Game & Gun Gazette

Readers & Writers Adventures 2008/'09

Shooting Sportsman hosts its 14th Readers & Writers Adventures program in 2008/'09 with a pair of American lodges that exemplify the premium experience available for two of wingshooting's regional archetypes: South Dakota pheasant and Georgia quail hunting. Through the years our adventures have been smashing successes for their combined camaraderie with fellow readers and SSM editors as well as stunning locales offering top-quality hunting and accommodations. This season continues those traditions.

Firesteel Creek Lodge
Since 1934 the Lindskov family has built a diversified farm and ranch that has grown to 60,000 acres of high prairie straddling three counties in northwestern South Dakota. Now run by second- and third-generation stewards, the Lindskov Ranch is among the largest family-owned land parcels in the Dakotas, offering a huge variety of terrain and plenty of room for gamebird-habitat management.
Today the Lindskovs offer spectacular wingshooting and hospitality at their Firesteel Creek Lodge. The ranch's extensive grassland and riverine systems of breaks and flats hold sharp-tailed grouse and Hungarian partridge, and the sheer size of the property allows the lodge to manage hunter pressure and offer some of the best wild-bird hunting on the American prairie.
Of course Firesteel Creek guides guests to plenty of ringneck pheasants as well, and here, because of the ranch's extensive management of cropland and other habitat, much of the population is wild. (There is also a designated preserve area.) By day enjoy classic South Dakota field drives or follow guides and dogs into the thick edges; by night enjoy a cocktail and fine dining at the main lodge-a 5,000-square-foot ranch house built in 1916 in impressive style.
SSM Contributing Editor Bruce Buck-gentleman, fine shot, freelance bon vivant and consummate host-will accompany our group for three days of hunting in early November. Guests will arrive Friday, November 7, and depart Tuesday, November 11. The cost of $2,375 includes licenses, ammunition and transportation to and from the airport in Bismarck, North Dakota. In fact, the only expenses not included are taxes, gratuities and the cost of shipping birds home.

Quail Country
From the broad plains of the Old West we move to the hallowed grounds of southwest Georgia-to 3,500-acre Quail Country Plantation, near Albany. Several decades ago, Quail Country was among the first plantations in the state to develop quail hunting as a business, yet it only recently has expanded to allow broader public access to its extensively managed lands.
Recent changes began with the right man for the job: Bill Bowles, who was born and raised in "quail country" and has learned the region's bird-hunting business from the ground up. As the plantation's new manager, Bowles has overseen the expansion of Quail Country's beautiful rustic lodge to 13,500 square feet and 15 bedrooms, with a dining room, two lounge areas and an outdoor deck and pavilion.
Bowles also has overseen the growth of one of the area's finest kennels and hunting-dog programs, as Quail Country uses pointers, setters and German shorthairs to find birds, and cockers and springers to flush and retrieve them. Hunting on thoughtfully designed courses, guests traverse the plantation in jeeps or in a custom-designed hunting buggy.
Our group-again hosted by Bruce Buck-will arrive on Wednesday, January 7, 2009, for three days of hunting, departing Sunday, January 11. The cost of $2,875 includes licenses, ammunition and transportation to and from the airport in Albany. The only expenses not included are taxes, gratuities and the cost of shipping birds home.
Many of our shoots have booked fully well in advance of hunting season, so early expressions of interest may help ensure your participation. For more information on our Readers & Writers Adventures, visit www.shootingsportsman .com or contact Thierry Bombeke, 207-594-5944; tbombeke@shootingsportsman .com. -Ed Carroll

