the initial possible win from selling many years of accumulated lead had been completed, should then going forward the lead need to be recovered annually.
Then if the club rents the land will the owner give permission for the intrusive lead recovery process and possibly claim any lead recovered as belonging to them the landowner.
The Club I am secretary for has been shooting over mainly grass land for several decades I defy anybody to walk the ground and visually pick up lead shot, nature has away of swallowing it up. We regularly see buzzards in the area.
So in practice only trap disciplines will be potentially able to use lead shot provided they can afford and are able to facilitate the risk measures and lead removal.
However the risk is that still leaves lead shot available for live quarry shooting, given a size 7 (2.4mm) pellet is certainly seen as adequate for decoy pigeons and early season game birds.
Sorry Conor, this looks like nothing more than BSAC trying to make amends with the CPSA.
Then expensive biodegradable wads, the HSE are not proposing a ban on single use plastic so why are you?
Plus in reality only the water soluble or cardboard wad types degrade in days or weeks the rest take years, unlike fibre wads.
Time the cartridge manufactures had to put on a carton of biodegrade wad cartridges how long the wads take typically to degrade in the english countryside, not in an industrial EN 13432 composting process, so we the customers can make an informed choice.
Lead shot for live quarry and target shooting
The consultation proposes a ban within five years or less, depending on the consultation outcome. BASC’s position is that clay pigeon shooting could continue where grounds have the correct risk measures in place, and they can ensure lead removal, as per the HSE guidance for target shooting with rifles.BASC will be recommending to the HSE that the transition time for cartridges used in live quarry shooting must take into account the world shortage of components due to the war in Ukraine, and the need for manufacturers and assemblers to source new machinery to produce steel cartridges with biodegradable wads.
timbrayford
Well-Known Member
Without proper research who knows? But there is a whole load of difference between the relatively light mass and spherical shape of no.6 shot and the considerably heavier jacketed rifle bullets that are intended to deform in a predictable manner on impact.
timbrayford
Well-Known Member
I don't share BASC's or the HSE's enthusiasm for steel shot, to my mind it is totally unsuitable for traditional driven game shooting. Neither Edward King at A.S.I. nor my local gun shop are willing to supply me with free replacement barrels if steel shot damages my shotgun and there is the matter of the much greater ricochet hazard from steel. When I was a kid one of my friends got a steel BB lodged in his head that had been fired from an air rifle and had bounced back off a wall into him.
bluesako
Well-Known Member
i worked in the water industry nww for 33 years, worked with lead pipes on a daily bases, even the joints on the mains pipes were lead, today 100,s 1000,s people in the uk are still using and drinking from lead pipes, in all that time ive never heard of one case of lead poisening? make you wonder doesnt it, more restrictions less shooters bs
timbrayford
Well-Known Member
It also makes you wonder if the lead residues found in wildfowl actually comes from the all too frequent discharges of raw sewage around our coast?
White Spider
Well-Known Member
After seeing the smoke and mirrors and wilfully negligent guidance on asbestos exposures from HSE, I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw them. This seems like the government attacking shooters from another angle.
Dixie Dean
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The whole thing, for some clarity.
Conor O'Gorman
Well-Known Member
Thanks Tim, the use of plated lead shot is prohibited under the lead shot regs for wildfowl and/or wetlands as they apply in E/W/S/NI by default because those regs define 'lead shot' as any alloy or compound of lead where lead comprises more than 1% of that alloy or compound. In the USA plated lead shot is specifically mentioned as unlawful in guidance for their various hunting laws in wetlands.
I think this is not about being 'anti lead' or to 'mitigate the concerns that the antis have raised' its about reducing the evidenced risks of lead exposure in a wide range of species of birds that pick up lead shot as grit. One would presume, given the above wetland related laws in place for decades, that it is understood that if plated lead shot is ingested that the very thin plating of copper or nickel is ground away in the unforgiving environment of a typical bird gizzard. Whether there has been actual research done to prove this I don't know, I didn't find anything online, but I will raise with colleagues on Monday.
Nonetheless, maybe something you could raise in your response to the HSE consultation?
timbrayford
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Precisely, before the HSE puts forward its recommendations perhaps they need to be based on proper peer reviewed research and not conjecture?
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