Fox Trouble

thelurcher

Vegeta: like anything when you try to do it yourself and do it correctly you will realise what it takes:
- Breeding - you can't buy a good dog off the shelf - I won't get into it but it's not a case of grabbing the neighbours yorkie and heading off. Most line bread working terriers have pedigrees going back longer than many show breeds.
ITS ALL IN THE BREEDING!
- Can the earth be dug - you don't want to stick your terrier into a dungeon everyone can get caught out but experience helps - or it could be sandy.
- You have to choose the right dog for the earth or game.
- You have to have your dog in good condition.

- Even when you enter the dog you must be able to tell when you're dog is 'on'.
- Give it time to settle - how long?
- You have to be able to read your dog - could be no-one home or did he try it properly.
- You have to be able to locate your dog - not rocket science with modern locaters but they do fail - and I've seen retards using a bar that are only asking to spear the terrier.
- When you break through is when newbies usually feck thing up - half smoothering the dog - yanking it off the game etc.

- what if things go wrong and the dog appears at the mouth of the burrow - is he a plug and had enough etc etc.............


If I was to look at shooting the way you've looked at terrier work:
- Buy gun from shop.
- Mount scope.
- Zero.
- Extend bi-pod.
- Pull trigger.
- Kill vixen with half reared cubs that go off and terrorise every farmyard in the parish!

Vegeta

thelurcher wrote:

Vegeta: like anything when you try to do it yourself and do it correctly you will realise what it takes:
- Breeding - you can't buy a good dog off the shelf - I won't get into it but it's not a case of grabbing the neighbours yorkie and heading off. Most line bread working terriers have pedigrees going back longer than many show breeds.
ITS ALL IN THE BREEDING!
- Can the earth be dug - you don't want to stick your terrier into a dungeon everyone can get caught out but experience helps - or it could be sandy.
- You have to choose the right dog for the earth or game.
- You have to have your dog in good condition.

- Even when you enter the dog you must be able to tell when you're dog is 'on'.
- Give it time to settle - how long?
- You have to be able to read your dog - could be no-one home or did he try it properly.
- You have to be able to locate your dog - not rocket science with modern locaters but they do fail - and I've seen retards using a bar that are only asking to spear the terrier.
- When you break through is when newbies usually feck thing up - half smoothering the dog - yanking it off the game etc.

- what if things go wrong and the dog appears at the mouth of the burrow - is he a plug and had enough etc etc.............


If I was to look at shooting the way you've looked at terrier work:
- Buy gun from shop.
- Mount scope.
- Zero.
- Extend bi-pod.
- Pull trigger.
- Kill vixen with half reared cubs that go off and terrorise every farmyard in the parish!

again if you like digging fancy holes and breeding dogs fair enough. As i said i don't find anything of interest there. Its not for me. I didn't slag it. Why the need to defend it?

PAIMEI

Apologies if I seemed argumentative but I am simply trying to make a point that the countryside sports are under threat enough already without fellow hunters taking moral stand points. I believe that killing a fox is killing a fox, they do damage to livestock and gamebirds, granted a clean rifle kill is as humane a way as any to kill, but wiping out an entire litter and vixen is extremely effective in controlling their numbers. I think if you're defending your sport to a lay man, controlling numbers by the most effective method possible is the easiest to defend.

Sparks

PAIMEI, noone took any stand against digging except to say that it's not shooting and this is the shooting forum.

I think if you're defending your sport to a lay man, controlling numbers by the most effective method possible is the easiest to defend.

Nuke the site from orbit?

Rovi

Sparks wrote:

Nuke the site from orbit?

It's the only way to be sure.

PAIMEI

Newby said he has a personal dislike for digging and that he saw no sport in it. I dont dig myself so I'm not really interested in a whats wrong whats right argument, I'll have my opinion and you have yours. I do find it strange however that Newby has no problem with shooting a fox but dislikes digging, at the end of the day what you'll end up with is a dead fox. Its a matter of respecting all country sports, it might not be your piece of cake but if we all go around saying my way is best and you shouldnt be doing yours eventually we'll end up with no country sports, I know this might sound extreme but this country and the countryside is changing, critising another mans sport when you shoot yourself is just fuelling the fires for the antis.
On the shooting forum aspect, surely vermin control is an essential part of a shooting mans outlook, there'd be nothing left to shoot except clays and targets if we simply let vermin run riot.

Sparks

if we all go around saying my way is best and you shouldnt be doing yours

Hold up there Paimei. Noone said that. Newby said he didn't want to do so himself. That's fair. It was said by a few of us that it didn't really apply to shooting foxes, and that's just logical. But nobody said that it should be banned. It's just that it's like discussing cropdusting in a forum written for windowsill herb growing.

there'd be nothing left to shoot except clays and targets if we simply let vermin run riot

Ahem. Was that you dissing target shooting in favour of hunting and vermin control?

PAIMEI

The first quote you used is taken out of context, I never accused anyone of preaching on about their prefered method, I was trying to make the point that if you're into shooting and you kill foxes why have a hang up about one method over another. I dont mind that you dislike digging but I just find it strange that Newby has no problem shooting a fox but says of digging

"I just personally dont like it."

"Have never gone digging never would, I shoot as a matter of skill/sport, i see NO sport in that lads, i have a personal problem with digging as well as snares etc, however seen as it is his livelyhood any means necessary i guess."

I mean if you look at it from a lay persons view, if you're killing foxes by any means and you're doing it for vermin control I believe you're fully justified, if however you shooting foxes purely for your own skill/sport and not as a vermin control measure you're open to critisism of your sport, I mean I'm not trying to convince Newby to take up digging I'm simply saying that as an end product the fox ends up dead, so why have such a dislike to one method.

