Shooting for Fun

With the start of the Pheasant season on the 1st of October it was interesting to see that the British Association of Shooting Association (BASC) are taking the unusual line of ‘saying hey lets eat what we shoot’ for a change; in an attempt to turn the sport into a food sourcing exercise!

With the proposed badger cull trail for the West Country I was surprised that Badger Burgers were not on the menu after all they will be shot ‘free running’ and above ground! Why we could have a version of Beatrix Porter’s Cook Book with featured menus such as Water Ratatouille, Brock Burgers and not forgetting the old favourite Toad of Toadhall in the Hole!

But on a more serious note a lot of money is being used to provide live targets for the sport of shooting with little concern for the birds lifecycle as DEFRA Farming Minster Jim Paice tore up the new welfare regulations for the rearing of game birds as one of his first acts in taking office, not a wise move if its entering our food chain on mass.

Now together with the election of Simon Hart, previously Chief Executive of the Countryside Alliance this could herald in the opportunity to push forward the Countryside Alliance manifesto of countryside pursuits which includes shooting wildlife as a grant legible sport.

To encourage children to take up pursuit shooting fuels an unethical demand for the range of targets that can be shot and then this goes on to create the demand for even more live targets, which usually results in more wildlife being classified as a targeted pest.

I have no problems with clays or target shooting, but if you introduce children to shooting as a form of wildlife management it opens up the whole shooting scene for them and also to be knowingly cruel is demeaning to the person who is perpetrating the cruel act and will perhaps be diluted on children introduced to shooting live targets by there peers and does this make for well rounded adults?

I still fail to see how the double barrel shotguns are seen as the tools of the trade for many countryside people working in wildlife conservation as I have never seen any reports of our wildlife returning the fire at these shooters!