And The Bunny Lived Hap....

Nature - now disney free!
SBW

Hank Shaw's Duck Duck Goose

We've waited a long time for this, there are plenty of books about game cookery that have a few pages dedicated to wildfowl, but there hasn't been a single work that puts all the wisdom in one place. Until now.

I've followed Hank Shaw's blog Hunter Angler Gardener Cook since it's first post, we've conversed by email and in the comments sections of our respective blogs. I am an unabashed fan of his writing, recipes and outlook on food and hunting.

There are lots of johnny-come-lately foodie bloggers, and frankly I'd trust most of them to tell me about the ambience of the eatery more than the food, some of them are very experienced customers, no bad thing, its all part of the deal. But if you wish to 'know' your ingredients, you must have put in your 'dirt time' hands on with the soil, walk the earth, gather and hunt from its fecundity.
The GF - Elfa, drank, and sold a lot of wine, but for her to feel her education had begun she had to make seasonal pilgrimages to the vineyard, to walk away from a planned harvest knowing another few days sunlight would take the crop to another level of ripeness, then crush the grapes with her bare feet, before her connection to the wines could become an almost living thing. I've seen a lot of wines sold, but passion will out. It's easy to fake the sincerity, but not the deep connection to the repast you serve.

I'd like to tell you some underdog-tale of how Hank's blog started from small beginnings and grew, but no, Hank was already an accomplished writer when he made his first post. He'd worked as a journalist for many years, he'd put himself through journalism school by slaving at a hot stove and he's walked the forests, fields and beaches with rod and rifle, with gun and basket. His books could be seen as a confluence of that time and many many evenings spent between the stove and the bookshelf.

The book hits AMAZON right about now

The book tour has started, so you can meet and more importantly EAT with Hank - the details are google mapped HERE

You can follow Hank on Facebook HERE

More soon
SBW

Education Is A Good Thing

"The Hunting season, where boys become men, and men become boys"
The Hunt  [a The Crucible for our times - very highly recommended]

On this side of the pond we have a system of voluntary hunter education, widely resisted by lots of older stalkers, widely praised by those who have attended.
The Deer Stalking Certificate is in two parts, the first like the American system - classroom and range based and the second completed afield, stalking in the presence of an accredited witness, more like the European system.
One great thing about the DSC1 is that its now recognised as a 'UK hunting licence' in europe and the states, making life easier for the traveling sportsman.

In the USofA and Canada you can take a course online for most states and provinces. Those lovely people at Huntercourse.com have the whole list, for example hunter education Alabama, and hopefully they'll come to europe soon, as I'd love to be able to study the German sylabus in english.

“There was something delightfully intimate about the relationship between predator and prey.”
― Nenia Campbell,

More soon

SBW

PS If you'd like to be one of the Lovely People sponsoring this blog email me regarding your product or service. Testing 'on the hill' commences second week of next year and pre-season training will begin again soon.

Hoodrat 'Served'

Not a lot to do with hunting or bushcraft, but an amusing incident

I was standing in the street waiting for a cab, dressed in building site clothes, with a large coil of pipe, a fold-up ladder and a HOOJ toolbox.
A teenage chav with a particularly annoying bum-fluff beard and horrid ball-cap is eyeing me up suspiciously.

Hoodrat: Officer, officer what's your badge number?

I ignore him

Hoodrat: Ay Federale, what you watching me for?

After a while he's joined by two of his little chums, they cross the road and one of them comes up to me

2nd Hoodrat  [pointing at my pile of tools]" these two reckon you're undercover, but I'm not thinkin' that, how would you chase anyone with all-a-diss?

SBW [pointing to stomach] Or with this?

Hoodrat's 2: laughs

Hoodrat: He is he's undercover init!

SBW: [to 2nd hoodrat] If I'm undercover your mate's a real gangster

Hoodrat's 2 and 3 crack up laughing

Hoodrat: Yeah you're funny

2nd Hoodrat: ' Nah blood, face it, you've been served

Hoodrat's 2 and 3 crack up laughing

There SBW 'down with the kids' who'da thunk it?

More soon
SBW

Wild Boar Hunting: A Bit Close For Comfort?