- New Sponsors for the Ninth Southern -

Griffin & Howe and Tony Galazan's Connecticut Shotgun Manufacturing. Co. have joined an impressive list of sponsors for the Ninth Annual Southern Side-by-Side Championship & Exhibition. The Southern-to be held April 25 to 27 at Deep River Sporting Clays, near Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina-includes a tented exhibition featuring some of the world's finest gun dealers and gunmakers.
For the fifth year running, the Southern also will host The Challenge Cup, a charity event held each year that pits shooters from the Parker Gun Collectors Assoc. against gunners from the L.C. Smith Collectors Assoc. All proceeds from the Challenge Cup are donated to charity, and Shooting Sportsman has become the event's official sponsor. This year a hammergun event has been added to the intense-but-good-natured rivalry.
The Southern is the largest regional side-by-side shoot in the US after the Vintage Cup. "Our gate count surpassed 1,500 last year," said Bill Kempffer, founder of the Southern and owner of Deep River Sporting Clays.
As in the past, attending the exhibitions is free for all spectators. The accompanying Grand Exhibition will again include prestigious American, British and Continental gunmakers, gun dealers and other firms associated with double guns and hunting.
Shooting events-open to side-by-sides only-include small-gauge championships; Compak Sporting; Helice; a 12-gauge preliminary event; a 10-gauge event; an American Classics event; The Challenge Cup; and the Southern Side-by-Side Championship, aptly named The Ripon Cup. In years past the championship has been based on a course of 80 sporting clays targets at a varying number of stations.
London gunmaker Atkin Grant & Lang will be returning as the founding sponsor of The Ripon Cup, with Holland & Holland sponsoring the Helice shoot, Connecticut Shotgun Mfg. Co. sponsoring the American Classics event, and Griffin & Howe sponsoring the Compak Sporting. Other sponsors include Italy's FAMARS, Chris Batha's Charles Boswell Gunmakers, and SSM. A traditional eastern North Carolina-style pig-pickin' accompanied by a bluegrass band caps off Saturday's events.
To register or for more information, contact Deep River Sporting Clays, 919-774-7080; www.deepriver.net. For more information on The Challenge Cup, visit the Parker Gun Collectors' Website at www.parkergun.org or the L.C. Smith Collectors' site at www.lcsmith.org.
-Vic Venters

A New Factory for Westley's

Birmingham, England, emerged as a great gunmaking power during the 19th Century, in part because of the genius of the city's native craftsmen. It is thanks to men like Westley Richards that the Midlands city became known as the "Workshop of the World."
The Westley Richards firm owed its success to breakthrough technology-including the Anson & Deeley boxlock action-but it also was the first to organize disparate branches of gunmaking under one roof behind the facade of its No. 82 High Street shop.
In A Brief History of The Westley Richards Firm, Leslie B. Taylor noted the change: "Colonel Hawker, for instance, it may be remembered, records that he would have needed to take a journey of twenty miles through London in order to see so many departments in the art of gunmaking as were gathered together under the Westley Richards roof, 'the splendid factory' of 1849."
By 1894, burgeoning business and the need for a testing facility made a move to what would become the suburbs inevitable. Land was acquired in Bournbrook, Worcestershire, and a local Arts & Crafts architect, Charles E. Bateman, was employed to create a purpose-built factory. (Even at this late date a typical Birmingham gun-quarter workshop was a terraced Georgian home converted to gunmaking by the simple expedient of roofing the back garden.) The result was a deliberately simple building of round arches and red brick that served the firm for more than 100 years.
Now the old Bournbrook factory will be torn down to accommodate a hospital, and the conservation architectural firm of Edward Nash and Assoc. has been commissioned to design the new facility, which Westley Richards owner and managing director Simon Clode says, "will preserve the old atmosphere to every extent possible whilst incorporating the very best manufacturing technology and practices available today." When completed, the new 20,000-square-foot headquarters will house workshops, retail showrooms, a museum and a 50-yard indoor range.
Scheduled for completion this spring, the new facility will cost an estimated $9 million and will house the operations of Westley Engineering-a precision engineering company that manufactures all of the components for Westley Richards guns and rifles.
"We will continue to offer the same highly personalized service that we always have provided our customers from the new location," Clode said. "I want our guns and rifles to be perfectly suited to their owners and to flawlessly perform their intended function in the field as well as be great works of art. The key to the future of in-house gunmaking is keeping the skills alive. If you start shaving off corners and introducing mass production and machining to a fine edge with no hand skills, then you lose the beauty of the English bespoke gun." The new factory will be the last and only one in Birmingham where all of the various departments in the art of gunmaking, including engraving, are gathered under one roof.
-Douglas Tate

