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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.

  • You are now up to date with Fieldsports Britain News. Stalking the stories. Fishing for facts.

  • [Music]

  • Thank you David, very Oriental. Now the good news is I got him. Later in the programme

  • we are going to do some real poaching in China. First, duck, Peking duck? Crispy fried duck?

  • No, decoy duck, because China is where they are all made.

  • It is hard to put into words how urban China is becoming and in such a short time. Cities

  • I have never heard of before such as Ningbo and Guangzhou are already like a cross between

  • Wolverhampton and Gotham City.

  • So that racket in the background - this is where your duck decoys come from. I'm here

  • to meet Frank, who is going to tell me all about it.

  • I fly to Europe each year one time, two times so I see the chain stores, I see the shops

  • and I get some ideas from them and I come back to China and make my lines for the hunting.

  • How many of these are you shipping every year?

  • Half a million pieces, normally, totally, together, like goose, crow, pigeon, magpie

  • and ducks.

  • That's goose, crow, pigeon, magpie and ducks

  • It's not just deeks. Frank's company makes float tubes for fishermen and even standalone

  • highseats.

  • It's all too much for keen deerstalker Erik. He has to go and try it out. It's meant to

  • cope with one tonne of weight. However, Erik may need to go easy on the wontons as he breaks

  • the ladder on the way up - and has to use the other highseat ladder to come down. Back

  • to the drawing board with that product.

  • If you are planning to order around half a million decoys and you want to find out more,

  • visit meitaisports.com

  • Now from a beautiful beach resort to the high hills of Canton where I will be going pheasant

  • poaching.

  • Picture a group of country blokes sitting down to a good breakfast before going out

  • for a bit of walked-up shooting. That's what we have here. There is lots of chat about

  • what we might see, what pheasants look like, what eagle tastes like and that needless to

  • say we should have been here last week.

  • How do Erik and I establish that we know how to shoot a muntjac if we see one? We show

  • them films of Roy Lupton of course.

  • They tell us they mainly shoot pheasants here. But there is a variety of game. That is a

  • leopard cat, which is common across China, India and the rest of Asia, and is fond of

  • farm chickens.

  • In the 1950s, there were tigers here. Locals say the government came and shot them all

  • - but it is hard to see how. There is plenty of game in the tangle of bamboo. The rural

  • China you see is hacked out of thick undergrowth. There's an awful lot of China you don't see.

  • The guns our hunter friends use would not pass muster at a British shoot. Outside, they

  • proudly show off a heavily repaired Manufrance No5 �Robust' shotgun and a single-barrel

  • home made hammer gun, both of them 12-bore.Cartridges range from 3-shot to 7.5.

  • We load up into vehicles and head out into the countryside.

  • We're hunting here in Canton Province - and these guys are out after meat, so we're turning

  • down the really little birds and going for the bigger ones

  • At first, we drive round local farmland looking for birds. When we see one, we stop the cars

  • and one of the two shooters hop out and have a go. Any biggish bird will do - like this,

  • a common bird in the rice padis, a brown crake.

  • Now, as you have probably noticed, they ask us to blob-out their faces, and they are not

  • keen to be interviewed. I think they are unclear about whether or not shooting is legal in

  • this province in the eyes of the police or the Government. But if you do go shooting,

  • nobody else bats an eyelid.

  • Unbelievable you would expect the farmers to just show up with strange people running

  • all over their land. Especially us with the camera and the dogs and everything and there

  • was absolutely no reply. Even if we passed them they were just very friendly, a little

  • bit afraid of guns but it was really, really positive.

  • At last we hit the trail of the bird we had come to see - the pheasant, which of course

  • comes from here in China. The guys make their way across the field and a volley of shots

  • follow our soon to be lunch.The dogs leave the bird for our hunter to retrieve who is

  • very pleased with it. This pheasant ... is nothing like a michigan blue, but a subtle

  • brown. It isn't going to matter what colour it is in a few minutes. After that it is time

  • for me to have a go and I think there is a 50, 50 chance that I am going to the way of

  • that last pheasant. I hope the string and ceiling wax will hold. Thankfully I am in

  • one piece as is the pheasant I have just shot over. We both live to fight another day.

  • It was a very challenging shot there - didn't you think?

  • Um I was watching it from the side and it looked easy. Probably if you were standing

  • behind that very short side by side it probably actually was very difficult.

  • I would like to come back here with a reliable 20 bore. A mixture of six shot and buck shot

  • cartridges in case of larger game a couple of british gun dogs, a couple of books so

  • I can point out to the locals what I want to shoot and a butterfly book so that I can

  • identify the dozens of fabulous insects that I will see. I would like to spend a week walking

  • the paddy fields of China in among this gorgeous scenery. I ask Erik how he reckons a Continental

  • would shoot this, he being both hysterical and continental.