Once he starts paying attention, he really gets it together.
I wonder if he'd worn the Kepi Blanc?
SBW

PS 'Seasons' publish a french hunting  DVD  full of wild and wacky french hunting exploits,
worth a look if you're over there

My Daughter The Anti Hunter

I was siting talking to my aunt. The conversation moved on to deer stalking, a sharp pain in my side announced that my daughter [TLB - the littlest bushwacker] was joining the conversation using Full-Contact Sign Language.

TLB: "Daddy STOP killing animals"
SBW: "You liked the venison we ate at Christmas, you didn't complain then"
TLB: " I know daddy, I wanted to say something, but it was so delicious!"

More soon
Your pal
SBW

Skull Pix pt?

This Skull road sign was spotted on the A22 by The Bambi Basher. Considering the over 250 rta's involving deer do far this year on that stretch of road alone it's plausible  they're all road kill !

SBW

Deer Stalking In Wiltshire Pt3

"I am SO going to blood you" HunterX

What is it about hunting? Really WTF is it? How can it be so hard to leave town in a timely manner? Especially as out of the season we could all gather together with our tools. Now with the prospect of yer actual shootable animals we struggle through the treacle of work commitments. Ai Yi Yi!

I'm on a construction site all day on the Friday, receiving regular changes and updates to our plans from HunterY who is at a fever pitch of excitement. By this time I'm just too dog-tired to care. The work get's done and I set off across town to meet HunterY who is still receiving regular travel updates from HunterX, he'll be leaving the office at 5.30 sharp, not before 7.00, make that 9.30, at the latest. Really. Anyone would think he was a plumber!

I'm passed out on HunterY's sofa by about 7.30 and oblivious to any further news of delayed departure. HunterX arrives at about 11.00 and we're off into the night. The truck blows a hole in its exhaust and we roar our way west.

The night is thick, all we'd need is the chirp of cicadas, and we'd be in Virginia on a summers night. We grab a little more sleep on the floor of a cow-shed and are on the ground a little late with the dawn is already breaking.

Leaving HunterY in a treestand HunterX and myself creep down a ride and deposit ourselves in a seat which overlooks the intersection of four rides, the long horse riding lanes that intersect the forest.

A Doe and her fawn appear from nowhere and mooch about for a while, out of season and in and out of view. Another Doe with a fawns and a follower appears. Again as if teleported in. Still and with baited breath we watch entranced, one of the Does seems to catch a hint of something on the eddying breeze, she acts weary but not enough to spook her and her young. A third group stroll into view Mum, this years fawn, last years fawn and hello who's this? Bringing up the rear with his nose to the ground is a rather handsome pricket, in his first year of having antlers, his coat white with a tinge of orange to him, strawberry blonde if you like. HunterX whispers "do you want to shoot him?" Muttering "that's why we're here, no?" I settle over the stock of the SAKO 85 and watch the shot present itself. One squeeze later, he staggers, describes a quick circle and crumples to the ground not 20 feet from where he received his .308 dinner invite.

To the disappointment of one commenter/troll I put a couple of fronds in his mouth, and wish him well. The deer not the Troll. I'm not what you'd call 'blessed with faith' myself but something atavistic stirred in my soul and it seemed appropriate to wish him well on his next adventure. I find all that whooping and high-fiveing on youtube a bit, well not to my taste, but at the same time some reflection of the moment seemed appropriate.

Just as I get to work bleeding the beast, HunterX surprises me with a handful of blood all over my face, this seems only to add to his delight. He keeps repeating 'I cant believe you're so calm" While it is exciting and wonderful to have meat on the ground again after all this time, I'm battered, I can hardly keep my eyes open. Wearily I accept his directions, "left a bit, no right, back a bit" as he takes the snap he shouts "that's animal husbandry right there!" As you can see in the picture at the top of the page - perfectly posed. Bah!

The gralloch is interrupted by the distant crack of an un-moderated 30-06, HunterY has meat on the ground too. As we work HunterX cuts off a slice of liver telling me
"In my family we always eat a bit of the liver when the animal is on the ground"
I'm not sure if this is actually true or he was just trying to claw back some dignity after being proven to be afraid of his dinner at the Kebab shop the weekend before.

Lots of stalkers abandon the liver and other offal at the gralloch or view them as dog food. What a waste! I've gotta recommend this practice to you, quivering, still at body temperature, fresh liver is one of the most amazing foods I've ever eaten. Delicious and then some. Woodland Sashimi.