William Evans Finds New Home on the Range

English bespoke gunmaking firm William Evans is heading west and opening an outpost at the National Shooting Centre at Bisley. The new retail shop is less than 30 miles west of Evans' central-London flagship store on St. James's Street. The building was formerly home to Kennedy Gunmakers, and Bisley is home to the original NRA (of the UK) and also the history-drenched shooting range that gave its name to Samuel Colt's best-known target revolver.
"We aim to provide the very best in modern shooting equipment and accessories and yet preserve the traditional elements of good service and classical style," said Managing Director Duncan Cavenagh. "This is a philosophy that fits perfectly with Bisley's provision of the most up-to-date shooting facilities in the world at a site that recalls its Victorian beginnings with gracious colonial buildings.
"William Evans are delighted Tony Kennedy will be working with the firm in a consultancy capacity, continuing to supply and service his customers with top-end Italian bespoke guns from our shops in both London and Bisley."
Located in an ivy-covered armory on the Bisley grounds beneath an old iron water tank, the 1,000-square-foot store will be open seven days a week year-round, providing William Evans' clientele with bespoke "best" guns from both Brescia and London as well as the best British kit for all of their clay-shooting needs.
Once an inconspicuous hamlet, Bisley's fortune changed in 1890 when the UK's National Rifle Association Championships moved there from Wimbledon. In 1894 Col. Colt created his target revolver to compete in the British Commonwealth Championships match; in 1908 Bisley hosted most of the shooting events in the Olympic Games; and in 2002 the grounds hosted all of the shooting for the Commonwealth games. Today Bisley is still active as a complete range for everything from air-pistol to full-bore-rifle shooting to clays.
For more information, contact William Evans, 01144-01483-486-500; www.williamevans.com. -Douglas Tate

Consider Columbia

Last fall, as so often happens during the season, things became hectic. After a flight to New York and then a trip to Maryland for the Vintage Cup, I returned home to Idaho just in time to pack for Montana. But a favorite travel and hunting shirt-one that hardly wrinkles and stays warm when wet-couldn't be found. Finally it turned up, nicely folded and still in the bottom of the duffel. I piled on the rest of my gear and headed out the door. It was only after wearing the shirt in the sharptail fields that I realized it had been on two six-hour plane flights and worn several times in the previous three weeks-and it still looked good.
It was a Columbia Sportswear Tennant Creek II shirt, a long-sleeve made from Omni-Cloth-the company's blend of two-thirds Modal (essentially a rayon made of fiber from beech trees) and one-third polyester. In the camper that night my hunting partner, a veterinarian from Washington, was unpacking his gear when we noticed we'd brought the same shirt. Obviously, we both appreciated the quality and value of clothing from Columbia.
Starting as a small family business in 1938 with a definite orientation toward the Pacific Northwest's "hook & bullet" crowd, Columbia Sportswear today enjoys $1.3 billion in annual revenues and supplies 13,000 retailers worldwide. The emphasis of the Portland, Oregon-based company has shifted to ski and sportswear, but hunters should always consider Columbia when looking for gear. Plain and simple: The gear works, holds up over time and is always reasonably priced. It's especially nice when you find it on sale from retailers such as Sierra Trading Post, Cabela's, Bass Pro Shops, REI or Campmoor.
My only real complaint with Columbia's clothing is that my favorite items seem to be replaced too soon with new models. I have a favorite cotton safari shirt that compares favorably with a Willis & Geiger, but you can't get either of them anymore. (Of course, that speaks more about me and the fashion-driven retail-clothing world than it does about Columbia.)
One nice new item is a version of the classic Widgeon Parka with a shell of Omni-Tech, Columbia's own breathable, water-repellant fabric. I still have my original Widgeon, but after 10 years it's faded and worn. A friend in Montana using the new model says it "works as well as anything I've ever used" in keeping the wind and rain at bay.
So if you have to look presentable after a long plane ride or want something functional for fishing or hunting without breaking the bank, consider Columbia (www.columbia.com). -Clair Kofoed

