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[Music]
Welcome to Fieldsports Britain. Coming up I am here in Wales talking about fishing with
Howard Morgan. I am meeting a charming young couple who made their business fox hunting.
But first we are going thermal. We are going fox shooting.
[Music]
Night vision is soooo 2013...2014 is all about thermal. Thanks to Darren Rogers, better known
as the Prince of Darkness on our airgunning programme AirHeads, bringing along his GUIDE
thermal unit we're producing some quite terrible images -
Here are some unflattering shots of our foxers tonight, starting with Roy Oompaloompa Lupton,
Gary, the little-known seventh member of Village People and David, looking like a Roy Orbison
tribute act from beyond the grave.
Needless to say Darren remains the other side of the thermal for this picture.
As well as a superb spotting tool, thermal also shows Roy's glow. Now, we know he has
a natural aura anyway, but today it is supercharged thanks to a thermal waistcoat he's been sent
to test.
I don't need a bigger one, it is perfect. It is meant to be snug.
It's a snug fit and we'll see how it performs later - Let's crack on with those foxes.
After the other day when we came in here and we squeaked the fox in but unfortunately David
was having trouble when he was doing his best Mr Magoo impression and couldn't see the fox
in front of his face. De big thing, with de big pointy ears and long nose is foxy yes?
In front of you.
We have a customer in the distance, but he isn't budging - Roy uses mouth calls and the
Western River too. The thermal picks up the deer in the distance and a few rabbits but
nothing fox-like appears.
Our next field offers Darren a great chance. He's using night vision tonight and the Nightmaster
IR illuminator draws in the fox in like a tractor beam. It's a done deal.
I think David should have got that one on camera, hopefully. So it was quite a large
fox he shouldn't have been able to miss it. We shall see if we get any more. You are getting
some abuse tonight. Sorry mate. Hope I don't miss, that isn't very nice is it. Why would
you say something like that. That really is quite cruel isn't it. Let's go and get one.
It's a beautiful evening with a clear sky - and we're finding foxes. This next one is
a little shrewder. Giving us a bit of a runaround, Roy has to get above it...
Where is it going. In the process of coming up we spooked it and it went down into the
thicket there and was obviously making its way through the bracken. We squeaked a little
bit more and got it to look back and put the lamp on it again and it disappeared and we
just held the lamp above it so we could get the scope somewhere near it and just as Darren
put the light down on it it just allowed me enough time to get a shot. Second one in.
Tonight Roy is using the Australian made Max Box magnetic rifle rest from Pro Duck & Goose
Hunting Supplies. It was actually meant for Mr Crow, but as he's been giving the budgie
smugglers an airing in some hot climate he hasn't been around to stop the Lupton nicking
the swag bags he has blagged.
Ditch the bipod to give this a go and so far I am very impressed with it. It holds the
rifle really nicely and it is very easy to just swing about it gives you a really steady
almost bench rest form of shooting. So for long range shots I would have thought that
is going to be really good. It has also got magnets in it which for the top of the gator,
because we have got wooden tops is not going to do much for us tonight, but if you were
shooting off the top of a pickup or whatever else it would be superb, but so far I am impressed
with it.
The fox is a large dog fox with impressive canines...
After admiring the dentistry - Darren's back in the chair.
Roy's calling works again - and again we have to manouevre to get ourselves in a position
with a suitable backstop..
We have got a full moon tonight so it is not the ideal conditions. We are literally like
pimples on a back side. He ran down to the hedgerow here and as we came down he was crossing
back in to come back into the thicker cover back here and stopped perfectly right in the
middle so offering a fantastic opportunity. We just pulled the gator and Darren got on
him, squeezed the shot and we are number three for the evening.
This time it's a ***.
Now as we're heading toward midnight the temperature is falling but someone on the gator is feeling
warm and smug - sorry snug...
So you have got three different heat levels so I am not that cold yet so I will leave
it on a medium. I will give it a warm up on a nice two there and see what that does.
How much does it take to cook a Lupton.
Cook a Lupton, I don't know. Is it normally 15 to 20 minutes a lb for rare. We could be
here for a long time.
We'll see how he's looking with the thermal camera in a bit - back to the foxes and Roy
is in the saddle.
