Out Foxing Charlie 15

Out Foxing Charlie 15

Well blimey yet again I really don't know where to start, Christmas has come and gone, the game shooting season and wildfowling season is over until it starts to get going again in September, well the wildfowling season that is we have to wait until October for the game season to start, The British Shooting show at The NEC has come and gone in a flash too, I must say my stand and my Young Ambassador's Stand really was the shizzle this year we were rammed all weekend with show folk all wanting to talk and meet my Young Ambassador's and have a calling lesson from us.

My game cooking theatre was also packed with wide eyed folk wondering what I was going to cook up next, and the launch of my NEW game cooking book Home & Away was so well received we sold old out, but we will be at The West Of England Game Fair Come March 21st and 22nd doing our demos and more.​

As For the Professional Poison Free Pest Control its gone completely mad and I have crop and live stock protection jobs coming out of my ears on my agricultural as well as my domestic and commercial pest control work too, I will tell you of a couple of live stock protection jobs I have had to do just recently and my Young Sports Ambassador's Oliver and Carter got to join me on as I further their education and training. 

We start out on a bitterly cold ghastly wet January night, we had to go to one of my oldest clients farms, he has sheep, pigs, ducks and chickens, this is a commercial piggery and lambing station, his fowl are kept for his personal eggs and meat etc, his neighbour is just a house with a large garden who also keeps rare breed fowl as they like to show them at the agricultural shows etc, something was attacking both the farm and the neighbours rare breed fowl killing many and just taking one, of course I knew this to be a fox or foxes.

I got there late afternoon about an hour or so just before dark would fall, I tracked around the perimeters of both properties to work out the attackers entrance and exit, I indeed found these out quite quickly but I wanted to test my Young Sports Ambassador's knowledge and field craft and see if they had taken in some of the lessons I had taught them previously, I was glad to say they had both boys doing very well with their limited young knowledge of tracking, I showed them some of the things they had missed from a single feather, to fur on the barbed wire and even some of tracks they had not seen.

I asked the boys to tell me where would be the best ambush point to take this fox or foxes on its natural attack route, both boys taking into consideration safe back stops, shooting angles, location of live stock, houses, farm buildings etc, I pointed out one thing they forgot, that was the prevailing wind direction as we did not want the fox to wind us before we could get a shot, it was decided that the gate going into lambing field was the best place to set up with everything considered and we had a large barn breaking up our silhouettes etc, I set up my trigger sticks and mounted the NiteSite Eagle Rtec Dark ops on the ole 223 Lead Injector with my favourite Norma Lead Aspirin loaded in the breach, As the dark fell we blended in to our surroundings, Carter started off using the NiteSite Sentinel Pro spotter but then asked could he use my Night Pearl Thermal Spotter, I let him do all the spotting for I knew we would not have long to wait, Niall that's Carters Dad went to check the lambing sheds then came back and said all quiet on the home front.

My 6th sense kicked in as I said I swear I could feel and smell a fox coming in on the wind, Carter looked to the left and very excitedly whispered there he is coming from the left down the big hill through the farm gate, I mounted the rifle switched on the NiteSite Eagle Dark Ops, there he was a big dog fox coming round on the wind just as I had tracked him earlier that day, he started to veer off so I got Oliver to do just two rodent squeaks on my Newly designed Ole Hedge Creepers Fox Magnet multi call, this worked like a dream as he came charging in down the steep hill from 300m to 200m to 100m at 60 I shouted but still he came on strong, at 40m I gave a load rabbit squeal that stopped him as he sat down face on, the rest is history really safety off as I squeezed off the shot and sent the Norma sleeping pill down range, a perfect heart and lung shot as the fox fell stone dead on the spot.

My Young Sports Ambassador's were off like rabbits to go and retrieve the fox, Carter got there first, they both excitedly said how do you do it this all happened almost exactly as you said it would, I just said experience boys but it don't always go this way sometimes the fox out smarts me, my client came out of the farm house after hearing the shot shaking his head saying you never fail you always get your fox, I laughed and said I have failed many times and every time I learn something NEW.

The next problem was on a VIP major sports ground, they had 2 problems, something was attacking their little petting zoo that they have for disabled children, the other was something was digging up the sports ground, the owner swore it was Wild Boar, now although we have had reports of Boar in that area the damage was bad but not bad enough for Boar, to me a swore it was badgers that was my gut feeling, as for the attacks on the petting zoo I had already proved it was foxes, there were plenty of fox tracks fur left on fences sides of enclosures etc, there was also a small rat and rabbit problem to deal with too.​

I said to Niall you take Carter and Oliver with the air rifle and the NS50 and see if you can deal with the rabbit and rat problem, I am going to set up camp under that oak tree high upon the hill off the sports ground, I know these foxes are coming down from high ground to attack, This position also gave me 400m of open killing ground with a 180 degree view all with perfect back stops.

I settled in for the night as the night fell the sky was cloudless and the moon was coming up bright, the reason for hiding under said oak tree to hide my silhouette, this it did superbly, I had voles, rabbits, deer all around me within 2 yards until they came around on the wind and winded me that was, I even had a tawny owl land 6ft above my head none the wiser I was there, then I hear a pig type snorting noise 3oom to my left and this big bramble bush start shaking I thought blimey it cant be Boar surely, then two of the biggest badgers I have ever seen came charging out at full throttle right towards me, I could see them clearly in the bright moon light, they charged right at me one chasing the other making loud snorting noises, they crashed through the hedge not 20 feet away from me and kept going, I telle that made my heart pump alright, I took a breath and calmed myself down and carried on spotting with the awesome Night Pearl Thermal Spotter.

A short time later I spotted the first fox coming in from the big wood right over to my right, I got in position with the 223 again with the NiteSite Eagle Rtec mounted on top and watched the fox quietly come in right where I thought he would, I made no sound at all as if I did he would have me pegged in a heart beat, I let him come on round on the wind, then he detected me, he froze on the staring right at me at 100 yards, but too late my cross hairs were already on target, again another text book shot as the fox fell on the spot, I breathed reloaded and settled back down, a few moments after I heard a fox calling to my left, I turned around and there coming down off the top of the hill was another fox.

Again I got the gun and NiteSite in position still hugging my oak tree, this fox knew something was up, he came through the big hedge jumped the high side of the large ditch to the lower side and sat there, this time I tried a rabbit squeal, he was having none of it, and just sat down on the lower side of the ditch bank, it was a long shot but not out of my range, I got my breathing right settled my heart rate put the cross hairs on the top of his head allowing the drop to be an engine room shot and squeezed off the shot, he did a big back flip into the ditch, I went straight up and there he lay in the deep ditch with a perfect shot to the engine room stone dead, it was a very deep ditch and one I was not going to retrieve from by torch light, I told the owner and he had his green keeping staff retrieve it for me in daylight so I could take it to be incinerated.​

By the time I got back to the oak tree Niall, Oliver and Carter were there asking well did you get them or it? I told them what had happened and the boys were off like rabbits to retrieve my first fox, both clients since my visit have reported no more fox attacks, as for the badgers we are trying some sonic beepers to keep them away so only time will tell if that works.

I hope you have enjoyed reading this as much as I have enjoyed writing it, so until Out Foxing Charlie 16 or one of my other articles, or you come say hello at a game fair, all I can say is catch you later, please keep the emails letters and smoke signals coming into The Countryman’s Diary Magazine I do try to answer you all but some do slip the purse net like a good rabbit on a frosty morning. 

Out Foxing Charlie 15
By The Ole Hedge Creeper
​www.theolehedgecreeper.co.uk