rearing peasants

[dickyboy 1]

ragamup

a few reared by broodies each year will kick start a wild bird shoot and that will be something to shout about then slowly reduce numbers as the boss requires....i am rearing some greys under broodies for an estate as there has been alot of foxes for a while but i'm hammering them although some c**ting organisation is dumping them!!

 

but i would dearly love to see wild birds up there we usually get a few broods but i'm trying to boost greys and this is what real keepers should be encouraging, its my feeling that the line between game farmer and gamekeeper is becoming blurred!!

 

i hope to have a job on this estate in a year or so! and really manage habitat and wild birds!!

[Guest ragumup]

ragamup

a few reared by brooders each year will kick start a wild bird shoot and that will be something to shout about then slowly reduce numbers as the boss requires....i am rearing some greys under broodies for an estate as there has been alot of foxes for a while but i'm hammering them although some c**ting organisation is dumping them!!

 

but i would dearly love to see wild birds up there we usually get a few broods but i'm trying to boost greys and this is what real keepers should be encouraging, its my feeling that the line between game farmer and gamekeeper is becoming blurred!!

 

i hope to have a job on this estate in a year or so! and really manage habitat and wild birds!!

Kick start a wild bird shoot " pipe dreams "and slowly reduce the numbers" really" pheasant are crap mothers fact and with all the raptors and vermin and road kills and wondering off the shoot, you need to kill every single covide, then the farmer just top the silage and kill them all ,and cut crops at night, wankers, there would be very little to shoot ,THE GAME CONSERVANCY have run wild bird shoots it took them 5 years off hard work with full time keeper to build it up and it cost more than a reared shoot ,and in the end they were shooting some thing like 200 cocks per season for most shoots even small ones with syndicate [can't spell}or guests ,that's not nearly enough i think the good old days are gone except in Norfolk may be where there habitat, i used to think rearing under broodier taught greys how to rear there own but in truth what does it teach them ? to freeze when raptors are fly over, the ones i reared under broodies were hammed buy sparrow hawks at 10 weeks old, greys have continued to decline since 1971 buy something like % its a shame as i love grey partridge ban my guns from shooting any at all during the shooting season, may be the line between game keeper and game farmer has become a bit blurred but at the end of the day bosses are not interested in how much vermin you've killed they are only interested in what comes over their heads IE results IMO, and iv only been keepering 20 years ,unless your shoot is a tin pot walk around with your mates and there's nothing wrong with that,then the boss will be disappointed, and buy the way iv just finished planting 2000 shrubs and wind breaking trees to improve the habitat in the woods and with this dry weather I'm having to water them

Edited May 18, 2007 by ragumup

[shotup 9]

ragamups right in that its easier to raise a few hundred day olds in a small shed that under a few broodies. just get a gas brooder and it will save you a lot of hassle as well as seening more produce for less worry.but its still good to learn the hard way as you will appriciate just what some people had to do to produce decent bags in order to keep their jobs.

[Guest ragumup]

Your right shotgun just that i went round the houses you worded it better than me

[teckel 3]

i agree with rag with regards to rearing of grey partridge if you have greys on the ground do not realease greys

. released greys are nasty birds they will drive out any wild greys and the reared ones are dumb and do not rear hardly any chicks. i am fortunate to have wild greys and the only reason is that i hammer the vermin and create lots of good ground for nesting and feeding of wild greys but also have a large numbers of reared pheasants which is the main draw for the shooters with the selection of greys through out the drives.

as for rearing of birds with broodies , yes, crack on with it best of luck but dont expect large returns on such small scale rearing. you will learn alot about the life style of the birds when rearing in small numbers which will help you later when rearing larger numbers.

