Shooting Pheasant Documentary

[boltgun]

Would say over the years been done to death one way or another jacks game and others over the decades showing the realities of game shooting and the conservation aspects with input from most pro conservation and shooting groups all singing pretty much the same song with different spins and well represented including some rural employment aspects.
Most recent offerings been done by Dave Carrie with visits to various shoots and very well done with some good flavours and well worth watching if a shooter and lover of the countryside.
Could be interesting if someone took a different view with why folks love what they do warts and all including a psychological perspective from a attractive female professional among others.
Possible dr evil meets Louis theroux as what harm could it do truth be told

 

[boltgun]

If you are wanting to show game shooting in a good light, stay away from the commercials they are so far away from what the small syndicates do, we are not in it for the money, the majority of us do it for the love of it and to try and make a difference for the better, no matter how small that difference is, now I’m not saying that the commercial keeper doesn’t want to create a better environment ( I’ve got a couple of mates that are commercial keepers ) but it’s a business and the tens of thousands of birds that they put down take priority

Was thinking you should step up here and offer a view it’s a perfect opportunity to showcase a great imo example including the odd pillow casing warts and all.

 

[Stalker62]

Pheasant hunting is a British tradition which was most likely introduced by the Normans in the 11th century.

Really?

Do tell...







That's the problem with just 'Googling' the word Pheasant...ain't it...

 

[boltgun]

Could go deep and dark

 

[enfieldspares]

Sound & Colour said:
Pheasant hunting is a British tradition which was most likely introduced by the Normans in the 11th century.

Yes. Indeed and also, not a lot of people including yourself clearly don't know this, they then also established a gun shop at Framlingham. It seems to have managed nearly nine hundred years 1066 to the 1960s when it closed (I remember the advertisements in "Shooting Times") so that isn't too bad.

 

[boltgun]

Interesting that Normans practised falconry but suspect the vikings had far more sport

 

[enfieldspares]

Interesting that Normans practised falconry but suspect the vikings had far more sport

Arrival of the pheasant in Britain​

It was this Caucasian species of pheasant that was introduced to Great Britain, possibly by Phoenician traders or Roman officers who bred them as gamebirds. Pheasant bones have been found in numerous Roman archaeological sites, although there is no evidence that they were ever raised here.

After the Romans left, the pheasant seems to have disappeared for some time with them, and the first written record of the pheasant in the UK does not appear until 1059 when King Harold offered the canons of Waltham Abbey a ‘commons’ pheasant instead of the usual brace of partridge as a privilege of their office. Another record exists from 1089 when the monks of Rochester received 16 pheasants, along with 30 geese, 300, hens, 1,000 eggs, 1,000 lampreys (a type of jawless fish), 4 salmon, and 6 sheaves of wheat from Bishop Randulfus.

It was the Normans who popularised the pheasant as a gamebird, with the birds appearing on the menu of many medieval banquets. They also passed laws to protect the birds which allowed the population to increase significantly and by 1100 Henry I granted the Abbot of Amesbury near Stonehenge the right to kill pheasants not long after the abbey was founded. Thomas Becket is said to have dined on pheasant the night before his bloody assassination in Canterbury Cathedral on the 29th December 1170.

It does go on nowadays as seen below. But I'd be curious as to if the Normans actually hawked for them. Still everyday schoolday.

 

[boltgun]

It does go on nowadays as seen below.

Perhaps we will never know unless some historian has the written word on what the Normans got up to with a pheasant if anything but accounts show their love of hunting for sport or pleasure to get their jollies

 

[stavross]

Was thinking you should step up here and offer a view it’s a perfect opportunity to showcase a great imo example including the odd pillow casing warts and all.