To give his mouth a rest, the Western Rivers call is blaring out the familiar tunes. Roy
has uploaded some of his own calls which have been successful.
So we have got one on the harmonica type from Best Fox Call and we have got another one
on the Silver Fox and what we have done is down loaded those onto MP3's and David has
sent them over to me and we have put them on the caller there and it does work quite
well. So towards this end of the night when your lips are feeling a bit puckered out you
can just sit back and play it on the machine and you have got exactly the same effect if
you were mouth calling yourself.
He's really having to coax these foxes out tonight - but eventually he manages to get
one in a shootable position.
Look at the size of you son.
So four in the bag and, as Darren says, we've had worse, especially given the entourage.
What with two camera men, two rifles, someone driving, moonlit night. I think we are doing
quite well.
He has got some daggers on him.
This last dog fox is the biggest of the night.
All that remains is to show just how toasty Roy's been with his new waist coat and to
make some funny faces - some intentional - some natural.
Well thermal does give you a different perspective on the world and for somebody else with a
different perspective on the world. It is David on the Fieldsports Channel News Stump.
[Music]
This is Fieldsports Channel News .
Farmers are getting rich thanks to rat hunting. Sadly not in the UK but in Vietnam. According
to a report in VietnamNet, workers catch them in the fields and then sell them as a delicacy
for up to £2 per pound or US$5 per kilo. In the local currency, the rat hunters of
Hung Ha district earns tens of millions of *** every season.
Do you fancy being a gamekeeper for 48 hours? If you're aged between 14 and 16 you could
be in with a shot of winning a gamekeeping experience at Newton Rigg College in Cumbria.
Backed by BASC and the National Gamekeepers' Education Trust, it will be held at the College
on a weekend in July. All you have to do is write a short piece (no more than 200 words)
about why you want to come to participate in the Experience.
With money markets booming, there are some seriously expensive shooting estates for sale.
In Spain, Monte del Duque is for sale in Casares , Southern Spain for €40 million. Chargot
in Somerset is on the market through Savills for £7 million.
The World Wildlife Fund gives Namibia a ringing endorsement with a series of films this week.
It calls Namibia ‘a powerfully bright spot' whose people have made the commitment to live
with and protect their wildlife.
Fancy A Land Rover Freelander 2 for a year? The Prince's Countryside Fund was set up to
support the people who live and work in the countryside. It is inviting applications for
its Land Rover bursary 2014, where it will be awarding five inspiring individuals or
organisations the use of a Land Rover Freelander 2 for a year. In this film 2 previous winner,
Sian Curley and Thomas Hartley explain how it helped them support their community and
grow their business.
And finally..It's the bird-shooting fundraiser other shooting and conservation charities
can only dream of. T. Boone Pickens (the bloke in the film) paid $130,000 in the auction
for four VIP tickets to a concert, and he also donated a quail hunt for six couples
to his Mesa Vista Ranch, which sold for $175,000.
You are now up to date with Fieldsports Channel News. Stalking the stories. Fishing for facts.
[Music]
Thank you David. Now let's see what you lot have been up to. It's Hallo Charlie.
[Music]
Here is what the world is up to this week.
Hallo Charles. Paul and Callum here. Hallo Charles. Doing a bit of crow shooing. Making
sure we scare the crows away. For the farmer on his drilled barley.
Hallo Charlie. John and Gary here. In the woods sorting the pens out for next year.
Struggling.
Hallo Charlie. Paul here up in sunny Ecclefechan. Just starting an evening's doe stalking and
we have not done too bad.
Send us your own Hallo Charlie. Film yourself on your mobile phone with just a sentence
saying Hallo Charlie, who you are and what you are up to. Then share it or email it via
Youtube, Facebook, Dropbox or Younameit, Yousendit to Charlie@fieldsportschannel.tv.
Now some less happy news. We lost the countryside campaigner Clarissa Dixon Wright this week.
She died at the age of 66 in Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. Countryside organisations united
to express their sadness.
