All clients are created equal, but the ones on the Outside Days Mailing List get offered sport first.
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There’s no question we’re stressed – just take a look at my follicularly-challenged bonce. Then there are all the statistics on strokes, unfitness and depression: all rising with my blood pressure. Read More
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One of the things we pride ourselves on here at Outside Days is customer service. Okay, I hear you chortle, it often comes with a measured dose of my humour, soup and a sausage roll. But as we’ve grown, wherever possible, its come with me. Read More
I make no apologies for dusting off this old chestnut and republishing. When the loonies, kooks and crazies stop asking questions that would require the publication of numerous volumes to answer, I’ll leave this one in the archive. Until then…
Subtitle: The Things I Really Need to Know to Make Your Day Work
We start booking shooting for one season before the previous season closes, and are in full swing planning for the season to come by the time March becomes lamb-like. Read More
Before you start shaking your head about the cost of foreign travel (never mind sporting holidays) and cleaning your weapons in preparation for mothballing, have a look at Outside Days out of season sporting breaks. Read More
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My passion for wild birds in wild places has led many of you astray. While it’s a stretch to call parts of Norfolk wild, the woodcock that flock there to avoid the winter cold had me dragging out my windproofs and the guinea pigs for a couple of walked up days earlier this month. Read More
This guest blog has us joining Tony Watson on the banks of the Kharlovka in Russia in his continuing pursuit of THE fish: an enormous salmon. Just how big is enormous is a question we’ve been asking Tony for years as he travels the globe after the elusive fish of a lifetime.
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As anyone who has been following my musings in these pages will know, I rounded up the guinea pigs and took them to South Africa last spring. So as not to overindulge you with the riches of South Africa, I’ve been drip feeding the exploits over the months since May. Having already expounded on the outstanding bird shooting and the beautiful fishing, I thought I’d round out the series with a blog on the diversity of plains game (South Africa’s most famous sporting draw) we encountered.
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We were in a highly agricultural area (hence the diversity of wild winged game), which meant much of the larger plains game was behind the wire. That said, these enclosures run to numerous thousands of hectares and support self-sustaining populations that are every bit as wild. Vermin like jackal and warthog move freely through the wire, as do antelope species like steinbok and dikdik. Clearly, an unanticipated risk of using gamekeepers as guinea pigs is their tendency to shoot vermin first and stalk game after as we managed the first two and neither of the latter. It has, however, now left me with the yearning to pursue the smaller antelope species, the more exotic Mini-Ten. Anyone (preferably not a vermin-hungry ‘keeper) with a similar inclination should get in touch.
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In an attempt to mediate my comments about ‘keepers, I should point out that collectively the group took 4 springbok, an impala and a kudu. So it wasn’t all warthogs and jackals. An advantage of the plethora of plains game operations means we can tailor a trip to suit nearly every interest and pocket – a week’s trip for six hunters (mixture of fur, feather and fin) costs less than your average 300 bird pheasant day.
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There’s a division of labour, responsibility or scope in my house: No. 2 picks the wall colour, I paint it. No.2 places the art, I hang it. With one exception: sporting memorabilia. Now we all know I’m not talking about rugby jerseys, cricket balls, or even bits of F1 car. I’m talking about examples of my stalking prowess transformed by the art of taxidermy. Read More
I’m a first aider, and consider myself to have a pretty cool head in emergencies (well, in the face of everything except No. 2′s credit card bill). But even I get in a tangle when it comes to giving a dog first aid. So when Jaz the Nurse told me about his mate ResussRuss and his Canine First Responder courses, it seemed a no brainer.
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