Re: Hunting

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Originally posted by slinky
I would say....this particular forum would always lean more anti than pro [:D] Mainly based on the back ground of users *ducks* [:D]

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Hi slinky..what do you mean by the background of users - quick to say I am not having a go..just wondering what you meant....[:)]

Re: Hunting

Funny this topic is running just now ... I say HUNT THEM DOWN!!!!! I have just had the most extraordinary experience ... it was midday, full sun etc and I happened to on the terrace sewing new buttons on my daughter's competition coat (all you out there who said you were frightened of children -- you are right. Be afraid. Be very afraid.) So I heard my chickens (very few of them left as have been losing them at a rate of knots, thinking it was the buzzards) start their alarm call and I rushed to see and a blumming FOX was just beside the house going berserk. Louis, my big boy cockerel took him on (yes, really!!!) and I sent the (bloody useless) dogs out but they just huffed in the wrong direction ... Anyway, Louis lost his magnificent back end and is a bit bloody but will live to tell the tale. Dunno yet if all the girls are all right. Here's the point: I thought about trapping the beggar (he clearly has lots of young to feed) but that's not a solution so yes, I will call the hunters tomorrow and see if they can bring their foxhounds up into the woods. I have had enough. My chickens are easy prey, clearly. But daylight hunting 10 metres from the house is taking the mickey. I want the foxes to DIE.

Re: Hunting

There is not a farmer in my area that would allow a bunch of horses and riders to gallop across his land just for fun. They allow the hunt on their land to do a job. The hunt may not be successful & to many in the field, it is merely a jolly, a nice day out, but to the farmer & hunt staff it is a job. Quite often the farmers ride with the hunt at a reduced rate as a thank you for allowing the hunt to go over their land. I've not drag hunted, so have little idea of its etiquette. In my area there is great emphasis on taking care of the land you ride over & I have witnessed various members of the field being publicly reprimaned for riding without due care and attention over fields. The farmers here also seem to keep their fences & gates in working order which is more than I can say for many of the bridlepath routes through non-hunting land.

Re: Hunting

Hoobster, while i value your opinion and you raise many valid points you cannot honestly tell me that a fox doesn`t kill for fun!!!! you are right about the fox taking its kill and hiding it for another day but you are so wrong on other points. some friends of mine have a poultry unit with just over a thousand laying birds kept on a barn/deep litter type system. one fox had managed to chew its way in and killed every single bird. it was a complete blood bath with wings, legs and heads everywhere. the sheer stress those birds must have gone through is not even imaginable. so many people now are feeding urban foxes and think its so cute but just wait for the day that they forget to trundle into the garden with the left overs and the fox takes their cat!!!!!!!! it happens and anyone who says it doesnt is sadly mistaken. bringing a fox down with a lurcher is no different to hunting with hounds or for that matter hunting with a lamp. not everyone is a crack shot and snaring or gassing is just plain inhumane. everyones opinion is needed and we cant all agree but facts need pointing out. this ban isnt going to save the fox in anyway and heritage does need preserving to some degree before we lose our identity altogether.

Re: Hunting

I have never hunted. so the ban does not effect me but I did used to think it was cruel when i was younger because i didn't know anything about it but since becoming more informed (slightly) by writing on the subject at college I do think it gives the fox much more of a chance. as someone else has said snaring and shooting do not always kill instantly as presumed. The foxes have a slow painful death, and the ones that are caught could be perfectly healthy, a nursing vixen or even a cub, where as when hunting, the majority of foxes caught are the older/sicker ones in much the same way an older sicker zebra would be picked out by a pack of lions. Not that i have seen it but i would imaginge that hounds, as a hunting animal, would instinctly go for the neck of a fox first to kill it? (please feel free to tell me if this is wrong) On the land i keep bernie there is a guy that runs a shoot, he rears duck, pheasant and a few other breeds of bird. he then releases them when old enough in the woods with loads of food to keep them content on staying there. when they have grown a bit more rich men pay to bundle into a van and go into the woods and shoot them, many of then for the first time shooting. the amount of injured birds we find is horrible, as many of the men do the shoot to train young dogs who cant find the fallen bird. we have even seen cases where young dogs "play" with the shot bird until it dies of shock. they are horribley stuck up people who are very rude and threatening to us and our dogs (nothing is said to them because they pay the farmer a lot of money and the guy who runs it has a very famous son. Anyway my point being this has not been banned? why? i find it strange that it is one rule for one but not for another? Also animal lovers setting like to a huntsmans horse or stabbing it with a pitchfork? where is the sense in that? I suppose i am slighlty swayed pro hunting as the points of view i have heard make more sense to me and it seems more natural, but saying that i dont think i could stomach seeing a fox torn apart in the same way i hate seeing the birds totured by the untrained dogs. (sorry if i contradict myself, it's because i can see some points of both sides)