August

Joe Stanley reports from his new home in our great countryside – the Allerton Project on the Leicestershire/Rutland border at the delightful village of Loddington.

A ‘perfect storm’ of positives looks set to make this one of the best GWCT Scottish Game Fairs yet – providing a massive shot in the arm for the industry.

With the home bred ducks busy with their test flights, and the first autumn migrants arriving, now is the moment to start feeding your flight pond. With luck, some of the families will have mums and dads that visited you last season, so will be only too happy to investigate now. Wouldn’t it be a pity if they found that the cupboard was bare?

After a dismal year regarding COVID-19 the coming season has finally begun to look brighter, game days are sought after, and we can all sigh with relief that normality will hopefully return. Unfortunately, on the other hand the weather has failed to be as bright as hoped, arable crops are still yet to be combined, along with various hay fields making wandering released pheasants a challenge to dog back to the surrounding pens.

NFU Mutual’s agent and branch offices in Scotland are delighted to have nominated 32 local charities to receive a combined donation of more than £206,000 from a national £2m ‘Agency Giving Fund’ launched by NFU Mutual’s Head Office.

It is alarming to see the imbalance caused by garden bird feeders laid out for clearly. Whilst well-intentioned, reports that it is boosting numbers of our more common garden birds and, in turn, threatening their subordinate counterparts, such as the willow tit and pied flycatcher should be a real cause for concern.

A public consultation was launched on Thursday 19th August by NRW, on the approach to regulating the shooting and trapping of wild birds and the destruction of eggs and nests. It includes open questions on their approach and proposals.

This summer is the first season of fieldwork for the Framework project. The project has helped support the setup of 11 Farmer Clusters across various European countries and is looking at the impact of landscape-scale management on farmland wildlife over a five-year period.

Corinium Travel is a private travel consultancy offering the very best in personal service. We are experts in luxury travel offering tailor-made itineraries, Private villas, European and North American ski holidays and beach holidays.

Poor quality habitat, following an exceptionally cold spring, resulting in hens being in increasingly poor nutritional condition, may be partially to blame for this difficult season.