  • First of all I think overcome certain taboos, shooting muntjac with a shotgun, but also

  • some challenges you have to walk up much, much closer for example to the muntjac to

  • be able to kill it. The rough shooting I found very interesting. I think if you are doing

  • it in the right season, we saw a lot of tracks of pheasants, of muntjacs and saw a lot of

  • quails. It could be really interesting for rough shooting.

  • The quail are exactly what I would like to shoot, but the locals consider them to be

  • a waste of a cartridge

  • The dogs are peculiar. They have an inscrutable calm about them, but then suddenly burst into

  • action

  • But the dogs are not much good at retrieving game, even with the encouragement of the shooters,

  • who regard any bird lost in that deep thicket a personal failure

  • At last we stop at a collective farm for lunch with the workers. This kind of generosity

  • is normal, charming, and it only costs a few bob. The Chinese are very much in touch with

  • what they eat. In rural areas like this you are woken each morning at 4am by the squeals

  • of whatever is on tonight's restaurant menus. If you can turn up at a remote farmhouse with

  • fresh game, all the better.

  • We shoot a brace of crake, five pheasants and a pigeon. We turn down several coveys

  • of quail. If anyone offers you walked-up shooting in countryside like this, you have got to

  • do it.

  • Now for some bushcraft. It's the Chinese bayberry season, known locally as yang-mei.

  • One thing Erik insists, as a European, you can like the Chinese, laugh with them, eat

  • well with them but do not expect to understand them.

  • Like every developed country in the world, they have plenty of competing religions. The

  • main two in this area are Taoism, which gives us yin, yang and several martial arts, and

  • Buddhism, which gives us Nirvana, and I don't mean the one with Kurt Cobain.

  • I am off to pick berries in the woods with the sunniest girl in China. Sunshine Sun.

  • And now this, this, this, this trees are our family trees and you can enjoy it.

  • After the frantic few days of travelling around the country hunting, bayberry picking - just

  • like blackberry picking - is gentle and therapeutic. Sunshine is proud of her family trees and

  • passionate about the fruit, as are most people in this part of the country. Everywhere you

  • go there are people balancing baskets over their shoulders, carrying the fruit to market.

  • Once again, it's all about the food. I asked if this had anything to do with the starvation

  • the Chinese went through under Chairman Mao. Everyone said no - food has been a Chinese

  • passion for centures.

  • How many of the baskets do you get every year?

  • Uh years?

  • How many baskets like this of fruit?

  • There are about 30 trees all owned by my family on this hill, one hill. My family has two

  • hills with young May trees. Sorry.

  • Thank you Sunshine. Sorry to interrupt.

  • Chinese bayberries are called yang-mei and where-every we go they are delicious, sweet

  • yet sour. Sweet and sour. Now there is an idea.

  • Now we have shot birds, we have shot mammals in China. The one thing that is missing is

  • fish. We are going fishing.

  • If hunting and shooting is somewhere between banned and reluctantly allowed, fishing is

  • a major national pastime. And once again it comes down to food.

  • If you are getting a picture of a people who like eating game, just wait till they get

  • their chopsticks and their chops around fish. And when a restaurant advertises fresh fish,

  • it means fresh fish.

  • I've come to meet Chen An. He's a factory boss who likes nothing more than a morning

  • float fishing for carp. I meet him thanks to his sister, Lily, who speaks English.

  • What is the fish food made from?

  • Rice.

  • Made from rice? And does it have flavour, like meat flavour?

  • Meat flavour? No flavour.

  • Just rice.

  • Yes.

  • I want to ask Mr Chen if he gets first dibs at the newest fishing equipment on the market,

  • because it all comes from China. But perhaps he is a businessman first and a fisherman

  • second, because he reckons I want to make a deal on a new rod.

  • If you want to buy fishing equipment he can give you some information. The main factories

  • to produce this equipment are in Shandong province.

  • Is that here?

  • No Shandong Province.

  • Fishing is huge in China. Public parks in Chinese cities have lakes and those lakes

  • have fishermen. These lads are fishing right in the middle of Ningbo, population 5.7 million.

  • I ask Philip the translator to ask what they are fishing for.

  • Crucian, crucian crucian, crucian carp.

  • That will be crucian carp, then. Back at Mr Chen's pond and the temperature has risen

  • to just short of 40 degrees centigrade - that's over 100 degrees fahrenheit. You can see why

  • the Chinese like a sport that involves sitting still, even though he gallantly gives up his

  • seat in the shade to his sister.

