A new permission.......And its lifting!!

After a long time away from our rabbiting permissions, Dave and myself finally got out and knocking. We tried a couple of farms further up from where we already have permission, both were keen to get rid of as many rabbits as was possible.

The land is quite hilly, and there are features that will at times make this a very difficult area to control. Last night was a calm evening and was to stay dry, so I armed myself with my air rifle, and Dave gave the long nets a try.

We had a good walk round when we got there, finding out were the concentrations of rabbits were, then taking note were we could hold up for a time and try and ambush them. We found our spots and went our different ways. I chose a small hill which would give me a good view of two woods which surround one of the fields. These woods also contain the warrens were the rabbits are at their most secure, we can't obtain the permission on there just yet.



As can be seen, if I keep low here the rabbits can be almost on top of me before they relies I'm there! And with there being no wind, scent wasn't a big problem.
After a good few hours sat here I'd got a good tally going, 5 of the rabbits I had shot fell back into the woods, these had to be left for the evenings carnivores, as we under no circumstances can enter these fenced off areas.

This was the right hand side of the wood, in the end I placed 2 air rifles out as the light lowered to save on movement noise when turning from side to side







Dave had sat behind a wall and had kept perfectly still, even though he was being eaten alive with the local midge population, after a couple of hours the rabbits had regained their confidence and had started leaping over the wall and returning to eating the grass. After a short time, they made their way out further into the field, and with this Dave set the net out, having rushed out today, he had chosen the quickset, which being noisier than traditional had a detrimental effect on numbers of rabbits caught. 100 yards of net walked out and a long walk through the fields resulted in only a couple of rabbits being seen and none in the net. on the plus side a few ran up the hill to were I was waiting!

We then had a wander round with the lamp and the air rifle, we use the Deben lithium battery and a Light Force lamp, cracking stuff when a full night of power is needed, but a few seasons have taken their toll and as we were lambing Dave noticed the connection heating up. The wire had come loose from its solder and was creating a short.
With this we packed up, knowing that we really should have been better prepared, I'm spending today checking batteries and sorting nets, we don't want to be caught short again in the future.

After a great evening our total tally was 6 in the bag, 7 left to the foxes and a rake more that will be on the cards for next time.

Happy Hunting.