Finding homes for shot birds

[Lid 194]

From what I have read a number of the larger shoots hold large numbers of birds back to release later in the season. If these are still on antibiotics, then they are not fit to eat until they have got it out their systems.  I doubt anyone checks which shot birds were released when though. 

[trigger2 3,144]

5 hours ago, Accip74 said:

It's been a real problem for years where I'm from mate. Shooting syndicates dominate the landscape. Growing demand for big days, but dwindling demand for the meat, what else are they going to do? 

My mates son has just begun his game keeping career on an estate just over the border in Suffolk. This isn't commercial, just for friends of the owner, but they have three keepers & weekly 3-400 bird days throughout the season. The estate owner is completely reliant on sending the birds over here to the continent. Brexit worries the guy. If this arrangement is effected he will close the shoot as he not going to bury 400 birds a week! That's just one decent size shoot, albeit not commercial.

I think attitudes towards eating game may be better as you get further north, but I think in the south it's very 'marmite'. A lot people I know just wouldn't eat it or know what to with it, which is a great shame, but you hear the same from people on here! It's just another meat over here in the supermarkets. It's really popular, but pricey! €11 for a whole pheasant & €22 for a saddle of hare in my local supermarket.

wow that is pricey. theres a big game dealer close to me and rumor has it that the shoots have to pay him £3000 each for him to take all there birds this season, then 25p a bird there after. which he plucks and dresses then sends abroad by all accounts. for some reason he keeps going bust for some reason. so this year is why there is a charge for him to take birds from shoots. rumor also has it that he takes birds from a 100 shoots. thats why all the other game dealers/butchers are taking them for free round here.

[micky 3,325]

Yesterday at Melton

PHEASANTS  £0 .50  BRACE

PARTRIDGE   £I . BRACE 

RABBIT          £9    COUPLE

BLEWITS       £8   PER lb

HARES          £5     EACH

MUNTJAC     £16    EACH

The big shooting days have not started yet, when the big bags come in they will remain unsold. There was a Jill  Ferret in that made£30

[Welsh_red 4,644]

Does everybody involved in shoots who own ferrets end up with tonnes of pheasants for the ferrets? 

[micky 3,325]

In the area i live there are three small  shoots [40 bird days ] the people who beat can take all they want , i think this happens on a lot of  shoots now days .

[Rabid 1,936]

1 hour ago, micky said:

Yesterday at Melton

PHEASANTS  £0 .50  BRACE

PARTRIDGE   £I . BRACE 

RABBIT          £9    COUPLE

BLEWITS       £8   PER lb

HARES          £5     EACH

MUNTJAC     £16    EACH

The big shooting days have not started yet, when the big bags come in they will remain unsold. There was a Jill  Ferret in that made£30

Jeez, I was going up with 86 rabbits but changed my mind at half 5 in the morning, wish I had gone now, that was good money, up on the week before.

 

i see the pheasant have already dropped

[micky 3,325]

If you had put 86 rabbits in Melton yesterday  you would have got nothing like £9 a couple and would have probably have to have taken a lot of them home ,Pheasants will make 5pence each in a couple of weeks because there will be a thousand in, if there was only ten in they would make ten pounds a brace 

[Rabid 1,936]

I normally reckon to get 4.50 - 5.50 when I put them in there, how many were in ? Jill's were making upto £30 the week before as well.

[micky 3,325]

I do not knw how many were in but it would not have been many to get that price .Up until a few years ago there would be at least been 5 hundred a week and if you were selling you paid  5 pence in the pound  in fees  now days you pay 50 pence entrance per lot  17% commission , on top of that you have £3 parking  and your fuel costs , its just not worth the trouble .

[Accip74 7,112]

17 hours ago, trigger2 said:

wow that is pricey. theres a big game dealer close to me and rumor has it that the shoots have to pay him £3000 each for him to take all there birds this season, then 25p a bird there after. which he plucks and dresses then sends abroad by all accounts. for some reason he keeps going bust for some reason. so this year is why there is a charge for him to take birds from shoots. rumor also has it that he takes birds from a 100 shoots. thats why all the other game dealers/butchers are taking them for free round here.

The high end restaurants will be doing nicely out it. I over priced the pheasants, checked this morning & it's actually €9 & €23 for a whole hare on the bone minus the legs! 

[Yokel Matt 918]

The BASC magazine has an article on Willow game which charges a annual retainer (or some thing like that) and then a further price per bird to guarantee an outlet for the shoot. 

Fair play to Willow game for coming up with that one but surely given all the publicity about people having to resort to food banks you’d have thought this would be a great opportunity for BASC to try and promote some sort of network to stop the waste and counter the argument that the antis seem so keen to promote!

[micky 3,325]

Just a little off topic , in season i pick and sell a lot of the fungus called BLEWITS i usually do well in the first two weeks of November , over the last few years the market for these has diminished  so i am constantly looking for new outlets , last week i rang a place in London who are PURVEYERS OF lUXURY FOOD STUFFS , they were  advertising Blewits  at £38 .50 a Kilo but they were out of stock , when my wife rang and said she could supply at least 50 kilo a week for two weeks they offered her £3 a kilo  subject to condition  and delivered to London , they are still in the field.

 

 

 

 

 

[Welsh_red 4,644]

29 minutes ago, micky said:

Just a little off topic , in season i pick and sell a lot of the fungus called BLEWITS i usually do well in the first two weeks of November , over the last few years the market for these has diminished  so i am constantly looking for new outlets , last week i rang a place in London who are PURVEYERS OF lUXURY FOOD STUFFS , they were  advertising Blewits  at £38 .50 a Kilo but they were out of stock , when my wife rang and said she could supply at least 50 kilo a week for two weeks they offered her £3 a kilo  subject to condition  and delivered to London , they are still in the field.

 

 

 

 

 

That's some serious greed

[micky 3,325]

16 minutes ago, Welsh_red said:

That's some serious greed

No mate it is business 

 

[Welsh_red 4,644]

1 minute ago, micky said:

No mate it is business 

 

True but you'd have thought if their out of stock and charging 38 for them and only offered you 3 which you didn't take , surely upping their offer to get some stock in and still make a handsome profit for themselves would be the next stage . They arnt making any money on them if they got none to sell .

Unless I misunderstood your original post