High Pheasants at Brailes Hill

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High Pheasants at Brailes Hill

Pheasant shooting at Brailes Hill

By Sarah Fitzpatrick for The Field

Wednesday, 17 November 2010

Warwickshire is good for shooting as well as hunting

Every week the National Lottery's siren song suggests,"It could be you", but sceptics know that at 13,983,816 to one you're almost 14
times more likely to be struck by lightning. A better bet is the Game and
Wildlife Conservation Trust's (GWCT) annual raffle, especially if you persuade
the whole gunline to chip in. This was Major-General Jamie Balfour's cunning
plan in 2009, when he coaxed his shoot guests into entering the prize draw for
a day's sport, 150 to 200 birds at Brailes Hill, near Banbury, Warwickshire.
David Fellowes did as suggested, and pulled out the plum.

"I got an early morning call from Jamie,
saying, ‘You bastard, you won the raffle'," recalls Fellowes. "Then I had the joy of inviting my friends." This, of course, included Balfour as a thank you for twisting his arm into entering."

Treating your friends is one of the great pleasures of a prize day, so it was a pretty happy gathering of guns and wives that met at the George Hotel in Shipston-on-Stour, where the keepers joined them for drinks. "We had a real house party," says Fellowes, but it was not a riotous affair. "I realised we'd have to be on form so didn't want a hangover,"
he adds. Suzie Corbett was so determined that her spaniel, Flounder, would
greet the day in fine fettle that she smuggled it into the hotel for a good
night's sleep.

This restraint was well advised. Two seasons ago, a
high-profile charity day was somewhat marred by the guns' dismal performance
after they'd stayed up most of the night getting totally over-refreshed. It
didn't endear them much to the shoot hosts, keepers or beaters, all of whom had
done their very best to provide a superlative day.

Fellowes's party knew that this shoot
warrants clear heads. Though Warwickshire is generally considered to be a
hunting rather than shooting county, especially by those without experience of
it, Brailes Hill has the topography to produce some extremely testing birds.

The shoot is close to the site of the Battle
of Edgehill, which took place in 1642. It surrounds the 760ft high Brailes
Hill, topped by Highwall Spinney, and covers 800 acres of the estate. They
shoot only about a dozen days per year and the reputation is such that demand
usually outstrips supply.

Starting the day with Marshalls drive,
Malcolm Bryan, keepering jointly with Will Hogan, confessed, "It's a very good
drive, in fact all the drives on here are good for high birds but if you have
the wind in the right direction you can shoot some stunners." A good wind
crossing the drive sent the birds whistling over the guns, fast and high.

There should be no downside to producing good
birds but Hogan admitted that, "It was occasionally a bit of a problem getting
the quality of the guns - it makes such a difference to the bags." Three years
ago they changed from charging per bird to selling days as a whole. "From a
keepering point of view it's nice not to be number crunching but I will aim to
see a bag of 200 to 250 at the end of each day next season."

For the coming season Malcolm Bryan will be
hosting days and Hogan is made sole keeper, adding new drives and partridges to
the mix with his "strong group of hard-core beaters". He puts down more than
5,500 birds and is determined to make his mark and put Brailes Hill on the map.

The beating team often includes Andrew
Knight, who owns the shoot. It is separated from the rest of his land by
Shipston-on-Stour. He fell in love with Brailes Hill on sight but had not
thought of its sporting potential until keeper Bryan Whitehouse came to help
him on the estate, having been made redundant following the sale of a
neighbouring estate, Foxcote. Whitehouse suggested it would be a lovely shoot
and set about making it so in less than three years.

The rapid success of the shoot has inspired
Knight's son Casimir to take up shooting, but Andrew is wedded to the beating
line. "It was too late for me to take up shooting but I love beating. You are
much nearer the fun, close to the game, and there is no danger of getting cold
like the guns standing in the valley," he told me, adding that it was also nice
to be able to comment on others' shooting without fear of similar treatment.
"It is a pleasure to watch really good shooting."

