Gaining some ground

Finding somewhere to shoot may not be as easy as it used to be, but being smart, polite and professional is a start, suggests Mark Ripley

- Mark Ripley

The biggest obstacle people face when getting into shooting is finding somewhere to shoot. I remember as a young lad struggling to find a farm on which to shoot. One weekend my friend and I went on a concentrated door-knocking excursion and spent the day asking at every farmhouse we could find, only to get the same rebuttal each time.

Disheartened, we returned to my friend’s house where his father asked how we had got on. We explained that we had asked at lots of farms with no luck. His father was a happy-go-lucky kind of guy and seemed amazed that none of the local farms would oblige our simple request. “Come on,” he said, “we’ll go see the guy over the road.”

We hadn’t thought to ask at the small cottage over the road, probably because, to a pair of naive 14-year olds, it wasn’t an obvious farm. As we walked down the drive we met the farmer and my mate’s dad, smiling warmly. He introduced us, explained he lived over the road and that we were looking for somewhere to shoot.

“The boys here are looking for a bit of ground to shoot on with their air rifles, just a few rabbits. They’re good lads, would you mind if they pop over now and then? We only live over the road,” he asked.

His simple, friendly approach and warm smile did the trick and to our amazement, the farmer kindly gave us his permission.