Lanford's Best

Lanford Monroe was one of those people who died far too young. She was born in 1950 and died in 2000, long before she explored the full stretch of her immense talent. In that, she was like the singers and songwriters Kate Wolf and Eva Cassidy. But rather than a voice, Lanford Monroe did her work with paintbrushes and left behind a body of art that sings as clearly and sweetly as any angel ever could.
She's been described as a "wildlife artist," but she wasn't, really. She was a landscape painter who often included animals in her compositions, and we haven't had a landscape painter her equal in several generations. She liked foxes and bears and horses and deer. Sometimes they're central to her paintings, more often they're elements in a larger scheme. Like us, they are part of something greater.
Born in Connecticut and raised in Alabama, Lanford came by her gift honestly. Her father, C.E. Monroe, was a top-drawer magazine illustrator in the age before offset printing wrecked an entire genre. Her mother, Betty, was a superb portrait artist. Lanford could do it all, and did. She liked working in oil, either on board or canvas. She also liked to travel, so she left us images from Arizona to France, but mostly from her beloved South. Unlike Leonardo and Jesse James, she was right-handed.
Thankfully, there is a magnificent new book titled Homefields-The Art of Lanford Monroe (Sporting Classics, 2007), containing 226 pages of the most gorgeous paintings you can imagine. Copies are available for $60 by calling 800-849-1004.
This book is a feast. Looking through it makes me miss her, but now she belongs to the ages.
-Michael McIntosh

The Flights of Spring

Hunters often are assumed to be killers only: Those unfamiliar with our sport believe we go out in the fall to shoot birds and are uninterested in our quarry at other times of the year. That certainly doesn't reflect my view toward the game I seek. In early spring I love to venture out at dusk to watch the woodcock males take their mating flights.
The show usually starts in mid-March here in northern Vermont. In Pennsylvania, where I lived until 2003, festivities got underway in late February. Simple enough to gain admission: Find an old field in a lowland setting scattered with brush but not profoundly overgrown. Peent. That's the male's call, issued while he sits on the ground. Peent. Sneak to within 50 yards and stop where you can see a swath of sky above the singing ground.
Peent. He sounds this rasping, buzzing call for minutes on end. Then he takes off on twittering wings. The woodcock flies upward, scaling the sky in a great broadening spiral. Near the top of this ascent-perhaps 70 yards up-the bird fades out in the gloaming. Then down he spirals, singing a liquid, ethereal p chuck tuck cuck oo chuck p chuck tuck cuck oo. It sounds somewhat like a robin's vocalizing but is wilder, purer. The woodcock sweeps past the grounded observer. The bird's wings beat rapidly, and the long bill sometimes can be glimpsed. The bird may hover briefly above the ground. Then he pitches in, landing in the spot from which he took off.
On my land I have rejuvenated several singing grounds by brushing out old pastures that were getting too thick. At times I have heard three males going at once, spaced out a few hundred yards apart. A bird will defend his territory, flying directly at an interloping male while making an aggravated chattering.
Hens, attracted by the males' displaying, steal in and land. On the ground the male fans his white-tipped tail and struts about like a little turkey gobbler. After mating, a hen will nest in suitable cover nearby. The male is promiscuous and will mate with as many females as he can; he plays no role in incubating eggs or rearing young.
The flights of spring carry on for weeks. A male will sing for an hour or so at dawn and at dusk. In the evening, if the moon is full, he may continue long after sundown. The crepuscular displays are beautiful, timeless rituals. Witnessing them helps me connect with the woodcock year after year.
-Charles Fergus

A California Concours

Continuing in the tradition of the Gold Medal Concours d'Elegance of Fine Guns, this spring a pair of the GMC's original organizers will revisit the juried fine-gun-exhibition format and return it to California, where it all began. Roger Sanger and Steve Helsley will host The Western Concours d'Elegance of Fine Guns on March 16 at Greg Martin Auctions headquarters, in San Francisco.
The daylong event will be a benefit for the National Rifle Association Foundation and will feature the display and judging of fine guns from many categories of rifles and shotguns, with awards presented in numerous classes. Members of several gun collectors' associations have been invited to attend and participate, and the event will feature the outstanding E.M. Reilly gun collection gathered by Terry Buffum, a Californian now living in Bend, Oregon. Amid a day given to fraternizing with like-minded fine-gun cognoscenti, the Western Concours will include a number of seminars and informal presentations, as well as appraisals and the opportunity for gun photography by Helsley.
The Western Concours is sponsored by Greg Martin Auctions, Shooting Sportsman, The California Side-by-Side Society, and the German Gun Collectors Association. For more information on exhibiting or attending, visit www.westernconcours.com. -Ed Carroll