Hansom Sporting
"We Offer Driven and Walked Up Game Shooting, Pheasant Shooting, Partridge Shooting,
Duck Shooting,
Roving Syndicates and Individual Guns "
- Terry & Russell
The partridge shoot has been developed on the lowland edge of a grouse moor close to the source of the River Wansbeck and overlooked by the rugged Wanney Crags, which spawned the popular phrase of being "in the wilds of Wanney".
Red-legged partridges are released on the moor and when driven they offer the guns who are standing in the valley of the Ray Burn, shooting similar to driven grouse. The moor is compact and it is relatively easy to walk to the pegs.
There are over twenty-five drives on the shoot and some of the more challenging are
- Sweethope Lough
For testing birds in beautiful scenery, see our letter in the shooting times, we drive the pheasants over the smaller of the two loughs, with the guns standing on a small ride at the bankside. This drive offers snap shooting at high birds in a woodland setting with good water retrieves for those with dogs. - The High Drive and the Garden Drive
Both of these can produce spectacularly high birds the guns stand in open grass fields as the birds are driven from woodland and watch as the birds gain altitude to avoid the waiting line of guns. - Sweethope Dean and the Dean Return
Set in a woodland valley dissected by the River Wansbeck, which when in good flow makes it difficult to hear properly leaving guns to rely on sight only as the birds whip past. - Old Firs
This drive is at 283 feet above sea level and is the highest woodland on the shoot, birds are driven from the mature woodland down towards the Ray Demesne. - Cushat Wood
A long narrow strip of conifers which the beaters drive in a southerly direction, when flushed the birds make for Sandhills Wood which is to the east of Cushat Wood offering difficult curling and crossing pheasants as well as a few partridge.