The all-round crop for the passionate shooter

Tom Payne heads out on to his much-loved peas this month, but tough conditions keep him working hard to build up the final bag

You’ve heard me say plenty of times that peas are a fantastic all-around crop for the enthusiastic pigeon shooter. From drilling to harvest, if you manage the crop protection over peas correctly, they can reward you with multiple outings.

There has recently been quite a decline in peas being grown in some places. They are not the easiest crop to take through to harvest and can be an absolute nightmare to combine. Add to that the potential for poor yields and you can understand the unwillingness to grow them.

However, partly because of the decline in winter oilseed rape being grown from 2019 to 2021, farmers have had to find a viable break crop to replace it. And so the humble pea, this all-rounder of a pigeon crop, has seen a resurgence, much to the excitement of lots of shooting people.

Switching on

However, I have a theory about new crops in areas that previously didn’t grow them. I believe it takes up to three years for a pigeon population to switch on to a new food source. There will be lots of you I imagine who have recently gained a crop such as peas on your permissions, but I suspect some of you won’t have seen much pigeon action over them yet. But once a pigeon population does switch on to a valuable food source, they will certainly dial in to it, to the extent that they will almost seem to be waiting for it. It’s like ducks and ponds — they come to know.