Knight is hugely supportive of sporting interests despite
not hunting or shooting himself. He donated the day in order to benefit the
GWCT's "wonderful scientific work", valuable to all political colours and
important in presenting clear evidence from the countryside. Knight also
welcomes the beagles and the Warwickshire Hunt, though he thinks Brailes Hill
itself is a bit too steep for them. Max Kendry of the GWCT was as impressed by
the birds shown as with the thousands of pounds raised across Hampshire and
Warwickshire by the raffle. The land is a hub for game, supporting a healthy
deer population which, with the stalking in-hand, often finds its way into the
shoot lunch, as well as the shoot and farm.

This was Hogan's first season back in the UK
after working near Auckland in New Zealand. "The standard was very high out
there and some birds were up to high Devon standard. There are some English
blokes out there who really know what they are doing," Hogan assures me. "And I
can say I've shot driven pheasants in the Southern hemisphere." He started
beating as a boy and also worked at Campden House and Lydney Park but Knight
hopes he is settled here for the foreseeable future.

The poults for Brailes Hill come from Martin
Sly at Long Compton, so they do not have far to travel. "They are well-grown,
strong birds. It's not a short-tailed bird scene. We have Michigan blue/black
crosses, Scandinavians and melanistic," says Hogan. The birds may be strong but
Brailes Hill is an oasis with no neighbouring shoots, so Hogan is diligent with
his dogging in. In addition to the family syndicate, he is attracting regular
teams for the let days. "It is good having guns that appreciate the work you
put in," he adds.

The gamecart, made by Shaun Rigler, proved a
great talking-point. It is a specially shortened Land Rover chassis with a
2.5-litre engine that Hogan has christened "Swamp Dog" because it will go
anywhere and leaves their Mule standing. Swamp Dog is often the only vehicle on
the shoot as guns walk from drive to drive. It is a linear shoot with each
drive leading neatly to the next, walking right round Brailes Hill in the first
three drives. Everyone seemed delighted to be able to get though a whole day's
shooting under their own steam, and thought it a treat not to be piling in and
out of 4x4s.

The third drive was The Bowl (known locally
as Primrose Hill), a real showcase of high and testing birds, a "show-stopper",
as described by Hogan, proudly. "These are our highest birds." They were
steepling and really forced the guns to keep swinging and get their eyes in, to
the extent that on the next drive, called Jenny Swift, Fellowes hardly let a
bird past him. "I should stop shooting after that," he joked. "I don't think
I'll ever top it."

Flounder's night in comfort at The George had paid off
and with friendly pickers-up it could enjoy getting stuck into the brambles
much to Suzie's delight. There was plenty to pick on the last drive, Field
Barn. With all the guns well into their stride there were 50 birds down. Floyd
was beaming. "It's nice when you connect with a fast one."

By the end of the drive the light was
failing and, having shot through and managed to come in just under the 200-bag
wire, it time was to repair for a late lunch. The
stone barn is a short walk up Brailes Hill from the pegs of the last drive and
has 360-degree views of the shoot and its stone floors meant that the guns
could march in with boots.

There is no electricity so the barn is filled
with large candles standing in clay pigeons, which makes a wonderfully
welcoming sight, especially as the nights draw in. Inside, lunch and the guns
are heated by wood-burners. A candlelit feast of piping-hot stew made a perfect
finale to what Suzie Corbett described as, "a private and special weekend,
which was different and new for everybody". Fellows was so delighted with the
barn that he plans to take it for a private dinner. "We've been looked after
like royalty," he says.

Under the care of Will Hogan and estate
manager Caroline Warren, and with its obvious geological advantages, Brailes
Hill may live up to Knight's boast that it is the best shoot in the Midlands.
Visiting guns leave superlatives ringing in his ears, like David Fellowes's parting comment: "The whole thing
was bliss." A year later I hear they are still
singing its praises.