Duty Calls

Keeping his permissions is vital to Eddie Jones, and he’s on rabbit duty in the paddocks.

This winter has been a busy time for me on the squirrels and as you know from my previous features, I’ve been taking quite a few. This month, I wanted to show some different quarry and yes, something different did put in an appearance, but I was surprised with the outcome from this particular ground.

A farmer called to say that a few rabbits were showing around his horse paddocks and that he would like them thinned out. I’d been on top of this ground for some years and when he calls, I like to show up as soon as possible so I arranged to go there after the girls had done all the horses. It’s not the best time of the day, of course, but you can only fit in what you can. As you know, the best time to shoot rabbits is early morning or late evening, my preferred times, but I had no choice today other than to go when I could.

I arrived at the ground at around at 9am, and I could see that all the horses were out in the fields, so at least there would be no interruptions. I was going to walk the boundaries first and then wait where the farmer had noticed rabbits feeding, and hope to get a few. Rabbits will feed throughout the day if they are not disturbed too often, so don’t miss an opportunity to get the rifle out if you can.

I was going to have a session with the Ultimate Sporter this time, but the Galahad is still a learning curve for me so I had to try it again, you know how it is. With a few magazines ready and the Galahad loaded, I set off to do a circuit of the ground, and my first opportunity came after about half an hour.

I came to an area with a few hawthorn trees planted along the route, and brambles made up the rest of the hedge line. The brambles had died back a bit so I could look over the top at what was ahead of me, and about 60 yards along the hedge I could see a rabbit feeding. To my surprise, it was not an adult; it must have only just started to come out to feed on grass, it was so small.