As Friday’s meeting trudges along like a slow-motion car crash, I find myself gazing out the window. Grey clouds are hurtling across the sky with a bit too much enthusiasm for my liking, heading towards the setting sun as if they've got a dinner reservation. Inside, my colleagues are droning on about the Local Government Review, while my mind is off in the wilds, contemplating the weekend’s hunting escapades. As the meeting finally fizzles out, they shift to an exhilarating discussion about tomorrow’s weather—grim, apparently—and, shock horror, decide to cancel their golfing plans. Absolute lightweights.
Someone turns to me and asks, “So, what are you up to tomorrow?” “Shooting,” I reply nonchalantly. “In the rain?” they ask, eyebrows halfway up their foreheads. “You bet,” I say with a grin. “You’re bonkers,” they say. “Yep, bonkers for hunting.”
Later that evening, I’m at home, prepping my gear. My loyal Labrador, Alfie, watches my every move like a suspicious housekeeper. I do my usual check on Windguru, a weather website designed for surfers and sailboarders, though I’ve sneakily repurposed it for my hunting exploits. It’s pretty accurate for wind speeds and directions at ground level—absolute gold for airgunners. According to Windguru, it’ll be drizzly at first with a good bit of wind, but things will brighten up later. I hatch my plan accordingly, and as I set the alarm for 4 a.m., my lovely wife groans. “You’re bonkers,” she says. “Yep, that’s me—bonkers for hunting.”
By half-four in the morning, I’m at the farm, yawning like it’s going out of fashion. Dawn is still a good couple of hours away, and the world is as dark as a coal miner’s socks. Alfie’s whining in the backseat, keen as mustard—he lives for this stuff. Me? Well, I wouldn’t say I’m thrilled about standing in a soggy field in the middle of the night, but I soldier on. I step out of the Jeep, greeted by relentless drizzle and a wind that’s doing its best impersonation of a hurricane. Perfect.
Armed with my FAC Airgun Technology Vulcan 3 in .25 calibre, shooting 34 H&N slugs at 960 fps and equipped with an Arken Zulus digital day and night vision scope with a built-in laser rangefinder, I’m ready. After five minutes of standing around like a lemon, my eyes finally adjust to the murky gloom. Shapes start emerging from the blackness—fence posts, saplings... probably not ghosts. We’re in business. Alfie, now practically vibrating with excitement, senses movement before I do. He’s already pulling on the slip, eager to chase something, anything, that moves. I head for the edge of the wood, drop to one knee in the soggy grass, and the dog instantly sits beside me like the professional he occasionally pretends to be.
I flick on the night vision, scanning across the field. A couple of distant white orbs glint back—probably rabbits, but at 160 metres they’re too far away and too close to the woods. Then I spot a closer pair of eyes, ranged 67 metres out. Target acquired. I line up the shot on the unsuspecting rabbit’s head.
Boom. Or rather, not boom, but a polite air rifle pop. Except I forgot two crucial things: the gusty wind and telling Alfie to stay put. Naturally, I miss, and Alfie, ever the optimist, charges off to fetch the non-existent kill. He’s still got his slip lead on, and after a few bounding strides, he steps on it, flipping himself head over tail in a spectacular display of canine acrobatics. He yelps like a banshee, and there we are—me, standing in the dark, not sure whether to laugh or cry. Any rabbits within a 5-mile radius have now scarpered, no doubt cackling in their little warrens.
Alfie limps back to me, thoroughly unimpressed, and we trudge off to the barn to reassess our life choices. Half an hour later, I’m sitting in the barn’s doorway, sheltering from the rain, and wondering why on earth I keep doing this. Pest control in the pitch black, faffing about with air rifles, hands cold, toes squelching—utter madness. But on a good night, when things actually go to plan, it’s quite effective, and besides, my landowners expect me to do it. Yep, I must be bonkers for hunting.
At least I get to enjoy the dawn chorus—a pair of tawny owls saying their goodbyes, rooks flocking noisily to the ploughland, and in the distance, rabbits emerge again as the rain eases up. I let them have their breakfast and head home, followed by a damp and sulking lab.
After a quick breakfast (it’s still only 7:30!), I’m off to another permission for some squirrel hunting. This time, I leave Alfie behind—his pride needs a bit of time to recover.
I switch the Vulcan 3 PCP for my trusty Weihrauch HW97K .177 spring-powered airgun. Love my sub-12 springers.
People often tell me I’m lucky to have so much hunting permission, but as the saying goes, the harder I work, the luckier I get. Since last April, I’ve taken a lot of pests from this estate, especially grey squirrels. The Lady of the estate doesn’t see it that way, though. To her, the greys are still raiding her bird tables, so in her eyes, I might as well be napping in the barn. But nature abhors a vacuum—clear one squirrel, another moves in, like clockwork. I’ve started leaving squirrel tails with Arthur, the gardener, just to show I’m not slacking.
As the sun rises, I spot a grey squirrel from the Jeep on my way in. I quietly park up and slip into the woods, immediately hearing the telltale scrabble of a grey at work. Five yards away. Airgunner’s nightmare—too close. I slowly lower the rifle, hoping to catch it unaware, and miraculously, it runs to the base of the tree where I’m standing. I can’t believe my luck—18 inches from my barrel. One shot, job done. What are the chances? Good start.
I make my way into the woods, on the lookout for rogue squirrels. Along the way, I startle a female roe deer and her fawn, a beautiful sight, though I suspect they’ve been making a nuisance of themselves in the sugar beet.
The stalk through the woodland is a bit like navigating a treacle swamp—slow, deliberate, and rather damp thanks to the morning’s rain. The leaf mulch underfoot is like walking on a bed of soggy sponges. I take five careful steps... stop, listen, and have a good look around. I catch a glimpse of a grey tail, half-buried in its leafy hideaway about 35 meter off.
Now, there’s a fair bit of dodgy advice floating about regarding squirrels and airguns—chiefly, that ‘headshots only’ is the way to go. Utter codswallop, if you ask me. You can just as humanely finish a grey with a heart or lung shot. So, I give this little digger a proper dose behind the shoulder, and down it goes, its head firmly planted in the dirt.
As I’m processing this, I hear a scurrying nearby—another grey, clearly not too impressed by the modest bark of the HW97K. It’s hunkered down behind some scrub. I cock the gun, load another pellet and give the ground a good stomp. Predictably, the grey bolts up a birch trunk and freezes, looking for the source of the commotion. At 25, maybe 30 metres—my primary zero—I line up the centre crosshair. Easy shot.
Venturing further into the wood, I stick to my five-step strategy, paying close attention to every sound. And there it is again—the scrabbling. I navigate around a pine trunk to find the grey buried in its digging, roughly 20 meter away but partially hidden by twigs. It pops out, clutching a beech nut, and leaps onto a fallen branch, right into my crosshairs. Bad move. Terminal move.
By late morning, with the rain now coming down in earnest and not much else stirring, it’s time to call it a day. On the walk back to the Jeep, another grey decides to make an appearance on an ash branch. Even though I’m about ready to drop, it’s another cull.
I leave five tails hanging in a bag by the gardener’s hut. As I drive slowly down the driveway, I can’t help but curse under my breath as I spot more greys cavorting around the woodland edge. I’ll be back, of course. Because I’m bonkers for hunting.
