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  • [Music]

  • Welcome to Fieldsports Britain, coming to you this week from the People's Republic of

  • China.

  • Coming up: This is where the pheasant and the muntjac come from, and I'll be looking

  • for both of them.

  • I'll be visiting one of the factories in Cina that make all the kit we use to attract pigeons

  • crows and ducks

  • First, I'm going to this paradise island to look for deer, goats and rabbits

  • So here's the story. In 2011, we carry a news report saying that the first man in China

  • to own land is a petrochemicals millionaire who has bought a lease on an island near the

  • city of Ningbo where, instead of opening a casino or a shopping centre, he opens a hunting

  • reserve, and this in a country where it is widely believed that hunting is banned. Well,

  • Erik van der Horst gets in touch with us to say he is based in Ningbo and would we like

  • to go? I push in front of David, Roy, Mark, Crow, Dom and everyone else, and say yes please.

  • 18 months later, I am at a ferry terminal that may not be up to much but the boat itself

  • is Chinese industrialist class.

  • So we've left the Chinese mainland behind us and we are heading for we don't know what.

  • But this is the birthplace of Chinese hunting - something that's been banned along with

  • guns since 1949. Here, it's not only tolerated it's quite possibly legal. Let's find out.

  • It's a half-hour air-conditioned whiz over the water past dazzling James Bond scenery.

  • We come into port and, if you listen carefully, you can hear them say it: "The plane, boss,

  • the plane". We land, we round a corner and there is the hotel.

  • The following morning, we are up early to go stalking. Rosy-fingered dawn is spectacular.

  • The potential for hunting less so. Erik spots a herd of goats or, as he disparagingly calls

  • them, sheep.

  • I reckon we will have about three to four hour stalk up to the sheep you just filmed.

  • By the sounds of it we have got quite an experience and quite a good stalk. As far as I understand

  • we will call in the sheep when we get near. It will be something like "sheep, sheep, sheep,

  • sheep" at which point they will all come running in and we have got about ten minutes to shoot

  • them.

  • Just ten minutes.

  • Probably ten minutes, yes.

  • The gamekeeper hands out the firearms to Erik me and to Mr Yang, a Chinese industrialist.

  • The 12-bore shotguns are marked with the word Ying - there: Yang with Ying - though it's

  • hard to know if Ying is the make of the gun or its dynasty.

  • We will use three-shot cartridges, whatever we are shooting at: deer, goats, rabbits or

  • pheasants. It is indeed a long walk in to the goats. There is plenty of sign of muntjac

  • but the undergrowth is so thick, you would have to be a muntjac to get close to them.

  • We reach the farm animals. Erik and the gamekeeper stalk forward. The goats turn out to be too

  • quick for Erik. Maybe this is not going to be easy after all. And Erik is cross about

  • another gap between European and Chinese hunting cultures.

  • It is a great and interesting stalk, but I am not going to shoot a goat at 50 metres

  • or more with a shotgun. We will give it to our Chinese friend

  • Another complaint Erik has is the speed at which the Chinese stalk

  • Fastest stalk I've ever done in my life

  • When I take over the gun, I slow the pace down significantly.

  • However, apart from the bark of deer and the occasionally crashing noise, I see nothing.

  • By 9am, the temperature has reached 30 degrees centigrade and the game is lying doggo, but

  • at least the gamekeeper is keeping something - his sense of humour. We head for the hotel,

  • where I ask Mr Yang what he thinks of the morning.

  • He says there are not too much game in this island.

  • Here the hunting is forbidden at night. But if we go out at night we may hunt some deers.

  • I also want to know what the Chinese think of shooting and hunting - and do they enjoy

  • it?

  • He says in China people are only hunting on islands, Gobi Desert and forests.

  • Ok and what kind of animals do they hunt in China?

  • In northern part of China and eastern China, people hunt bears, and in Mongolia people

  • hunt wolves.

  • And for him is it about the hunting or eating the food afterwards or the whole thing. That

  • is important for us to understand.

  • People go hunting just for fun and you know that guns are illegal in China, so people

  • who are interested in them just due to their interest.

  • Throughout our trip to China, we were unable to find out whether hunting is really banned.

  • Certainly, gun ownership carries a stiff prison sentence in some provinces, but plenty of

  • people own guns, and some we met own them with the permission of the police. Look at

  • the London 2012 Olympics. The Chinese won more medals in the shooting events than any

  • other country.

  • As you can imagine, Erik has strong views about the hunting - and about what he would

  • do if he were running the gaff.

  • At the end of our walk I actually had the feeling that what we did may actually have

  • been wrong for the Chinese way. So what they do is they walk so fast and basically they

  • bump into animals.

  • They march the animals down.

  • Where we now had to compromise with too many people and of course the stalker behind us

  • chopping away on branches.

  • Yes, and I noticed that if we stopped where we might have seen a muntjac that was a good

  • opportunity to have a cigarette, especially if the wind was behind us.

  • Yes, exactly.

  • Interesting yes. And of course the misfires with the shotgun were absolutely ... you have

  • to cope with a lot. But we are sitting at one end of this beautiful beach, it is not

  • a bad place.