She was a well liked and well respected woman and she was a stand up campaigner for everything
we believe in. I well remember seeing her at game fairs sitting having dinner, listening
to her stories. I am sure many, many BASC members and everybody who came to the game
fairs to see her will miss her and remember her with great fondness. We made several films
with Clarissa for the Countryside Alliance. She was always forth right and always quick
witted. Here she is shooting from the hip.
I mean to be brutally frank I don't think the NFU does very much for farmers. It wasn't
the NFU that saved the dairy industry such as its saved. It was Starbucks Coffee shops
selling Lates. I want to see the day when the only thing you buy that isn't local rural
produce is in those palaces of pain, supermarkets is dry goods or things we can't grow ourselves
like lemons. Every West Country pub used to serve badger ham on the bar like ham on Iberica
like in a Spanish tapas bar.
What does it taste like though?
It is delicious. It tastes like young wild boar and I have had barbecued badger fillet
from a maize fed badger which died in somebody's corn field and it was excellent. Oh yes and
very good eating.
You will have to come back and do that for us.
Of course I will. I said to the secretary of state for DEFRA that is your answer - cook
em and she said oh don't say that. I said very good eating and she said but what about
the TB and I said presumably you test for TB before you ate them and she said well it
is not a very reliable test, as it is the same test they use on cattle what does that
say about our beef industry. I wouldn't say that if I was you.
I will miss Clarissa for her sharp sense of humour, the way she stood up for the ordinary
sportsman - the lurcherman, the terrierman and not just the Master of Foxhounds - she
was arrested for coursing, she was a true countryside freedom fighter.
Farewell Clarissa.
Now, looking to the future of hunting with hounds, I have been to meet a couple of young
people who are making a business out of it.
This is why people go hunting on horses in the UK - the chance to gallop madly across
beautiful British open country. This GoPro is mounted on Megan Corp's hat. She and Ben
Darlington have started a new holiday company, offering hunting just like this.
We subscribe to the Blackmoor Stockland Vale which is traditionally when you go visiting
and you say you hunt with the Blackmoor Vale everyone says oh you must be able to jump
big hedges then. You must be really brave. I suppose once you get used to it you realise
that it is only a certain percentage of people that jump all the big hedges are all nuts
and fall off all the time. There are plenty of the young and the old, the knowledgeable
and not so knowledgeable and follow through the gates.
You need to know how to ride and rider instructor Megan checks you out at the start of your
trip.
I take riding first.
Every holiday we start with a long ride which gets you comfortable in the saddle. If you
rode yesterday or you rode last year it is a good day where you can find your feet again.
Now many people in the country may be labouring under the misapprehension that Ben and Megan
have been banned from running holidays like this.
People realise in the countryside that fox hunting has evolved since the 2004 ban and
despite the limitations put on it, people have a lot of fun hunting.
More people go hunting than before. So.
People love being out in the countryside and it has changed the face of fox hunting in
a very positive way. The PR. Fox hunts are looking to make friends rather than and being
less exclusive than they once were. So it is a fantastic time if you want to visit fox
hunts. They are really open so from that point of view it is brilliant.
Will you write and thank Tony Blair personally.
I don't know about that.
Maybe he will come on one of our trips.
Book a hunting holiday with Blackthorn & Brook and they will meet you at an airport if you
are flying in, put you in a local pub or hotel, mount you and guide you through your hunting
day or days. Visit www.blackthornandbrook.com
From the west country to Wales, mysterious country with deep dark lakes and a deep dark
fisherman Hywel Morgan.
We are so lucky in Wales we have such diverse fishing. Close to the coast, where ever you
are in Wales you are close to the coast. The best shark fishing in the UK is just off Fishguard,
but also where ever you live there is always a river. There is a lake. There is water every
where and you cannot help but be a fisherman.
When did you start?
I had no choice. Honestly I had no choice. When I was born an old lady told my Dad in
the hospital well you might as well give him a fishing rod now. There is a picture of me
at home at 18 months walking down the walking down the back garden with a fly rod and a
fly reel. I used to start fishing on the river Teifi. Mum reckoned at the age of three she
used to give me a little wicker basket put sandwiches and a flask of tea and I used to
walk down to the bridge and I was only allowed to fish 20 yards above the bridge and all
the old people, Mum used to run the post office, so they used to come by and get their pension
and buy some food and groceries. So I used to look over check out and then tell my Mum
it was alright. That is how I started.
