doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Boxing Day Shoot

Nigel,

I offer you a sincere thank you for taking the time to photograph and share your shooting experience with us fellow SxS enthusiasts!

Do your faithful dogs get to hunt anything?

Mark

Hello Nigel,

So nice of you to write and to include photos. I also celibrate Boxing Day after explaining the significance to my chumbs, by firing up the trap and slinging a few clays.

It would appear that the little fellow on the right is a Parson Russel terrier with a rough coat. I have two, mother and daughter, both smooth coats, and they love to hunt. I can only put rugs on them for winter social activities, not while we're in the woods. They will pursue down into borrows and the rugs can get caught.

Best wishes for the new year, and do say "Hello" to the Queen for me if you run into her.

Webb

Mark, the faithful dogs are not mine but belong to one of the stalwarts who keeps the range running for the rest of us. They don't get to hunt, officially, but have had to be forcefully extracted from rabbit burrows on more than one occasion. They are also small enough to make useful hand warmers when the mercury drops!

I see. My in-laws live in a town where almost everyone is in oil exploration, so I should've guessed - they do have their own collection of missing body parts in the family What was on my mind instead, however, was the old technique of pocket pistol shooting, where you line your index finger along the barrel, point it to whatever you want to hit, and squeeze it with the middle finger. I was hoping you've involuntary disclosed the decret of your success bad luck

Nigel, nice to see someone from our Channel Islands on site. I understand that you, along with the Isle of Man have rather liberal guns laws that our American Cousins may envy. Are they still o.k. or have you suffered like the rest of the British Isles too? Lagopus.....

Hi Lagopus,

For readers who may not be familiar with the Channel Islands (about 100 miles south of the English coast and around 20 miles from France), the islands are British but, by several accidents of history, they are independent of the English parliament and islanders' allegiance is direct to the Crown. Here in Jersey we have our own legislature and our own laws, as does Guernsey, separately.

When the UK banned handguns and self-loading rifles, Jersey did not follow suit, and we can still possess both. The licensing system is similar to the UK; however, all barrelled weapons are on licence (air weapons, long and short rifled arms and shotguns) and there is a single licence rather than separate shotgun and firearms licences as in the UK. Permission must be obtained for the acquisition of each item. In practice this isn't a major difficulty. Shooting is one of Jersey's most popular sports. I say 'sport' because hunting is effectively restricted to vermin, plus pheasants under certain circumstances.

I doubt that many US shooters in more liberal states would be to happy if our restrictions were imposed on them!

As far as I know, the Isle of Man has similar firearms legislation to Jersey, but I am open to correction.

N.

Thanks Nigel. I understand that the Isle of Man is pretty liberal too. Although part of the British Isles they are not part of the European Union and have the world's second oldest Parliament; second only to Iceland, and as a result have remained pretty much uninfluenced by silly politics, although they were forced to abandon flogging as a punishment only a few year ago. No speed limits there on the roads either I believe.

I believe that you still can, or at least until recently, own and use fully automatic firearms.

Just to confuse our other readers; there is a difference between Britain, Great Britain, The United Kingdom and the British Isles. All very confusing. So confusing even that the city of Berwick on Tweed, that frequently switched between England and Scotland, was still officially at war with Russia until 1966! Lagopus.....

The Isle of Man abandoned flogging! Damn! Another of the great civilising influences gone!

I have been in Jersey since the early 1980s but full auto weapons were already verboten by that time. Not in Guernsey, however, until a little while later than that.

Yes, Great Britain is the combination of England, Scotland and Wales, formally constituted by the Acts of Union of 1706 and 1707. Wales was co-opted by laws of 1535 and 1542. Here ends the history lesson!

Nigel