With meat in the larder and all of us feeling battered-tired we beat an early retreat back to town, where I treat my flatmate to the surprise of finding me doing home butchery on the kitchen floor, before collapsing into bed to sleep the sleep of the dead.

An armed ramble with The Bambi Basher and Keeper Du Bois next and maybe another go at the Fallow Bucks.

More soon
SBW

Deer Stalking In Wiltshire Pt2

I'm 'real life' friends with a few readers of this blog, occasionally I get the time to do a bit of hanging-out with them.  HunterX and I did a bit of unsuccessful Deer Stalking together and this year we've been fishing and having our two-man reading circle, [or as there are only two of us participating should that be hunting-book-tennis?].

HunterX has joined a wonderful deer stalking lease. Where as youngest member its fallen to him to set up the larder and highseats. He roped your pal SBW and our new friend HunterY into helping prepare for the season.

As per usual women, work, and kids conspire and we're a little behind time by the time we all have a clear saturday for the work party. It's also the hottest day of the year and the bracken is both high and crawling with Ticks.

I have to hand it to HunterX he is one of only two people in town who get up earlier than me, sitting outside my place at ungodly o'clock. Chipper as you like. HunterY on the other hand keeps the same hours as Elfa and seems completely non-plussed when we rock up at his flat to collect him on the way out of town. So much for 'we leave before dawn'.

The drive is the usual stuff: animals I've shot, places I've shot them, eccentric deerstalkers I know, cunning plans that have worked out, cunning plans that have not worked out, calibres I would own if I could, knifemakers and knife design. the proper proportion of rusk in an english sausage, and we're soon on the ground.
The last leaseholder has taken his tree stands on to the next place so we spend the morning measuring up and the afternoon strapping highseats to trees. There's a lot of cutting back to be done but thankfully we're joined by another member GentlemanD who has pretty much everything from the Stihl catalogue, all in perfect working order so no fires or nasty surprises this time.

Once the seats are done we drop the tools back to GentlemanD who it turns out has a giant pile of heads in his backyard. Really well over a couple of cubes of them, this guy has shot a lot of big Fallow. GentlemanD lives up to his name and is kind enough to give me the rather wonderful Fallow head at the top of the page. Fallow do get a fair bit bigger than this, but usually only in deer parks, this chap lived wild and free until GentlemanD's super custom .243 brought him home to dinner.

So much for me and HunterY's woefully optimistic 'it'll only take an afternoon'
The next couple of saturdays are a little more tense as we have to overcome a few electrical and plumbing conundrums in the cowshed. Quite a few baking hot hours later the chiller hums to life, the scales are hung, the hoist works, and the fly zapper zaps. All good.

As the afternoons cool off and our work is done for the day, we set off on a few practice stalks with an unloaded rifle. The Fallow are still in mixed sex groups and are taking advantage of the closed season to munch their way through the tenant farmers crops. Stalking without glass you can really see the value of stalking with glass, in one memorable encounter we stalk a Doe and follower, who then become two spaniels before swishing their tails to confirm their shetland pony-ness. We dryfire at a couple of opportunities, blow a couple of opportunities by stumbling about in heavy workwear, and generally look forward to the Fallow buck season's start on the 1st of August.

On the way home we stop off for Kebabs [keybobs for readers in the USofA] at HunterY's 'bab shop of choice. London has a lot of Kebab shops and they run the gamut from; processed mechanically recovered meat - which means a pressure washer and a sieve - to sublime hunks of incredible lamb, stacks of quail and chicken marinated in angel's tears. All served with a hand-cart full of salad and flat bread made in front of you. The really good ones serve offal too, great quivering lumps of liver, and what are those white things?
HunterY "Testicales, lambs balls dude"
SBW "Great! mark me down for some of them"
My first few attempts at ordering are taken as piss-taking by the guys behind the counter and are greeted with much hilarity, only when regular customer HunterY intervenes do they end up on the Mangal (grill).

HunterX suddenly morphs from roughty-toughty-hunting-dude to big-girls-blouse and sits, looking on, appalled. HunterY tries one and agrees that "they taste like brains, just with a more meaty texture"

More stalking and eating soon
SBW