You made a life out of it. Did you have to go beyond Wales?
No I actually went to the real world and got a job did that for eight years and ended up
being the manager of a leisure centre. Working for the local council, working 100 hours a
week getting paid for 37. I thought this isn't very good. I managed to win the world casting
championships at the same time. I know why really because I am first and foremost a fisherman
and you fish in all kinds of weathers. If it is wet, it is windy it doesn't matter you
fish. Whereas a lot of casters they are just casters, just doing distance and just doing
accuracy. Me being a fisherman first and foremost that is why I won the world championships
so there and then I thought it is now or never and that was 19.5 years ago. I thought right
I will try it and see if I can make a living out of it. It is not easy. It is definitely
not easy.
It might not be easy, but it is easy to envy Hywel's lifestyle, flying all over the world
and, well, just fishing. As well as his enthusiasm for the sport, one of the things that's likeable
about Hywel is he has his feet firmly planted on the ground, even if that ground is a few
feet underwater.
Somebody asked me quite recently where would I like to spend my last day on this earth.
Would it be Cuba would it be this would it be that, would it be New Zealand. For me it
would have to be on the river Dee catching a nice Grayling. If I could catch that Grayling
I would die a happy man.
Catching grayling on the Dee is one of the films we have made in our new weekly show,
Fishing Britain, which Hywel presents. Click on the link on the screen to see him in action.
From Wales to the wider world of hunting and shooting on Youtube. It is Hunting YouTube.
[Music]
This is Hunting YouTube, which aims to show the best hunting and shooting videos that
YouTube has to offer.
A viewer called Dan sends in this entertaining timelapse film about building a duck blind.
You won't learn much but it is fun to watch.
Also amusing is this film of a fox, asleep in the Ardennes region of France, that's about
to be surprised by viewer Francesco Calianno.
Our third viewer video of the week is Linus Edlund from Sweden. In his 20s, he started
filming his hunting and shooting exploits a few years ago.
Here's a film by our old friend Simon Whitehead which he made for Shooting Times's YouTube
channel. 'Rabbit shooting at night: The Invisible Man' still doesn't show him smiling.
Staying in the UK, Mik Lynch has made 'Falconry: Harris Hawk Catching a Rabbit' which does
what it says on the tin.
Now let's go abroad. 'Chasse aux sangliers - Des journées magiques!' is Chasse Passion's
résumé of his European big game hunting season.
Although I sometimes worry about the word 'awesome' when used next to the word 'hunt',
rather as politicians shouldn't use the word 'clearly' when they are about to lie, 'Aweseom
Watergowl Hunt' is forgivable hyperbole as Buck McNeely has hunts awesomely for wildfowl
in Saskatchewan, Canada.
And finally, BlaserRifles offers 'Blaser Global Hunting Adventures - Nothing Good Comes Easy.
National Sporting Clays Champion Cory Kruse has always dreamed of hunting in the Mountains
of Canada's North-West. He hikes the vast and steep terrain for days with guide and
outfitter Harro Obst of Moonlake Outfitters. OK - they are flogging a rifle - but it's
beautifully filmed.
You can click on any of these films to watch them. If you are missing the fishing films
and the airgun films, watch our new shows, AirHeads and Fishing Britain. If you have
a YouTube film you would like us to pop in to the weekly top eight, send it in via YouTube
or email me the link charlie@fieldsportschannel.tv
I have already done the plug for Fishing Britain with Hywel our other big programme is AirHeads
click on the screen to watch that.
We have a tour around a shooting vehicle pimped for night vision. James Marchington has his
Crosman trained on crows and magpies nicking his breakfast. We have Ted the Magnificent,
Airgun Centre's Peter Zamit, HotAir, the best of airgunning on YouTube in Airstreaming and
we look at laser range finding with Phill Price.
And we are back next week and if you are watching this on Youtube please don't hesitate to hit
the subscribe button which is somewhere around the outside of the screen or go to our webpage
www.fieldsportschannel.tv where you can click to like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter.
This has been Fieldsports Britain. Good hunting, good shooting, good fishing and good bye.