Hunting

rifle23141124

Hi Guys,

Just wondering if anyone could explain how coilte forests hunting permission works?

Is there shared areas or how does it work?

Living in Galway with plenty coilte forests around!

Any advice appreciated

For hunting deer

Thanks

cookimonster

Ok, I'll give my experience on Coillte Lease system for hunting. As always open to correction and updates.

Firstly log onto the below link.

https://www.coillte.ie/our-forests/explore/permits-2/

Download a copy of the catalogue and all available documents. Decide how far you are willing to travel, this is important as it can influence how often you get on sight and therefore value for money. Don't get caught up in the 'its only another 30 mins away', suddenly you'll find yourself traveling for hours and hours and in the depths of winter during the weekends your finished up by 11.00 am.
Find a wood where its reasonably close, be weary of woods too close to population centres or high amenity attractions : walking ways, country pursuits , feckers on trail bikes etc etc, as these can be quiet an attraction for both poachers and weekend country types who don't seem to be able to read warning signs.
Once you see the location you fancy, look at the size of the wood and the cull numbers. The cull numbers will drive the price up, there's no rule of thumb as to costing but if you put a price on each animal at 200-300 hundred Euro you'll have a good guess-t-mate. This will help you determine again what is realistic for your budget. If you familiar with the area your interested local knowledge may help you out. Questions like how busy is the wood, how well is it poached etc etc. You can contact the woods manager and quize him, find out how long was the last lease held for (if its changing hands to often, especially before the terms are up then there might be issues), find out the felling plan (there is a Coilite document for it, but no harm asking). See if there is another lease on the wood birds, running concurrent with the deer lease. Check to see if you require anything higher then the basic HCAP or equivalent ( there are woods that require higher levels), also check to see if the wood is noted for direct culling by Coilite (can't remember the term for it) but you may find that at certain times the wood will be out of bounds to you and a cull may occur. Again check for scheduled events - running, motor cross, public events etc that could be regularly occuring under licences from Coilite.
Normally I would advise you to take a trip out to the wood and give it a once over. Look for access points, public entrances and the general lay of the land, in this case Google is not your friend.
If all is good fill out the forms, there are some bullsh@t parts on the form, but if you basicly use common sense they are no problems. Safty wise - all nomimated stalkers will be competent, HCAP or equivalent qualified and insured (both mandatory), hunters will comply with notification procedures, be in possession of mobile phones etc etc .... sounds good yeah.
Decide how much you want to pay, include full VAT so if you bid a €1000.00 you'll pay that plus VAT. The tender is a blind binding process, you make your bid and wait until the competition is over. If your unsuccessful or lucky you'll get a shout and you'll be expected to pay up quick enough. Don't dispair if you don't click first time, sometimes others don't make good on thier bid and the next person will be offered the licence. Also a secound catalogue may be offered at the end of summer for similar circumstances.
When you are successful they will issue you a licence and you may nominate stalkers to hunt the wood. AFAIK the number of stalkers must not exceed the cull figure, ie 10 deer max 10 stalkers. You will be required to send copies of HCAP etc and insurance details of all concerned to Coilite before they will issue individual stalking permits. These should be carried by all stalkers while hunting the wood.
Now my foray into leasing gave me a pleasant out come in the beginning, I made a bid of €1000.00 + ( not exactly sure) but I callculated the max I would spend inculding the VAT, deducted the VAT and this was the sum I bid. I won the bid but at over €200.00 less then my bid. Happy days...... for a while. I mustered two suitable stalking buddies to go on the wood but at the last moment one pulled out and myself and the other lad had to pay the loss. My advice get the money in hand prior to bidding or you could be out of pocket. I handed that lease back 1 year latter as it was heavly poached, fed up finding more grolloachs than live deer.

Stalking on Coilte woods have some rules, the big pain in the arse is the 11.00 am finish on weekends and public holidays. Evening hunting can be done by prior approval of the woods manager and may involve the necessity of high seats, which also require prior permission. The wood needs to be booked in advance through the woods manager prior to heading out. Check the regs its either 24 or 48 hrs prior notice. Total cull must be returned at the end of the season. As you may have guessed by now an other issue that you come across is the presence of the public not so common on private permissions.

Having said that I've been on various Coilite leases over the last 8/9 years, I have access to private lowland stalking as well as extremely good hill stalking but I do like to stalk wooded landscapes and for the fore seeable future I'll be availing of a Coilite lease.

The pigeon man

It's very hard to figure out where the forests are from the coillte brochure. No address. So I suppose you have to search the address of the named forest?

cookimonster

.....also check to see if the wood is noted for direct culling by Coilite (can't remember the term for it) but you may find that at certain times the wood will be out of bounds to you and a cull may occur. 

This is what my feeble mind was referring to


Concurrent Rights (deer licences only) – Where indicated in the catalogue, the licence period of licensed areas subject to Concurrent Rights are restricted to weekends, bank holidays and National holidays only on or after the 15th of November annually. It is Coillte’s intention to undertake direct culling operations of female and non-antlered deerin these areas during weekdays after this date.

cookimonster

The pigeon man wrote: »

It's very hard to figure out where the forests are from the coillte brochure. No address. So I suppose you have to search the address of the named forest?

Open the catalogue, go to the map, each region is numbered and allocated to a administrator.




For the purpose of the exercise I'll pick the first wood on the list:



By the BAU number we know that wood is in Donegal, we kniw the name of the Forest Name - GROUSEHALL and the Property Name/s - GROUSEHALL, TIEVEM.

Pump them into a map search and use Donegal as detail :




Tievem is to the left and Grousehall to the right.


Coilite will supply a map of the boundaries on request but I can't remember if they do this only for the successful licensee.

If I can jog the memory as to another way I'll get back to you.

cookimonster

I know on one hand I'm going lampy and on the other hand I know I'm right about somethings

https://coillte.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=7b05ec6a44a14bd8b523ea1fcb78b4e9

This link should sort you with boundaries and felling plans.

Heavy handed

Only ever had one year on a lease and it was enough to put me off them. Was constantly having to deal with dog walkers despite putting up the proper signage to say I was in the wood. They didn’t care less and when confronted and asked why they entered. All I’d get is F off I’m walking these woods for years and no sign is going to stop me. Woods manager didn’t do anything about it either. Was a waste of money. Now not all let’s might be like this but that was my experience of the one I went in on.

garyc007

No shared areas im afraid unless you pay for it. You have a couple of options, take/bid on a full lease yourself or look for a place on someone elses. Or stick with private permissions. Best of luck with whatever option you go with

Chiparus

cookimonster wrote: »

Ok, I'll give my experience on Coillte Lease system for hunting. As always open to correction and updates.

Firstly log onto the below link.

https://www.coillte.ie/our-forests/explore/permits-2/

Download a copy of the catalogue and all available documents. Decide how far you are willing to travel, this is important as it can influence how often you get on sight and therefore value for money. Don't get caught up in the 'its only another 30 mins away', suddenly you'll find yourself traveling for hours and hours and in the depths of winter during the weekends your finished up by 11.00 am.
Find a wood where its reasonably close, be weary of woods too close to population centres or high amenity attractions : walking ways, country pursuits , feckers on trail bikes etc etc, as these can be quiet an attraction for both poachers and weekend country types who don't seem to be able to read warning signs.

Does that rule only apply to weekends? I thought it was every day?

cookimonster

Chiparus wrote: »

Does that rule only apply to weekends? I thought it was every day?

You'll need to talk to the individual forest manager as to timings and use of highseats.