PSA: Sling Swivels

This is a public service announcement (PSA). When purchasing sling swivels please ensure you check the quality of manufacture, it is no use saving a few pounds on the cost of a more expensive version when they can break and trash your much more expensive firearm. When it comes to installing them, take care and ensure they are installed correctly and securely before you trust them to your rifle or shotgun.

We are making this PSA because we have just become aware of multiple cases of failures via Facebook.

Content Updates

We do our best to update our website and social networks as often as possible, but with so many pressing issues that deserve our attention, we don’t always have the time or resources on hand to prepare a detailed “blog post” of every issue we tackle, or every piece of content we provide or update.

The majority of our most recent work will be listed on our blog page and shared on our Facebook page, but please continue to browse the website, especially the home page where significant and important updates which impact firearms ownership and shooting in the UK are mentioned. We also do our best to update and roll out new content on the rest of the website, though “live issues” tend to take priority over our time. If you have suggestions or would like to assist us by providing content or pictures for any of these pages please get in touch via our Facebook page or by e-mail at contact.firearms.uk@gmail.com, thank you.

Game Shooter

BASC advise on police right to enter and seize firearms

Anytown Rifle Club

The Case for Lead

Environment Minister announces new measures to tackle raptor persecution

Firearms UK supports the Scottish Governments efforts to tackle illegal raptor persecution and other wildlife crime….

However, buried in the Environment Minister’s announcement is the following statement;

“I will be asking Scottish Natural Heritage in their capacity as the authority for licensing decisions under section 16 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act to examine how and in what circumstances they can restrict the use of General Licences to trap and shoot wild birds on land where they have good reason to believe that crimes against wild birds have taken place. These General Licences allow the holders to carry out actions that would otherwise be unlawful if undertaken, without any reference to SNH. We regard the use of General Licences as a privilege that should not be extended in circumstances where there is evidence that their use may be facilitating illegal activities.”

Firearms UK is concerned that restricting General Licenses may have an unjustified and unfair impact on law abiding shooters. Why should someone else’s illegal activities impact those who actually obey the law?

The full announcement can be read here

We encourage the law abiding shooters of Scotland to write to their MSPs expressing concern at the potential impact of restrictions to the General Licenses.

You can write to your MSPs via the writetothem online service

Land Authority Form

We have produced a “Land Authority Form” which you may use for confirming, in writing, the details of your shooting permission. We recommend that you carry a copy of the signed form with you when out shooting, perhaps as a scan or photograph on your mobile phone.

The form may be used to provide evidence of “good reason” during Shotgun/Firearms Certificate grants and renewals. For those on their first Firearms Certificate the form may also be used to notify your local Firearms Licensing Department of new shooting permission obtained. N.B. This should be done prior to you shooting on the new permission.

Crow Shooting Tips

Crows, a member of the Corvid family are recognized as a pest species within the UK and are therefore legal quarry on pest control grounds. The act of taking Crows, or other pest bird species are covered by the General License. It is important, and a legal requirement that you are familiar with the General License and any specific conditions related to your particular quarry.

Mike Freeman has kindly given us his permission to reproduce his Crow Shooting Tips from the Pest Control UK Facebook group.

I was asked for some tips on shooting crows, I can only advise on the way that I shoot crows, some of you may benefit, some will have different methods and ideas on this topic.

1. Use a decent cartridge, I use mainly 5’s or 6’s if I have no 5’s. A crow can carry a bit of lead and its not fair to use too lighter load on them and send em off pricked.

2. Location, Find where the crows are feeding on the crop, normally on tram lines or laid areas, I will try to watch the feeding birds the evening before I shoot if its late in the day. Get there and set up before first light, the first visitors are the most confident.

3. Hides. Make a good hide, crows are very wary and will pick up on anything out of the ordinary, I put a partial cover on the top of the hide to give cover from birds looking in. keep movement down to a minimum and be aware of barrel glint on bright days. Look through your hide and not over it.

4.Decoys. I just use 4 plastic deeks, I wipe them with gun oil or WD40 before I use them, yea I know but look in a field of feeding crows, they shine!! I set these about 20-25 m out and slightly to one side of the hide, not a too open pattern. Replace deeks with dead birds as you shoot them, use cradles or props to make em look right. Add to your pattern as you shoot but don’t crowd it.

5. Shooting, Don’t be tempted by the rangey birds wait for em to come to the pattern, same for the high circlers that don’t feel safe, Let em come right in as they can veer off pretty quick if you shoot too early and you wont get the second barrel off if needed. Watch for the ‘stealth crows’ they come in with no sound when you ain’t looking , and enjoy the ones that are committed and come in like jets on an aircraft carrier.

6. Finishing up, clear up ya empties, spread out dead birds on their back wings spread on damaged crop, I spray with diesel to stop foxes buzzards etc from taking them. This will stop them returning. Go to next farm!

The above tips are based on a shotgun approach, for information on tackling crows with a rifle; Shooting Times has an article from April 2010 which covers this topic.

Our Response to the GCN’s Mission Statement and Objectives