The shooting of game birds, in particular pheasant, is a popular sport in the UK, on large, traditional driven shoots on estates and on small-scale rough shoots. Shooting of game birds is carried out using a shotgun, most often 12 and 20 bore or a .410, often on land managed by a gamekeeper.
Game birds are shot in different ways: Driven Game shooting, where beaters are employed to walk through woods and over moors or fields, dependent on the quarry and time of year and drive game towards a line of 8 - 10 standing guns standing about 50 or 60 metres apart. The guns will have paid in the region of £25 per bird for pheasants and much more for grouse, and the total bag (number of birds shot) will be anywhere between 80 and 400, again dependent on the budget and quarry. The day may be very formal, and the head gamekeeper or a shoot captain will oversee proceedings and great emphasis is placed on safety. Pickers-up with dogs are also employed to make sure all shot or wounded game is collected. On such estates, large numbers of pheasants, partridge and duck, but not grouse, are reared and released to provide sufficient numbers of game. Grouse cannot be reared intensively but the heather moorland where they live is intensively managed to maximise numbers.
Rough shooting, where several guns walk through a woodland, moor or field and shoot the birds their dogs put up, is increasingly popular. It is less formal and may be funded by several people grouping together to form a "syndicate", paying a certain amount each year towards pheasants, habitat maintenance, etc.
Wildfowling is often a lonely and uncomfortable sport. A single gun sits in pursuit of wildfowl by a body of water, or on the coastal foreshore, often at dawn or dusk, and waits for birds to "flight" in. This is sometimes undertaken in total darkness or by the light of the moon. Duck are also shot on the two former methods.
In the UK game is defined in law by the Game Act 1831. Other (non-game
birds) that are hunted for food in the UK are specified under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. UK law defines game as including:
Pheasant
October 1 - February 1
October 1 - January 31
Partridge, Grey and
Red-legged
September 1 - February 1
September 1 - January 31
Black Grouse
August 20 - December 10
N/A
Red Grouse
August 12 - December 10
August 12 - November 30
Ptarmigan
August 12 - December 10
N/A
Brown Hare
No closed season
August 12 - January 31
Although there is no close season for hare - the Hare Preservation Act of 1892 makes it illegal to sell, or offer to sell, hare between 1st March and 31st July. Additionally the Hares Act and Hares(Scotland) Act prohbit shooting hares at night.