I am lucky to have 17 years experience in all aspects of keepering from grouse to pheasants seen and heard all sorts but in this job you are always learning some thing new so unless you ask people you will never learn good luck with your rearing season

[Guest ragumup]

well said teckel and another reason that releasing reared greys can be a bad idea, is a reared grey hen can pair up with a wild cock in a good territory and the hen then rears bugger all

Edited May 18, 2007 by ragumup

[Rob 0]

Cheers for advice, only doin it as a project for a bit of fun.The rest of the birds are being bought in as six week old poults.

[dickyboy 1]

the shoot i am now part of has not seen greys on the ground for many years but theoretically it is perfect! the boss likes pheasant and a few red legs so we continue to rear and buy in but to increase biodiversity on the shoot and variation on the shootdays then i am going to broody a few greys and hopefully some will stay some will die/move on but the vermin is being hammered we get a few broods of wilds each year...hopefully more this year as the vermin is being controlled heavily...and you can always tell which are the wild birds, they just look and act more like pheasants than chickens(and we keep our birds very wild, purely hopper feeding)

 

but in 3 years when i've got the nesting cover right and the few broody reared birds on the shoot rearing her own...and its the closest you can get to wild by releasing! i'll know i've helped to save the grey partridge, keep it on the shooting list and succeeded where others have failed

[Guest The Big Fish]

When you come to release your broody reared greys, try and find a baron pair of wild greys and release yours there, the baron pairs have been known to adopt released youngsters

Edited April 16, 2007 by The Big Fish

[dickyboy 1]

thats the plan for next year but have none at moment so in a few years fingers crossed.............plus with having no greys on the ground in 5 years any spring birds/pairs will be my doing

[Guest ragumup]

When you come to release your broody reared greys, try and find a baron pair of wild greys and release yours there, the baron pairs have been known to adopt released youngsters

That's called the ustuion system, can't spell

Edited May 18, 2007 by ragumup

[Guest The Big Fish]

I could go into detail about rearing greys and releasing to eventually produce wild stock, but to be honest i cant be bothered, cause no fecker listens to what i say anyway

[hafod 1]

go on big fish,lets hear it mate,i"m all for learning,i got a bit of a small shoot,a flight pond is the main atraction,but there are pheasants on there,but partridges "no",but who knows in the future...ive had a few tips off tek and ragumup in the past and its much appreciated,so more info the better

[Squirrel_Basher 17,100]

Is there anybody on here who is old enough to remember the euston system?,[spelling].The rearing of pheasants by large scale broody hens .I can remember the local estate just finishing with it .It was the underkeepers jobs to shoot rabbits by the hundreds to be boiled down for feed and added to corn .The hens were kept in small boxes and tethered individually to feed .The fronts of the boxes ,if I remember right ,were slatted to let chicks out to scratch about but not big enough to let the hen wander with them .

Very labour intensive as someone had to be there 24-7 to kill vermin and shut chicks in during bad weather .Where the got all the broodies from was anyones guess !.

[Guest The Big Fish]

Well i'm not old enough to remeber it, but i have certainly read a lot about the old broody hen system of rearing and heard a lot of different stories from the older retired keepers around my way.

 

The rabbits were as you say foxdropper, boiled down and added to the chick feed, this is what made up most of the protien content in the feed. Nowadays it comes in a bag as chick crumb.

The broody boxes were slated so that the chicks/poults could range free around the box, but the hen could not get through the slats, so she would keep calling the youngens back to her, this way they wouldnt wander off.

 

An estate fairly near to me still has its old rearing field and the size of it is astonishing and to think that the whole field was covered with broody coups

Someone had to be there all the time to watch over the field and make sure that nothing untoward was going down. Even the kestrels used to get it if they came too close.

But i suppose that was a different era.

 

When the poults were ready to go to wood, the poults, hen and the coup went too. Completley different style than the chicken rearing that goes on today.

 

If i was still involved in keepering, i'm bloody sure that i would have a few clutches of one thing or another sat under broodys, its great fun hatching out chicks in this style and they make MUCH BETTER birds :thumbs-up: