Steve Nuttall of Border Fieldsports

If you’re young and fit, join as many wildfowling clubs as you can. Back in the early 1980s I signed up to Fenland Wildfowlers Association. A great club it was, too. Still is.

Club members Steve and Jeff took me under their wing and showed me how to find my way around the marsh and discover its flightlines. Their wealth of knowledge helped me understand tides on the Wash and where you could safely sit one out if push came to shove.

For me, staying safe and enjoying everything nature has to offer below the sea wall is what wildfowling is all about. The sights and sounds of waders, gulls and geese waking from their roosts at dawn is magical.

Yes, a coastal marsh can be an unforgiving place but just go along to any club meeting and find out what’s involved. All will be explained. I’ve been a member of four wildfowling clubs in my time, not all of them coastal.

By all means join a small syndicate where members shoot a few well-fed ponds for duck and geese, but trying to outwit those birds on a rain and wind-lashed marsh is far more exciting.

Believe me, nothing beats coming back from morning flight with a brace of duck – better still, a wild goose – in the bag.

Best of all, right now many wildfowling clubs are desperate for new blood – the sport’s future depends on it. So there has never been a better time to savour the FINEST sport shooting has to offer, bar none.