Wednesday 6 February 2008

Show The Bushwacker To The Rabbit


Sunday morning dawned cold and transport-less, so I dressed up in a base layer of nylon sportswear, hoping the static generated would act as on-board central heating, with a layer of cotton work wear on top to keep out the thorns. I chose a bag that I'd be able to hose down if I needed to and said goodbye to the kids. As I was leaving the house I could hear Mrs SBW sniggering and singing Simon and Garfunkel's well known ode to successful rabbit hunting

'Bright eyes,Burning like fire.Bright eyes,How can you close the pain. How can the light that burned so brightly Suddenly burn so pale? Bright eyes.'

After three changes of train due to engineering works I was finally on my way to meet James for a spot of old-school rabbit hunting. With Ferrets.

And what a great way to spend the day it is,James and Sara met me at the station and we drove through the Sussex countryside. For readers in the US - it looks just like the farmed parts of my adopted home of Northern Virginia, except the roads are narrower and the cars are smaller.

James's dad's place is big enough to have several warrens all in different states of occupation. The biggest coney conurbation we investigated had been flooded out by the recent rains and was unoccupied. Of the five warrens we tried, two yielded a total of three bunnies.

The Ferrets are charming, they have an animated curiosity about them and while I'm sure rabbits view them as dangerous thugs, to me they look very pet-like and from what I've been reading are easy to keep as companions and hunters. Here in the UK their role in feeding a hungry nation is quite well documented with references in court papers going back at least as far as the twelfth century when a ferreter was listed as part of the Royal Court. Today Ferrets ownership and hunting counjours up an images of working class countrymen in flat caps and long coats (to hide the booty) with bulging trousers using them for poaching for the pot or pest control for the land owner but it wasn't always the case. In the 1300's you'd have needed an annual income of some forty shillings (I'm not exactly sure of the exchange rate - but it was quite a lot of money) to own a ferret and the penalty for unlicensed ownership would have been harsh. King Richard II issued a decree in 1384 allowing one of his clerks to hunt rabbits with ferrets and they're mentioned again in 1390 with a law prohibiting the use of ferrets on Sunday when feeding your family wouldn't be allowed to interfere with marshal archery practice.

Ferreting is very simple, at the end of the afternoon I asked James if there was anything more I needed to know and he replied 'that's about it'.
First you need a business of ferrets, two seems to be the preferred number. I'd recently read that one male one female was considered the best ratio, with males being more aggressive and females being more through, James reckoned that whatever you had would do at a pinch. We used the modern locator collars which certainly made things a lot easier when it cam to the digging. In days gone by you'd have had to tie a tread to your Ferret and let it pay out as the Ferret went down the hole, when the Ferret stopped taking line you'd know that it had either killed a rabbit and was taking a nap (something they're notorious for), or it had backed the bunny into a hole with no exit and wasn't letting it out. Either way it would be time to start digging along the tread until you got to the action. With a locator you're spared a hell of a lot of digging as you can find the spot from above ground and dig directly down. In the wet clay laden soil it's still hard work. If your lucky and it all goes according to plan, you've put you ferrets into the right holes the rabbits bolt out of the warren into 'purse' nets that you've secured over the exits. As the rabbit barrels into the net it's own momentum pulls the drawstring tight capturing it. These bolted bunnies are the most highly prized as without teeth marks from the Ferrets their flesh is untainted by coagulating blood and the make slightly less gamey eating.

On the subject of eating special thanks and a commendation must go to Janet (james's mum) for the huge, hearty country lunch she served us that kept out the cold and the AMAZING bread and butter pudding she made.

James has posted a video of our hunt here.

As Ferrets usually come in pairs, they offer up some amusing naming opportunities.
James had a pair called Dead and Buried and a lad called Robin who lives in Scotland and has a Ferreting blog calls his business Purdey and Kalashnikov!

At the school gates I ran into young R, (well he ran into me) a lad in bushwacker jnrs class, he's absolutely fascinated with everything 'survival' and was proudly showing me his copy of The Dangerous Book for Boys when his mum showed up. She'd heard about the forthcoming trip from Mrs SBW and wanted to know if I'd been. I told her we'd gotten three rabbits
S. 'where are they? in a shed in the garden?
SBW 'No! they're in the freezer!'
S. 'NO!!!'
She scuttled off dragging young R behind her leaving me wondering is she still speaking to us or are we now a family of evil rabbit killing hillbillys?
As they say up north 'there's owt as queer as folk'
Thanks for reading
SBW

PS If your interested in getting started yourself Deben have a DVD, sell the locator collars and net making kits.

Picture Credit
Stained glass, Long Melford,Suffolk. Picture by chris chapman
Have a look at his fascinating site about the motif and it's appearance in medieval art across the world.

11 comments:

Mungo said...

Mmmm rabbit stew! Delicious...

Anonymous said...

Well, it looks like that was interesting. So are you having rabbit stew or braised rabbit or have you not decided yet?

Anonymous said...

Good post! Read every word. Keep on hunting those bunnies and eating them. I would hate to live in England, because of the horrible firearm restrictions, but it may get to that in America whether we like it or not. I am sure there will be trouble if it tried. Too many people like their firearms here to try to take them away. But carry on and I hope you make it to our shores for a good time. If you come alone the wife and I would put you up for a night or two down here in southern Indana. You would lke the ambiance.

Michael
http://wwwstayalive.blogspot.com/

The Suburban Bushwacker said...

Michael
thanks for your kind words, and the invitation!
Our firearm laws aren't ideal. Not enough jail time for illegally held weapons, and way to many restrictions on legally owned hunting tools. An even bigger problem is we have NO public land. there are the equivelent of state parks, but woebetide anyone fireing so much as an airgun in any of them.
thanks for reading
SBW

Pablo said...

That's a great account of a great day out. I've never been ferretting so I learnt stacks too. Great vid as well.
I won't mention the bald patch bald patch bald patch.
Pablo.

Ken and Joanne said...

Thank you for enlarging my worldview. I'd heard of ferreting, but never met anyone who'd actually done it. I believe that around the turn of the last century American farmers used to hire ferreters to clear their barns of rodents. Ken from Arizona

The Suburban Bushwacker said...

Ken
From what I've read online ferrets like james' are only pets in the US, hunting with them maybe against the law. There is also a native ferret (black footed I think) which is native to the eastern sea board.
SBW

Anonymous said...

The Black footed ferret is actually native to the Northern Great Plains, and extremely endangered. It subsists primarily on prairie dogs whose populations have been greatly reduced over the last 150 years. I am glad you posted on this. A very interesting hunting style. I love hunting rabbits here in the States (Iowa to be exact). Great blog by the way. I check it daily.

Anonymous said...

Huh, what fun! Do you have to train them at all (like to keep them from eating the rabbit before you get to it)?

The Suburban Bushwacker said...

Howling duck ranch
From what I understand, it's a mixture of keeping them reasonably well fed, conditioning them to come to the sound of locator collars and the instinct to bring food to the pack leader.
SBW

Tim Noble said...

Great job...I haven't been ferreting for years...