reynard scarce.

rock garden

Evening men. Was out lamping last night and monday night past and never seen an eye. Have shot 6 since mid september but they seem abit thin on the ground here as late . As there seems to be plenty south of the border would it be possible for some of you fine men to live catch a dozen and send them up north .

kildare.17hmr

did ya have snow up where you are when you were out? the bright nights and the crunch under foot might have let them know you were there and the scarpered long before you were ready

rock garden

Dont know the reason for sure but its my opinion thats fox numbers are down in this neck of woods. There is a couple of guys who lamp this area and its said they took nearly 200 last season of course thats over a wider area not just my area . As for lamping in hard weather ive found results to be poor.but JG and Declan shows it can be done.

Birdnuts

Get your ar%% up to these parts;) - we have enough foxes between Blessington and Naas to keep every lamper in Ireland busy FTFF:D;)

johngalway

rock garden wrote: »

Dont know the reason for sure but its my opinion thats fox numbers are down in this neck of woods. There is a couple of guys who lamp this area and its said they took nearly 200 last season of course thats over a wider area not just my area . As for lamping in hard weather ive found results to be poor.but JG and Declan shows it can be done.

That's a lot of foxes! It will have an impact on numbers in your immediate area if they're also taking a lot of foxes from the neighbouring areas that feed new foxes into you.

rock garden

Yes john i would agree with you that it would have an effect on fox numbers in my area . It will help grouse numbers in my area no doubt .But the only thing being is other peoples lamping suffers .

mayfly36

what part off the north you in . sounds like the antrim area?????

Glensman

If it is the Antrim area then you are right, fox numbers are well down at this stage.

The problem is that a lot of people are shooting cubs, just to put their 'score' up a bit... :mad:

steyrman2

hi lads im shooting a long time and keep a eye on my fox numbers over the years and have found out the numbers do go up and down over the last 4 years shooting season from sept till feb first year we shot 159 foxes lamping in roughly 30,000 acres we do the same ground 2 times a week next year we had 98 shot next year we were back up to 171 we take misses into account :rolleyes::rolleyes: between the 2 of us this year we have 87 so far weather is the biggest factor this year withn the big cold spell i keep a diary of the nights lamping along with going out lamping with other lads conditions ,area ,roughly how many we seen it hard to work out how many are around with other lads lamping ,digging but i keep a eye on the earths and did noticed there are more and more foxes using the maize fields once there hardy enough there bankers once there cut

foxboy

rock garden wrote: »

Evening men. Was out lamping last night and monday night past and never seen an eye. Have shot 6 since mid september but they seem abit thin on the ground here as late . As there seems to be plenty south of the border would it be possible for some of you fine men to live catch a dozen and send them up north .

Know the feeling, out 3 nights this week and only seen one fox, too far away to take a shot
out last night and after about 5mins calling spotted eyes on a ditch but didn't look quite right called for about 30mins more and the eyes would dissappear and then come back to the same spot on the ditch but would not come into the field I was in, so I decided to circle around and try get a better look from the other field
when I got there I saw 3 sets of eyes looking back at me, 3 ponies wondering what the f...... was going on, vixen calling, rabbits squealing, light blinding me

THE IMPORTANCE OF KNOWING WHAT YOUR LOOKING AT BEFORE YOU SHOOT

johngalway

foxboy wrote: »

3 ponies wondering what the f...... was going on,

Horses tend to blink a lot more than foxes. Also if they're moving their heads up and down the distance the head moves can be a give away also.

But as usual, always identify the fox by it's body before thinking about shooting.

foxboy

johngalway wrote: »

Horses tend to blink a lot more than foxes. Also if they're moving their heads up and down the distance the head moves can be a give away also.
think that is why the eyes disappeared behind the ditch and reappeared in the same place

Birdnuts

foxboy wrote: »

Know the feeling, out 3 nights this week and only seen one fox, too far away to take a shot
out last night and after about 5mins calling spotted eyes on a ditch but didn't look quite right called for about 30mins more and the eyes would dissappear and then come back to the same spot on the ditch but would not come into the field I was in, so I decided to circle around and try get a better look from the other field
when I got there I saw 3 sets of eyes looking back at me, 3 ponies wondering what the f...... was going on, vixen calling, rabbits squealing, light blinding me

THE IMPORTANCE OF KNOWING WHAT YOUR LOOKING AT BEFORE YOU SHOOT

Could you image the level of potential grief if one made a "mistake" out the back of John Oxx's yard!!:eek::eek::eek:

kildare.17hmr

Birdnuts wrote: »

Get your ar%% up to these parts;) - we have enough foxes between Blessington and Naas to keep every lamper in Ireland busy FTFF:D;)

jasus lad dont tell everyone!:p

homerhop

they are scarce enough in south kildare

rock garden

Yes may fly it is the antrim area .Was out last night seen 2 first ran like a cheetah when he saw the the beam .Second well he came in like a train without stopping and got down wind of me .Got him in scope but before i could get crosshairs lined on him and send him a nice xmas box of 22 grains of h322 behind a 50 grain nosler bt he cleared. oh well it was good to see 2 anyway.;)

mayfly36

I havent been out now for a few weeks or so due to back problems, but before back caved in we were seeing at least 20 to 30 foxes any night we went out. On average taking around 6 or 7 and missing a few, the others were a wee bit lamp shy not many though as the area i have hasnt been lamped in years, long may it continue.

meathstevie

homerhop wrote: »

they are scarce enough in south kildare

That's the whole point of fox control isn't it, have some and not an army of them roaming about.

homerhop

meathstevie wrote: »

That's the whole point of fox control isn't it, have some and not an army of them roaming about.

True but it is nice to get a bit of a run around. Am a bit envious of them lads that can get more than 2 foxes in a night and 7 is a nice bit of shooting. Last time we got anything near that number I didnt even have my own gun.

meathstevie

I suppose it's all a matter of what angle you take on the issue. Don't get me wrong I thorougly enjoy a night lamping but it's also pleasing to go out and see 3 or 4 foxes in the distance over a few hours of driving around rather than eyes glaring back at you from every second field.