The problem to me with any documentary on game shooting is what side is the documentary maker coming from because both sides have very conflicting views and I’ve never seen as documentary on subjects such a shooting that were 50/50 straight down the middle, I wouldn’t be comfortable sharing some of what we do even though I can justify what I do, the majority of people have become so far disconnected from food and the land that they would see some things as a negative and it’s always the negative that is highlighted far more than the positive

 

[jall55]

If you are wanting to show game shooting in a good light, stay away from the commercials they are so far away from what the small syndicates do, we are not in it for the money, the majority of us do it for the love of it and to try and make a difference for the better, no matter how small that difference is, now I’m not saying that the commercial keeper doesn’t want to create a better environment ( I’ve got a couple of mates that are commercial keepers ) but it’s a business and the tens of thousands of birds that they put down take priority

Totally agree Stav - but the acres - often hundreds of acres of wild bird covers many commercial shoots plant does make a serious difference
Appreciated - not all shoots are the same just plant maize

 

[boltgun]

The problem to me with any documentary on game shooting is what side is the documentary maker coming from because both sides have very conflicting views and I’ve never seen as documentary on subjects such a shooting that were 50/50 straight down the middle, I wouldn’t be comfortable sharing some of what we do even though I can justify what I do, the majority of people have become so far disconnected from food and the land that they would see some things as a negative and it’s always the negative that is highlighted far more than the positive
[/QUOTE
Don’t blame you would not touch it with a barge pole personally but imo your postings of the shoot activities paints a very honest and accurate account of a everyday “lads” shoot and tradition as a contrast to others either commercial or other and posted on open forum so figured you may have been up for it in constructive and positive way to demonstrate the different flavours of pheasant shooting.
Definitely to be commended for putting on open forum and speaks volumes..

 

[boltgun]

Touching on the commercial shoots have worked on one or two who let some days for a variety of reasons so semi commercial but not exclusively accepting ground and climates differ along with motives but would say in anything I was involved with other wildlife saw a benefit. Commercial shoots offer roving teams of guns the chance to travel and shoot in some wonderful locations which appeals to many who enjoy variety without been tied to one syndicate or place that once number drawn many can predict the whole day and for some mundane. So in simple terms as always all about the money at end of day whatever motivation.
As for making a film on the subject hope it differs to previous offerings and not a remake. edit, clearly for those that make it happen commercial or otherwise full or part time there are varied rewards and not all financial.

 

[enfieldspares]

Compare and contrast. A pheasant's end we know. Here's a chicken's end.

 

[stavross]

Totally agree Stav - but the acres - often hundreds of acres of wild bird covers many commercial shoots plant does make a serious difference
Appreciated - not all shoots are the same just plant maize

Absolutely, the commercial I’ve been on in the last couple of weeks has some amazing wild bird cover one is a 4 acre field that would otherwise be used for grazing if there was no game shooting there, I was up there helping out with the “ tidy up “ which is predominantly done for disease control and this type of thing is something I don’t think average Joe Public would understand, on commercials pheasants and partridge are stock and there’s many similarities with the everyday husbandry people see farms but can’t seem to join the dots when it comes to what they see as a wild animal

 

[Malxwal]

Free range chicken, yeah, that's okay. Free range game birds, oh no, that's not civilized, horrible.
I'm afraid it's not the birds themselves that those opposed to game shooting care about.

 

[boltgun]

A little taste.

 

[boltgun]

For afters.

 

[Malxwal]

Not sure I'm down with the Dave Carrie stuff. Films of old blokes driving Range Rovers and eating fancy scoff, accompanied with edited footage of birds getting crumpled (and winged etc) to orchestra hero music is not, in my mind, swaying anybody. It's all about selling days, not changing minds.
To be clear, I love my driven days on commercial shoots, and beat regularly on one.

 

[boltgun]

Not sure I'm down with the Dave Carrie stuff. Films of old blokes driving Range Rovers and eating fancy scoff, accompanied with edited footage of birds getting crumpled (and winged etc) to orchestra hero music is not, in my mind, swaying anybody. It's all about selling days, not changing minds.
To be clear, I love my driven days on commercial shoots, and beat regularly on one.

Just one slice of the cake when taking a view, am impartial and do not judge but consider it well done and will sell days

 

[Ratel]

Worked with Partridge, Grouse and Pheasants for a long time, and of course deer. To be honest, these videos do nothing for me. I feel the whole system of the commercial shooting world has almost destroyed the sport of driven game shooting. Thank goodness I worked on estates where we sometimes let just the odd day or two, often to just friends of the boss.