Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Europe Wife is dragging me to Scotland in May!

the 10 days I have off school are not enough my wife says. She is going without me! I hope she and her mother have fun. I am going to substitute a pack trip into the Gila in it's place.

What? No consideration of a driven pheasant shoot!?

MAY????
Really?? May????
And miss a day of NY State Turkey season?????
Unbelievably unbelievable.

Jim

I have from the 5th through 13th off. With travel time etc, that was not enough. I guess I will go next time

I will just have to suck it up and settle for catching several hundred mountain stream trout!

She better bring you a few liters of souvenirs!

My wife and I went to Stirling in 2009 and I found my GGGgrand fathers headstone in the cemetary beside the castle. Stirling is small enough you can walk to most places and old enough to see lots of cool stuff. It's only one hour by train from Edinburgh. Edinburgh has one gun shop. Here's the link.

http://www.dicksonandmacnaughton.com/

kwg

Ur lucky

Small World! I was there in 2010, and also found quite a few ancestors in the same cemetery!!!

My father's parents were both born & raised in Dundee and I've still got relatives there. I was there in '89 and still plan to go back one of these years. Saw Edinburgh, St. Andrews, Glamis Castle, Pitlochry, etc. and a few nice pubs. Even saw the graves of a few of my ancestors along with the building my grandfather grew up in. I wish my wife would drag me to Scotland someday but that ain't gonna happen. If she ever dragged me across the pond it would be to Italy where her family roots are. At least in Scotland there's no language barrier. Interesting link to that Edinburgh gun shop but it's unbelievable what you have to go through over there to become a gun owner.

Since I didn't go, she took her mother and went a cruise in the Caribbean. She is still gone! I'll know tomorrow how it went. I guess Scotland is next year now.

Interesting link to that Edinburgh gun shop but it's unbelievable what you have to go through over there to become a gun owner.


Not sure what you mean about that, "Gun" Shotgun go to police station get paper work fill out (10 mins) and provided you have no serious convictions you get your shotgun licence.

Rifle, get land owners permission to shoot on his land and provided you have no serious convictions you get your licence.

Once you get your licence you can shoot unlimited amounts of game, no bag limits no tags, and the icing on the cake, suppressors are almost mandatory now.

All I got was a T-shirt and a bill...

Lucky you

They Love me in Scotland

Hit the distilleries

Where in Scotland will you go?

Snake

Wrong time of the year mate. I was born and raised in the UK and driven pheasant shooting is best in November to December IMHO but then, I was a gamekeeper so I might be biased..... Not to mention it is NOT cheap: expect to pay at least $35 to $50 per BIRD shot. 100+ bird days are the norm so do the math, even shared between 8 shooters, it ain't cheap. Add in tips, ammo, vehicle rental, hotel and you are looking at serious money. Walked up or 'rough shooting' is a much more cost effective way to enjoy the UK game scene in the winter with a more varied bag too. Everything from pigeons to rabbits, hares, pheasants, partridges, woodcock, snipe, ducks, geese and even deer if you have the right spot to shoot on.

I dunno how long it's been since the guy in Canada has lived in the UK but the shotgun and firearm certificate process is nowhere near as simple or easy as he makes it sound. In the first place, the licensing system is administered by the county police forces and therefore subject to the vagaries of the local cops and their admin. Several police forces in the UK have a well deserved reputation for being a complete PITA with their admin of the system.

I lived in North Yorkshire and even while serving all over the world in the Brit Army, they were pretty decent about all the guns I owned and wanted to buy. Finally gave up my licenses when I moved to the USA in 2005.

You have to get your application countersigned by 2 people who have known you for at least 3 years for both a shotgun and firearm certificate application. While not strictly required by the letter of the law, the cops will likely come to your home to inspect where you intend to store the guns when not in use. Again, while not required by the letter of the law, many police forces will list the exact locations where each of the rifles may be used and for what purposes. There is also a limit on the amount of rifle ammunition that may be purchased at one time and stored in your home. Not to mention with the stupid EU rules on firearms, some police forces count soft or hollow point bullets as complete rounds of ammo for the purposes of how much ammo you can have in your possession....

Sure the game laws are far more relaxed than here (and that is one of the very few things I miss about the UK) but the gun laws are fuggin HORRIBLE!!! I much prefer the USA and was one of the very MAJOR reasons I moved here.

The UK can absolutely be a visiting sportsman's delight at any time of the year but you need to get with a reputable guide to get the best out of it. I think the OP got the better deal by hiking in the Gila; after all, mixing with the skirt wearing porridge wogs (Scots!) is always a bit of chore......

I dunno how long it's been since the guy in Canada has lived in the UK but the shotgun and firearm certificate process is nowhere near as simple or easy as he makes it sound. In the first place, the licensing system is administered by the county police forces and therefore subject to the vagaries of the local cops and their admin. Several police forces in the UK have a well deserved reputation for being a complete PITA with their admin of the system.Quote

2 years ago.
Its as simple as I made it out to be. How difficult is it to ask a couple of friends to put there names and addresses on a piece of paper? sure each force is different but I cannot say enough good things about Sussex FD and NEVER had any problems and I was on first name terms with them!!. Oh and the "cops" that come and look at your cabinet, they are civvies and again whats the big deal?.
Again not sure what the big deal is with the ammo, sure expanding heads were classed as "ammo" but you want to hold 1000 rds you put that on your application, not difficult really.

I guess you never lived in Gwent (that's a part of Wales for those not familiar with UK geography) like several of my mates did? One of them had a .458 Win Mag as he liked to go to Africa every other year. Had hell on convincing the local Firearms Officer he should be allowed to buy it. That pompous little git eventually allowed him a variation to purchase it but absolutely refused to let him have authority to purchase or possess ammo for it. This turd said if my mate wanted to use it to kill things in Africa, he could buy ammo for it in Africa as no animals in the UK required a rifle with that amount of power to kill 'em. Yeah, really! He eventually ended up suing the police to allow him to buy ammo and he won when the judge agreed the cops were acting like idiots.

