Angmering Park West Sussex

Sheila Flavell takes the first of the day, a sublime high partridge, and soon all the guns are in action, latching onto challenging birds that set their wings at distance.

- EWAN DAVY

Appearances can be deceptive – and no more so than in the case of the Angmering Park Shoot in West Sussex, which is set over 6,000 acres of land in the South Downs. Having driven from Arundel, where the castle sits sentinel high above the surrounding flat and rather docile land, it’s hard to see how Angmering Park has built a reputation for high birds. The approach to the shoot lodge does little to belie this view.

Warmly greeted by Nigel Clutton, who took charge of the shoot 31 years ago, I ask the obvious, if somewhat impertinent, question: “Tall birds, from here?” His reply is simple: “You’ll see.”

Against the warmth of the log fire in the lodge, Clutton introduces me to the shooting party for the day: Richard Andrew, Sheila and Rod Flavell, Gavin Knight, David Moorhouse, Michael Prideaux, Martin Reed, Paul and Michael Roy. And then, over coffee, gives me a quick history of his involvement with Angmering Park.

“My late sister-in-law, Anne Fitzalan-Howard, Lady Herries of Terregles and the 16th Duke of Norfolk’s eldest daughter, invited me to manage the shoot on behalf of the family. It had become rather too much for Anne and her husband, former England cricketer Colin Cowdrey. As a professional in estate management, and being married to Anne’s sister, Sarah, I became the natural choice.

“From that point on my role was to turn the shoot into a profitable entity providing an income for the estate. That meant creating a very high quality shoot that would rank among the best in the country using the right kind of drives, stocking them properly and making optimum use of all our contours.”