Had a quick look but can`t find any threads about this subject, please forgive me if I missed any.
I`m 48 now and grew up with a dad who was a poacher. He was what I call an old school poacher..he did it chiefly to put food on our table during hard times and to make some pin money which he did by selling salmon to a wee fish shop in Helmsdale and the occasional haunch of venison to the local polisman who would then turn a blind eye. (note..the police have definately changed character over the years!!)
Nowadays I keep hearing about folks called `poachers` and the damage they do, the carnage they leave behind, but to me those folks are not truly poachers in the sense I know it.
They hit the highlands in vans and shoot indiscriminately, usually red deer, leaving behind dying injured beasts and taking meat from whatever actually dies regardless of quality, age or health.
I`ve driven past such sites where deer heads litter the ground, and blood is spattered yards in every direction. It`s horrendous.
Ditto the gamefish poachers who decimate lochs and rivers in just one night.
Dad would take what we needed...a couple of salmon, an elderly deer to last us a wee while. He was good at it and taught many a young local lad the art of poaching and responsible poaching..that is, don`t take more than you need, always clean up after you, and never leave a wounded creature behind.
Oh, and how to avoid the ghillie and gamie....
I think the old fashioned poacher is dying out now, if not entirely gone. I see no auld fellas around the countryside following the deer paths or lying alongside a river bank guddling for fish (something dad was expert at and taught me to do)
and this may be partly due to the increase in what are now called countryside rangers patrolling and not, like the village polis of old, turning a blind eye to the family poacher, but prosecuting even the laddie taking the occasional pheasant.
I`ve often been accused of over romanticising poaching, the old style, that is.
But, the fact remains I grew up in a poaching family and when times were hard, as they often were, it saved us a great deal of genuine hunger.
And yes, those old poachers did have a code of sorts, and would have much to tell in the way of conservation that modern so called poachers wouldn`t give a damn about.
After all, simple common sense means you have to conserve a resource you want to keep coming back to....
They also knew more about the countryside and it`s inhabitants than many a modern ranger does nowadays, their ways seemed somehow more leisurely and the times they spent watching their prey and the surrounding landscape paid dividends in their understanding of how wildlife lived and functioned, and they were quick to spot any troubled areas and changes.
I know that modern political correctness means I have to say, I am not encouraging poaching in any way and this post is simply an anectodal trip down memory lane.
But I`d just like to raise a toast to the poacher of old, who had much to teach us about bushcraft, feeding ourselves from the land without raping the area, and in watching nature unfold and work in a seasonal rythym.
Dad`s dead now, he died at the end of last year. But I still remember what he did and taught, and with each change I see in the Highlands and how they are run around me, I gain more and more respect for those ways that were the legacy of older, more fitting country ways that are in danger of vanishing altogether.
I`m 48 now and grew up with a dad who was a poacher. He was what I call an old school poacher..he did it chiefly to put food on our table during hard times and to make some pin money which he did by selling salmon to a wee fish shop in Helmsdale and the occasional haunch of venison to the local polisman who would then turn a blind eye. (note..the police have definately changed character over the years!!)
Nowadays I keep hearing about folks called `poachers` and the damage they do, the carnage they leave behind, but to me those folks are not truly poachers in the sense I know it.
They hit the highlands in vans and shoot indiscriminately, usually red deer, leaving behind dying injured beasts and taking meat from whatever actually dies regardless of quality, age or health.
I`ve driven past such sites where deer heads litter the ground, and blood is spattered yards in every direction. It`s horrendous.
Ditto the gamefish poachers who decimate lochs and rivers in just one night.
Dad would take what we needed...a couple of salmon, an elderly deer to last us a wee while. He was good at it and taught many a young local lad the art of poaching and responsible poaching..that is, don`t take more than you need, always clean up after you, and never leave a wounded creature behind.
Oh, and how to avoid the ghillie and gamie....
I think the old fashioned poacher is dying out now, if not entirely gone. I see no auld fellas around the countryside following the deer paths or lying alongside a river bank guddling for fish (something dad was expert at and taught me to do)
and this may be partly due to the increase in what are now called countryside rangers patrolling and not, like the village polis of old, turning a blind eye to the family poacher, but prosecuting even the laddie taking the occasional pheasant.
I`ve often been accused of over romanticising poaching, the old style, that is.
But, the fact remains I grew up in a poaching family and when times were hard, as they often were, it saved us a great deal of genuine hunger.
And yes, those old poachers did have a code of sorts, and would have much to tell in the way of conservation that modern so called poachers wouldn`t give a damn about.
After all, simple common sense means you have to conserve a resource you want to keep coming back to....
They also knew more about the countryside and it`s inhabitants than many a modern ranger does nowadays, their ways seemed somehow more leisurely and the times they spent watching their prey and the surrounding landscape paid dividends in their understanding of how wildlife lived and functioned, and they were quick to spot any troubled areas and changes.
I know that modern political correctness means I have to say, I am not encouraging poaching in any way and this post is simply an anectodal trip down memory lane.
But I`d just like to raise a toast to the poacher of old, who had much to teach us about bushcraft, feeding ourselves from the land without raping the area, and in watching nature unfold and work in a seasonal rythym.
Dad`s dead now, he died at the end of last year. But I still remember what he did and taught, and with each change I see in the Highlands and how they are run around me, I gain more and more respect for those ways that were the legacy of older, more fitting country ways that are in danger of vanishing altogether.
