Speed, agility and a beak for danger

I remember the first time I was invited to a wild bird day. It was a cold January morning and I stood on the edge of an old woodland filled with oaks and ash that sloped away into a deep valley where the other Guns stood waiting, nervously shifting their feet, for the first bird to appear.

My job for the first drive was to shoot any wily old cock pheasants that turned back over the beaters and headed for safety in the trees behind me. The first bird went out to the left and high over the Guns before falling to the second shot. The second followed a right-angle trajectory and made it through to the other side of the valley amid a volley of shots. The third bird had evidently seen what was going on in the valley