Making sure pigeons don’t eat their greens

A warm spring afternoon sees Tom Payne on crop protection duty, this time saving a valuable forage plant from the hungry hordes

As I pottered around my pigeon shed, I was thinking what a joy it is to be managing pigeon numbers at this time of year. April and May can be tricky months in which to get a bag. There is plenty of food available for them, so it takes skill and thinking like a pigeon to have any chance of success. Trees budding at this time of year can put the brakes on birds heading to any crop but, a bit like last year, the buds came early and were over quickly.

Loading my kit into the back of the Land Rover, I was feeling pretty excited about the afternoon’s shooting. Lucerne was the day’s crop of choice; it is not grown in many areas, but it can be a real pigeon favourite in late spring.

Under stress

Lucerne is a high-protein perennial legume. It usually lasts four to five years and is predominantly used for silage or hay. While lucerne isn’t for human consumption, this doesn’t mean it does not need protecting. Livestock farmers, for example, rely on it as a forage crop. However, and rather interestingly, coumestans — or estrogenic compounds — are prevalent within lucerne which, at high levels, can affect fertility in livestock. The levels of these compounds are known to increase when the crop is stressed — for example, from pests, disease or extreme moisture stress. The

“I could see the neck bars of birds through the crop — not big numbers, but it’s always good to see early interest”

field I was on my way to had been hit relentlessly by up to 100 pigeons every afternoon, so it was almost certainly stressed.

When I arrived there was a light frost on the shaded spots on the lawn,

and the spring sun was beginning to warm up. I was in no rush, as I knew I wouldn’t be shooting until 2ish, so I was able to stop and watch for a while. As I sipped tea in the car, I could see the neck bars of birds through the tallish crop. Not big numbers, but it’s always good when there’s early interest.

Good spot

The crop itself was only about 20 acres, in its third year of growth and was bordered by winter wheat. I positioned myself to the top side of the lucerne, off a grass belt that is normally used to exercise horses. It was a good spot and any arriving birds would be highly visible on their approach.

I pulled my hide just slightly off the hedge to maximise my angles and used three nets: two green and one desert coloured. I use a variety of net colours and textures as the British countryside is a patchwork of different hues, depths and composition. You must be careful using only green and

so full. But from that point on, it wasn’t all plain sailing. Arriving birds were quite keen to get to the line of oaks just down to my right before drifting out to feed. This is always a tricky problem because, ideally, you want to decoy them off holding woods and sitty trees, as opposed to them going to the trees first before feeding on the crop.

Fight or flight

Every now and then, I would have a bird decoy but, after my shot, I would see half-a-dozen birds drifting back on the line, away from the holding wood. It’s really important that you kill a decoying bird so that any other birds that are sitting and watching will see the pigeon fall into the crop and not flare,

Lucerne goes into agricultural feed The last bird of the day heads into the decoys, bringing the proceedings to a satisfying close