Pigeons at any price?
These days you need to ensure your kill ratio is up to scratch, unless you have deep pockets, says Robin Scott
What sort of kill-to-cartridge ratio is the norm for woodpigeon over decoys? I haven’t kept written records of the birds I’ve bagged over the past 50 years or so but I’m honest enough to admit my average can swing wildly between 1.08 shots per bird on a very good day to six point something on some that are best forgotten.
Maybe other shooters do keep accurate notes – if so, I would love to hear from them and finally nail down what constitutes a good, bad or indifferent performer.
Yardstick
To try to establish some sort of a yardstick I did put the question to Essex-based pigeon maestro Peter Theobald several years ago. I forget his exact words but if memory serves me right his take on things ran something along the lines of: “If you shoot reasonable numbers of birds on a weekly basis, and you class yourself a competent Shot, then you ought to be looking at a return over the year of something in the order of two for one.”
But isn’t that setting the bar too high, I asked? Possibly. Peter, after all, has not only ‘done for’ innumerable woodies since an early age on his own and neighbouring farms, but he has also shot for Great Britain in one of the hardest of all international clay disciplines, Olympic Skeet. If you can hit those targets consistently, woodpigeon are a doddle. Or should be.
Returning a two-for-one average is no mean achievement and requires days where a shooter kills every bird he fires at, or fractionally close to it. Only then will he be able to maintain his high average when the wind blows hard and those ‘easy’ pigeons get bumped by the breeze at the back of a decoy pattern.
Every bird
Gundog trainer Pete Blatch from Northamptonshire pretty well agrees with
“We will become increasingly aware of the returns from a bagful of cartridges”
the other Peter’s assessment of things. He, too, shoots a prodigious number of pigeons in the course of a year and believes: “On days when they’re committed to the decoys you should get every bird fired at within 30 yards if you use an open choke.
“Then again, on days when they’re not so confident in your set-up and keep their distance, an average of 3:1 is a reasonable return – just as it would be when flighting them on anything but a stormy day. As for shooting them at roost in a wind … maybe it’s best to not bother keeping count of the shots.”
Anyone, like me, who doesn’t keep records of ratios might well say it’s a pointless exercise anyway because how can you possibly measure the pleasure of a decoying day by the number of shots fired? However, in the not-too-distant future I think more and more of us will start to become increasingly ‘aware’ of the returns from a bagful of cartridges. Some acutely so.
In short, pigeon shooting is about to get a whole lot more expensive than it is now and pigeon decoying as an effective form of crop protection could be stood on its head.
How so? Well, just take a look at the cost of non-lead loads.
We have long been told that the price of steel loads could be cheaper – or, at least, on a par – with lead, but that is certainly not the case today. Steel shot cartridges are now noticeably pricier than good, old-fashioned plumbum and the current supply chain crisis caused by the pandemic threatens to push the price of both imported steel, bismuth and tungsten ever higher.
Cost per bang
Today, a suitable, affordable, lead load for pigeon stands at about 20p per bang whereas its steel equivalent ranges anywhere between 32p to 48p a shot. The new Bio-Ammo cartridges, apparently, work out around 58p a go while one of bismuth is double that. I can’t think of many people who will be prepared to fire several thousand shots each year at pigeon at those sort of prices, can you?
While the current going rate for shot pigeons (if you can find a game dealer prepared to take them) might be pitifully low the few pence it does contribute to the cost of a lead shot cartridge is still just enough for most people to justify the time, effort and cost involved in providing a subsidised cropprotection service.
Inflation
But for how much longer? As we can see already, the minute lead shot for live quarry shooting is banned in Britain, the cost of a day on the pigeon is going to jump markedly. For the status quo to continue and keep pigeon numbers in check one of two things might need to happen: either farmers will have to contribute to the cost of cartridges used to protect crops and profits; or game dealers must take all shot birds and pay a decent price for them.
Neither is likely to happen, of course, but on the price for shot birds I was reminded recently by my pal Les that back in the 1970s when even top brand cartridges cost just £80 per thousand (8p a shot) the price for pigeon reached the dizzying heights of 50p a bird. Not only did that mean you could still cover your costs with a dreadful 6:1 kill ratio, it also meant that the bird in today’s prices would fetch in excess of £2.
Oh, happy days!
Everybody would like to be a better Shot, whether a beginner or a veteran trying to increase consistency. I have shot since a very young age and gathered different tips and tricks to improve my shooting ability over the years.
One key element with shooting, which I think is sometimes overlooked, is that we have a responsibility to shoot to the best of our ability when in pursuit of live quarry. I would always ensure that any person wishing to transition to live quarry has the ability to shoot consistently and has already mastered the basics.
I love to shoot with a range of guns for variety; the downside is that they all operate, handle and perform differently. I swap and change guns depending on the day, but I don’t usually have an issue switching as I have taken the time to develop muscle memory for each gun and how it operates.
Dry mount
Some of my guns are very short in the stock and I will instinctively push my shoulder forward to combat that and naturally mount the gun in the perfect position. One of the best ways to start this process is to dry mount and use snap caps at home.
I will spend a good amount of time playing with a new gun to understand the operation, get a feel for the safety and how the gun mounts. This can be done in front of a mirror or repeatedly dry mounting and swinging through imaginary targets.
This may seem like a waste of time but it helps to overcome some issues before you fire the first shot. I often shoot in a range of difficult positions, especially on the foreshore. I get a feel for the gun when I am sitting down or even reclining on the sofa to replicate the awkward shooting positions that I can find myself in. The snap caps allow me to get a feel for the safety operation, trigger-pull and reloading.