Greater Manchester Police were nearly as bad as I had friends there too. Gave my brother a car, Ford Sierra hatchback. He ends up trading to some rip off car sales place on the outskirts of Manchester. They call GMP when they find 9mm cases under the carpet in the trunk area. (This was about a year after the handgun ban in the UK) GMP wanted my local cops to send the Armed Response Team to my house and lock me up until they could come over to interview me. Sensibly, my local copper called me first. We established the 9mm cases had ended up there when I was shooting my Browning HP service pistol on the military range in preparation for Army pistol competition and I was using the car as a case catcher.

I can give you chapter and verse on the abuses wrought on law abiding folks by out of control Firearms Departments at various police forces in the UK. The "big deal" is that the Firearms Acts do NOT allow the cops to make up the LAW to suit themselves when it comes to enacting the provisions of the Acts but many do, time and time again. I have had to fight to own more than one rifle in the same caliber; fight to be allowed to buy more ammo than they thought I should be; fight to get the stupid restrictions they put on rifles removed and many other instances of inane behavior. My .22 Hornet rifle had a restriction of "only to be used for the destruction of hares and foxes on the XYZ Farm." Ergo, if I shot a rabbit with it or wanted to shoot hares on ABC Farm, I was technically in violation of the restrictions on my certificate for which the penalty could have been revocation and forfeiture of my guns.

You were lucky with Sussex Police; many others in the UK weren't and aren't so please educate yourself before you mislead a bunch of people into thinking that 'reasonable restrictions' can be easily complied with. The problem with reasonable restrictions is whose definition of reasonable are we going to use? Yours or Diane Feinstein's???

I have educated myself and am not misleading people, I also dealt with Cheshire police without issue, perhaps its your friends that caused these problems i dont know, what I do know is that everybody that I have shot or dealt with have had few issues.
Words like "pompous little git" and "Turd" I have never had the need to call any of the staff these names.

You mention about shooting hares and foxes on other land other than whats on your cert, again this is a very simple fix, you just get a letter from the landowner saying that they give you permission to shoot on there land, not difficult really is it? I have seen this and usually the wording is something along the lines of "or other land deemed suitable by the CFO". I had an open cert so this was a none issue for me.

The incident you had with GMP I would say is pretty fair and so was the outcome, you didnt get locked up and once the facts came out all was good. I had my own issue going to work one morning and I insisted that the 2 cops to call the ARV, they even wanted to cuff me while I waited! the ARV turned up I spoke with them about what had happened and the words they used to the 2 officers were very interesting, the cops apologised for my trouble and left!! this is in London.

I try and treat people the way I wish to be treated, so far I`ve have few issues in all aspects of life.

So if everything was so fine and dandy in the UK with the firearms laws, why pray tell does the BASC have an office who deals with only those issues and nothing else? Why do they offer 50,000 pounds worth of insurance to cover appeals court costs of suing the police when they attempt to impose unlawful and unnecessary limitations on the legitimate firearms owner?

I held both shotgun and firearms certificates from 1986 to my immigration here in 2005. I had one of the largest collections in North Yorkshire and dealt with many others of a similar interest to mine. I was an expert witness for the Northern Regional Crime Squad in several cases involving the illegal conversion of deactivated firearms back to full auto machine guns. I was also the VP of the Anglo American Hunting Club at a RAF Menwith Hill near Harrogate and arranged a way that US service personnel could have their commanding officers certify they were of good character to enable them to get around the requirement to have personal referees who had known them for 3 years.

In short mate, I know what the hell I am talking about when it comes to Firearms Laws and the way some police forces in the UK rampantly abused their powers. Your supposed idea of having a land owner give permission to use the Hornet on other land is completely and utterly WRONG. The conditions on the certificate MUST be complied with; any deviation from those conditions are grounds for revocation of the certificate, regardless of your intentions or permission slips from farmers.

I finally, after much effort also ended up with an open certificate but the POINT sir, is that nowhere in ANY of the various Firearms Acts is there any authority for the Police to act as they did. Some Police forces are very good in the way they administer the Acts; others are simply horrible. It is the arbitrary and capricious way the law was interpreted that led to Hungerford and Dunblane. In both cases, if the letter of the law had been followed, neither Ryan or Hamilton would have owned the firearms they used to commit their heinous crimes.

You are right about one thing; you really don't know much of the reality of how the Firearms laws are administered outside of your isolated experiences. I take it you never read 'Guns Review' or 'The Handgunner' when those magazines were published in the UK? Never heard of an organization called the Shooter's Rights Association? If you had, you wouldn't be so bloody blase about the pointless, needless and completely unnecessary regulations forced on the UK shooter for nothing more than a knee jerk, political reaction to incompetent police administration.

It still annoys me that my friends in the UK have to put up with stupidity, ignorance and unfair treatment at the hands of firearms officers and departments who either don't know or don't care about the LAW rather than their policies. Consider yourself lucky you didn't have to deal with them; many others were and are not as lucky as you.

Stirling is 90 k from Edinburgh via rail road. It's a nice lttle town with some nice little bars and a short walk from everything. Visit the Church of the Rude where Mary queen of Scots was corinated and her son, King James was baptised. Also the Wallace Monument. It's a nice little town on the edge of the Highlands. kwg

My GGGrandfather was the military governor of the castle as was his father my GGGGrandfather. I found a guy who can help you with some history at the old hospital across the alley from the Church of the Rood. PM me and I can give you his name. kwg