Lies, damned lies, and statistics

As hatchet jobs go, the campaign bulling up the benefits of iron shot and trashing lead pellets is a done deal. Whether we like it or not, sooner not later we’ll be spraying steel balls around the countryside with gay abandon. No amount of shouting or kicking against the traces is ever going to change this orchestrated outcome.

Lead’s demise was a given the moment the sport signed up to a ban for wildfowling 20 years ago. While the anti-lead propaganda peddled back then was bad enough, today it is relentless. And, depressingly, much of it is being generated and fanned by some