Vegeta

PAIMEI wrote:

The first quote you used is taken out of context, I never accused anyone of preaching on about their prefered method, I was trying to make the point that if you're into shooting and you kill foxes why have a hang up about one method over another. I dont mind that you dislike digging but I just find it strange that Newby has no problem shooting a fox but says of digging

"I just personally dont like it."

"Have never gone digging never would, I shoot as a matter of skill/sport, i see NO sport in that lads, i have a personal problem with digging as well as snares etc, however seen as it is his livelyhood any means necessary i guess."

I mean if you look at it from a lay persons view, if you're killing foxes by any means and you're doing it for vermin control I believe you're fully justified, if however you shooting foxes purely for your own skill/sport and not as a vermin control measure you're open to critisism of your sport, I mean I'm not trying to convince Newby to take up digging I'm simply saying that as an end product the fox ends up dead, so why have such a dislike to one method.

Well some people like the act of shooting itself, doesn't matter what the quarry. Well by that reasoning no one would shoot fox at all, we'd all down guns and buy dogs with tracking collars.

Some people like shooting. Its the shooting itself that they enjoy. It is a bonus if you control the vermin population a bit too. That's my view on it anyway. I'd get the same buzz if the fox was a robot that performed in the exact same manner as a fox. Its not the taking if the life its the hunt and practice needed to be capable of shooting one.

Digging is very effective, it works and it is skilled work. If I had a problem with fox numbers i would do it definitely but i'd take no pleasure in it, hence why i say its not much sport for me. I'd be satisfied yes that the fox numbers were down, but i would not enjoy the task.

If you look at hurling, a very skilled game you'll agree and I respect the hurlers for what they can do and are doing. But i don't like playing hurling, its as simple as that.

PAIMEI

I'm not making much of a fist at getting my point across, basically what I'm getting at is that I really think that no shooter/hunter should critisise anothers sport, OK if you dislike it or disagree with it, but you enjoy the sport of shooting/hunting yourself. I just think there's enough antis out there without shooters/hunters making comment on their fellow shooters/hunters sport. We might make big distinctions between the terrier man, the lamping man the duck shooter, but to your run of the mill anti we're all blood sports enthusiasts.

Vegeta

PAIMEI wrote:

I'm not making much of a fist at getting my point across, basically what I'm getting at is that I really think that no shooter/hunter should critisise anothers sport, OK if you dislike it or disagree with it, but you enjoy the sport of shooting/hunting yourself. I just think there's enough antis out there without shooters/hunters making comment on their fellow shooters/hunters sport. We might make big distinctions between the terrier man, the lamping man the duck shooter, but to your run of the mill anti we're all blood sports enthusiasts.

i get what you're saying cos as soon as we lose one aspect of shooting/hunting the others may eventually follow

newby.204

PAIMEI wrote:

The first quote you used is taken out of context, I never accused anyone of preaching on about their prefered method, I was trying to make the point that if you're into shooting and you kill foxes why have a hang up about one method over another. I dont mind that you dislike digging but I just find it strange that Newby has no problem shooting a fox but says of digging

"I just personally dont like it."

"Have never gone digging never would, I shoot as a matter of skill/sport, i see NO sport in that lads, i have a personal problem with digging as well as snares etc, however seen as it is his livelyhood any means necessary i guess."

I mean if you look at it from a lay persons view, if you're killing foxes by any means and you're doing it for vermin control I believe you're fully justified, if however you shooting foxes purely for your own skill/sport and not as a vermin control measure you're open to critisism of your sport, I mean I'm not trying to convince Newby to take up digging I'm simply saying that as an end product the fox ends up dead, so why have such a dislike to one method.

Im not attacking the sport, my apologies if that is the way it was taken.
I shoot because i enjoy the "shot".

I.E. when you take the fox at 200yrds with 10mph wind at dusk with a well placed .22 hornet

*You dig, *as in paople who go digging, i assume, because you enjoy the hunt and the other aspects involved, i have no experience with digging so i wont speak on it. And when you find the foxhole you dispatch the fox/litter by terrier/lurcher. If this is your sport fair enough each to his own.

Finally if this fox has killed 20 chickens at the end of the day this is his livelyhood, as ive said before, and maybe dispatching with the fox/litter would be best and good foresight. However personally id still grab my O/U one of my heavy load cartridges or my freind and his rifle and dispatch with the fox that way.

PAIMEI

Its difficult not to sound argumentative sometimes. Vegeta has me right though, I think we have to defend our sports enough to non-hunters/shooters without having to defend it each other.

Whizzo

Wowzers! Hot debate here.
Just an update, sat out on the patio at 5am (the same time the red lad showed his face last) with the polestyrene against the glass on the conservatory and the rifle on the table.....no sign! Since then I've put a snare along a track and I've been checking 2-3 times/day, no luck. Went down the old wives front of pissing around the hen enclosure and putting hair around the outside of the hen house ( i have one of those trimmers and had just cut my hair - not for this purpose:D )

So anywhoo, I have both 12g and .22LR, I wouldn't know where to start re digging and shooting would be my choice of dispatch. I've also been asked to help rid our GC pheasant pens of foxes. Can you tell me what would be the best brand of .22LR bullets for the job.

Terrier

Whizzo wrote:

Can you tell me what would be the best brand of .22LR bullets for the job.

40gr CCI Velocitor is the hardest hitting 22 round I have used.
(Not a fan of using .22LR on Foxes)

Terrier

Whizzo wrote:

Hi,
We had a fox attack our chickens on Sunday morning kiling one of the cockrels. Two nights ago I was woken up by the noise of the chcikens again, going nuts due to a fox in the yard.
I want to get rid of the fox, I'll be using a .22 and have no problems regarding houses nearby. Whats the best method of attracting him into my sights!
Thanks

Whizzo,
Did you ever manage to get this Fox?