Game Fair 6: this blog, ‘overheards’ and en passant

‘Oh we all read your blog – don’t you worry‘ – a senior staff member of a pro-shooting organisation. Trimbush – was that you entering Churchills’s tent at around lunchtime on Saturday? ‘Ian Coghill out-Faraged Nigel Farage‘ – a back-handed compliment, if a compliment at all. ‘Nigerian Garage‘ – how the GWCT’s Chair was reported…

Game Fair 5 – missing my bison burger for breakfast

Of course, man cannot live by blasting birds out of the air alone.  One has to eat. And although there are an awful lot of places to buy a bacon buttie at the Game Fair (including the one Indian Food stall that I spotted) other foods are available. Sloe Motion is run by a former…

Game Fair 4 – BASC, seriously nice people

I spent some time, on both Saturday and Sunday, talking to BASC people on their stand at the Game Fair. I’ve always thought that BASC was the serious and nice end of shooting with lots of wildfowlers and not many grouse shooters, and my conversations strengthened that view.  They also plied me with cold drinks…

Hen Harrier Day updates

Hen Harrier Day is now supported by RSPB, the Wildlife Trusts, the National Trust, the Hawk and Owl Trust, the Peak District National Park, the League Against Cruel Sports, Birdwatch magazine, Rare Bird Alert, the Welsh Ornithological Society and Quaker Concern for Animals.  Thank you to all who are supporting this day. Three events are…

Game Fair 3 – in photos

This must be about my 20th Game Fair, so I realised that when it said that it opened at 9am this was just nonsense – soon after 8am I had parked, got a lift on a trailer from the car park to the entrance, paid to enter and then started walking down the hill where…

Oscar Dewhurst – Bluish-fronted Jacamar

Oscar writes: Bluish-fronted Jacamar: Bluish-fronted Jacamars were fairly common in the lowlands and I saw them most days around the station buildings. Luckily this one perched out in the open and gave me a nice clean background. It would sit on this branch before shooting up to snatch flies from the air and returning to…

Game Fair 2

What sort of people come to the Game Fair – you might (or might not) wonder? All sorts – although there is more tweed worn at the Game Fair than you will see at most July events with the temperature in the high 20sC. But judging from the cars parked near mine on my two…

Sunday book review – Shrewdunnit by Conor Mark Jameson

There are two things I like a lot about this book – and four things about which I am less keen. The two are overwhelmingly more important than the four. Shall I get the four niggles out of the way first? I shall. I don’t like the title, I’m not drawn in by the cover,…

Game Fair 1

This year the Game Fair is in the grounds of Blenheim Palace. The Game Fair could keep a blogger going for  full year, but let me tell you about some sensible people I met today. Today, Saturday, is ‘Conservation’ Saturday apparently.  I noticed that there was a talk about rivers but it was as much…