  • Now it's Erik's turn to fish. The heat may be dulling our mammalian senses but the carp

  • are as sharp as ever

  • Nearly got one. It was a little bit quick and my response wasn't fast enough. But in

  • this hot weather it isn't easy.

  • Then it goes right for Erik and he is into his first Chinese crucian.

  • Now it's my turn to get the wrong end of the stick:

  • So he likes hunting, he likes the idea of hunting but he can't go hunting because of

  • the current situation. Would he like to see change?

  • He likes the hunting but the government closes the hunting places from each April to October.

  • During this time you take your guns to the police station.

  • So he can go hunting.

  • Yes, he can.

  • This is a country of a billion+ people. Around a quarter of the world's population is Chinese.

  • The government here tolerates fishing but it says that hunting/shooting is banned. That's

  • not what I've found. Just look at the restaurant menus. They go from pheasant through deer

  • and anything you can pull out of the water, right up to whale meat, and I have to say

  • the jellyfish was rubbery. You don't need a game meat marketing executive here because

  • everybody wants to eat everything. It's probably a good thing that the Government doesn't encourage

  • hunting any more than it does, otherwise there'd be nothing left. However, this is a country

  • that loves its fieldsports.

  • Right. My go. Mr Chen sets me up and I get to sit in Zen-like fisherman's trance, at

  • one with my float, feeling slow disintegration of ball of rice on the sharp little hook.

  • And I'm in.

  • Very unchinese feeling, but that is a really wonderful moment. First Chinese carp.

  • It's been a glorious, sweltering day. With a rod in your hand, you can forget the smog

  • and horror of life in urban China. And Mr Chen has plenty of fish to give to his friends.

  • Of course, we don't have a monopoly on making hunting films in China, even though we reckon

  • were probably the first. Let's have a look at the rest of them on Hunting YouTube

  • This is Hunting YouTube, which aims to show the best hunting, shooting and fishing videos

  • that YouTube has to offer.

  • El Dorado of Chinese hunting is the Mongolian steppe Inner Mongolia is part of China. There

  • are lots of films on YouTube about locals using golden eagles to hunt wolf and fox right

  • across Mongolia and into Kazakhstan. Israel Feiler spent a few days with a falconer to

  • make this film.

  • Hainan Island is located in the South China Sea and is China's southernmost province.

  • The Li people, native to the island hunt python and pig in the forests there.

  • Here's a home video of another of the chow-type dogs we saw actually doing some work. This

  • one is catching a large rat somewhere in southern China.

  • You can't cover Chinese fishing without putting 'Cormorant fishing' into the search box. This

  • film is a straightforward story about men using birds to catch fish and even the BBC

  • can't get it too badly wrong, apart from pointing out that the birds are 'slaves'. And what

  • the BBC gets right is superb underwater footage.

  • There's quite a lot of good sea fishing in China but not many good seafishing videos.

  • The more interesting film I have picked shows electro fishing in a river. The guys here

  • are floating car batteries on innertubes behind them. They fish along the bottom of the river,

  • electrocuting as they go. I have seen this done elsewhere in Asia where the fishermen

  • save power by only electrocuting certain known lies.

  • The Chinese are superbly resourceful. Here is a news story about how they have trained

  • foxes to catch rats that are destroying pasture lands. The presenter points out that foxes

  • are cheaper than rat poison.

  • Now, is there a European sporting agent operating in China? I hear you demand. Well this Spanish

  • operator claims to show argali sheep hunting in China. Chinese hunters we met told us that

  • North-West China and Inner Mongolia are the two great paradises for hunters, with game

  • including deer, bear and wolf. They were unclear about how legal this is. And they were vague

  • about the methods, mentioning everything from knives to dogs to AK47s.

  • Finally, let's go back more than 100 years to this extraordinary film from French IndoChina,

  • which shows buffalo hunting by white-clad colonialists in pith helmets. This was filmed

  • not far (by Chinese standards) from where I had my pheasant outing.

  • You can click on any of these films to watch them. If you have a YouTube film you would

  • like us to pop in to the weekly top eight, send it in via YouTube, or email me the link

  • charlie@fieldsportschannel.tv

  • Well I'm on the beach for a well-earned break after all that hard hunting, but not for long

  • because we are back next week and if you are watching this on Youtube please don't hesitate

  • to hit the subscribe button that is somewhere around the outside of the screen or go to

  • our website www.fieldsportschannel.tv where you can click to like us on Facebook, follow

  • us on Twitter or scroll down to the bottom of the page, pop your email address into our

  • constant contact box. There is a special incentive this week. If you can tell me the time code

  • in this show where you saw my friend the panda then you will be entered into a draw to win

  • the panda. This has been ...

[Music]

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