  • Actually I think it is a really, really good place. The sea with the beach. The hotel is

  • sunny and comfortable. I love the food it is really excellent food.

  • I love the fact that you eat what you shoot immediately.

  • Yes that is really good.

  • Brilliant.

  • And to be honest if they would buy two dogs and a buttalo call

  • That would make all the difference.

  • Absolutely. Actually I think it could be a really good mix. On the one hand for the Chinese

  • people with the bunnies and the goats and on the other for Western people who have more

  • stalking experience, but they need to learn a lot.

  • They need to learn about muntjac stalking.

  • Shall we go back in for a cheeky rice wine?

  • Um that might be a very good idea.

  • And perhaps take a surf later.

  • Late afternoon before dinner we head off again, this time after bunnies which we have seen

  • near the hotel and look suspiciously un-nervous. Our new Chinese friend limbers up by practicing

  • on a nearby flag pole. It is only a few yards and we come upon a rabbit. Another 20 yards

  • and blow me another rabbit lurking behind some rushes, but otherwise oblivious to our

  • presence. Erik shoots, misses then goes to see if he can flush it out.

  • It is wild enough to have gone into hiding.

  • Further up the path, it's my turn to shoot and bring down another mighty rabbit.

  • Well I can't show you too much, but two man team from Europe is one all versus China at

  • the moment.

  • As well as the rabbits, the island offers Chinese bayberries.

  • These are really, really nice.

  • With the scores running even, Mr Yang edges ahead with first one rabbit, and then another

  • - but after we have one each, Erik and I are not quite so keen on the sporting side of

  • Chinese rabbit shooting.

  • The Chinese may have a lot to learn from us about shooting - but we have plenty to learn

  • from them about eating. Everything we shot or caught on our trip we ate immediately,

  • meat, feet, guts, backbone and all - and I might have come home smelling like a Chinese

  • restaurant but it was delicious.

  • Food for the Chinese is a social event that takes place three times a day. Whenever possible,

  • it involves beer, rice wine and French brandy. Here's Mr Yang showing his skills as a calligrapher,

  • writing Fieldsports Channel in Chinese - literally "hunting the weird". If the hordes sweep in

  • from the East, this is our new logo.

  • Then Mr Yang, partly fuelled by rice wine, shows how he will disable Erik when that day

  • comes.

  • The Golden Sand Bay Hunting Resort is expensive, but much of the cost is tied up in the price

  • for hiring the boat. One night there comes to �200 a person, including ferry, bed,

  • board and two outings shooting. Also, the price goes up significantly once the manager

  • decides you are rich. If you want to find out more and you either speak Mandarin or

  • you don't mind Google Translate's version, have a look at nbhaiyang.com

  • Another hunting resort advertising in China is the Oriental International Hunting Park

  • in Shanxi province, west of Beijing. Visit East-Hunt.com

  • What do you reckon?

  • I am not sure.

  • Do you think shoot it anyway?

  • Give it a try.

  • Ok and now it's over to David on the Fieldsports Channel news stump.

  • [Music]

  • This is Fieldsports Britain News.

  • The Netherlands has 300,000 greylag geese. The environment department of a Dutch university

  • says that 380,000 geese need to be gassed over the next five years to bring that number

  • down to 100,000. It costs around 18 euros to gas each goose. Holland banned goose shooting

  • in 1981, except under licence.

  • Our government says well when you hunt them the next problem you are going to have is

  • what are you going to do with those animals and that is more or less one of the reasons

  • that I wrote a book about it. How do you get it back in the food circuit.

  • And you can watch more of that interview by clicking on the link.

  • Now, Swiss MPs have voted against a ban on stray cat shooting. They rejected a motion

  • to outlaw the cat hunt. The Swiss Government says there are around 1.5 million stray cats

  • in Switzerland and it points to a British study which shows that cats kill 15 birds

  • each per year.

  • Staying with cats. A woman from Indiana in the USA who shot what she thought was a bobcat

  • that had been attacking her own cats was surprised when it turned out to be a leopard. The owner

  • of a local wildlife rescue centre that specialises in big cats denies that it is his.

  • If you would prefer to see a live leopard instead of a dead one, then click on the link,

  • to see our how to release a leopard film. Made all the better because Charlie nearly

  • soils himself.

  • Our own Roy Lupton has been appearing on ITV news this week. Roy was talking about the

  • urban fox problem after ITV Meridian used our night vision footage of urban fox calling

  • in Maidstone town centre. The report also featured a fox expert who suggested that walking

  • a dog around the edge of your garden will keep foxes at bay. Yeah right.

  • Schools Challenge TV is offering a competition prize this week. You can win a family ticket

  • to the CLA Game Fair. Click on the link on the screen to watch this week's show, which

  • says how Schools Challenge Academy members plan to take their shooting careers to the

  • next level and bid for Olympic success.

  • And finally, these South African tourists got a surprise when an angry giraffe started

  • chasing them. Giraffes can run up to 35 miles per hour and have a lethal kick.