Today the British Parliament bans hunting with dogs

Justthefax wrote:

Should hunting be stopped, no way. If game population is not controlled then there will be too many critters .

not true - natural selection and available food means that a balance is achieved

hunters are sadists - they get their fun from the torture and death of an animal - as Steve says, the foxes are protected and bred in order to have enough to hunt, so the pest control arguement is quite ludicrous. the 'blooding' of children at their first hunt - the foxes tail (brush) is cut off and the bloody mess wiped over the children's faces - says it all.

it is precisely the same mentality as those who enjoyed bear baiting, dogfighting and cock fighting,

I agree - heads of hunters on poles please! Twisted Evil

incidentally - it isn't going to have an 18 month delay - it will start in February Very Happy

0 Replies

I know its starting in February, but only because the House of Lords wouldn't agree to an 18 month delay, as the Commons wanted in order to move the ban, and any ensuing civil disorder, away from a possible general election. Which was my point about MP's being spineless. If they so strongly wanted to see a ban they should have had the courage to vote for an immediate ban.

Quote:

I agree - heads of hunters on poles please!

Funny how animal rights types seem to value the life of a fox (essentially vermin) over the life of a person isnt it?

0 Replies

Welcome to A2K, Aztec!

I'm sure, you'll soon find the other thread about this .... and a couple of your "brethren". :wink:

0 Replies

heads on spikes was in fun - not literal

unfortunately the 'fun' of chasing a fox to exhaustion and then watching the hounds tear it to shreds is not a joke aztec

0 Replies

Quote:

UK fox hunters 'not welcome in Ireland'
Nicola Byrne
Sunday November 21, 2004
The Observer

Frustrated British fox hunters will not find a refuge in Ireland after the blood sport was banned in the United Kingdom on Friday.
The Hunting Association of Ireland says that the 80 hunts operating in the Republic are already oversubscribed and there is very limited potential for 'hunt tourism'.

However, proponents of hunting in Ireland fear it may not be so easy to put off mainland animal rights activists, who are now expected to turn their sights on Ireland and France in a bid to achieve a Europe-wide ban.

Several of the Republic's top hunts have been warned that experienced hunt saboteurs will cross the water to boost a hitherto disorganised and flagging campaign.

Aggressive British tactics have led in the past to clashes with Irish farmers and hunt supporters, who had previously faced only passive local protests.

This weekend, the Irish hunting association said that visiting demonstrators would encounter strong resistance. 'Let's just say that the author ities in Ireland will view these people very differently from the way they might have been treated in the UK. There will be no softly, softly approach,' said spokesman David Wilkinson.

The Irish Council against Blood Sports said yesterday that overseas protesters would receive its full support. However, it called on the government to discourage English huntsmen using Ireland as a means of avoiding the ban.

Its vice-president, Tony Gregory, TD, said he was preparing an anti-hunting bill for the Irish parliament and would introduce it when the UK ban came into effect.

The hunting association, however, says it is confident that such a ban will never be put in place in Ireland. 'We're confident that the government recognises and will continue to recognise the importance of hunting to the rural community,' said Wilkinson.

The Irish Bloodstock Agency yesterday admitted that the UK ban would hit the horse industry in Ireland. A substantial number of young horses are bred for export to the UK for hunting and point-to-point racing.

The agency says that breeding these animals provides a livelihood for many farmers, who had been forced to abandon dairy and livestock because of EU quotas.

Meanwhile, a few hunts in Ireland may be willing to bend their rules to allow a handful visitors from the UK.

The North Galway Hunt will continue to accommodate Captain Mark Phillips, the former husband of the Princess Royal, who runs a twice-yearly hunting and cross-country clinic in Co Mayo, and the West Waterford, which hunts near the Lismore home of the Duke of Devonshire, is rumoured to be ready to extend an invitation to the Prince of Wales.

Source

0 Replies

Thanks to Walter Hinteler for his kind welcome.

Vivien, I dont hunt nor do I know anyone who does. I don't however agree with the ban because these vermin need to be controlled. What, as I said, annoys me is the way in which our self-serving MP's wanted to introduce this ban.

Perhaps we could agree to the ban on hunting foxes and hunt MP's instead? (joke)

0 Replies

but they aren't vermin - without foxes the rabbits/rats/mice would increase and damage farmers crops, eat pastures meant for cattle etc (look at the problems that rabbits caused in Oz where there were no natural predators) their population is controlled by natural selection - not enough food and the population decreases. theyare important in the ecological balance

hunts breed foxes for the hunt - the hunt does not 'control vermin' but is purely about the pleasure that sick people get from the hunt and the kill.

as Walter pointed out, many farmers dislike the hunt and ban it from their land - the huntsment are arrogant and ignore the ban, cutting wire and damaging property and crops.

My daugher who was, as a student, involved with the hunt saboteurs (non violent protests and spreading aniseed trails to confuse the hounds) was often threatened with physical violence, had horses ridden straight at her and cars she was in, had whips aimed at her etc previously trapped Foxes were released from bags so that the hunt could chase them - now if this is 'vermin control' why release it to be chased? it was caught and could have been humanely put down if it was indeed 'vermin control'.

0 Replies

Not sure I believe the one about hunts breeding foxes for hunting, nor in fact about bagging foxes to be rereleased. Sounds like a bit of anti-hunt propaganda to me. What did they do? ask the hounds to corner the fox then have a chat til the hunt caught up? (Although I have seen some evidence that this type of thing has happened with stags, which is totally disgusting)

Also not sure about local land owners denying access to the local hunt in pursuit of a fox, though this may well happen if a drag hunt were to take place over their land as a drag hunt would reap no benefit to the landowner in the way that the killing of foxes can.

Incidently, did the hunt sabateurs have permission from the land owners before leading a pack of horses and hounds on a wild goose (read fox) chase possibly tearing up valuable land for no reason?

I think it all comes down to where you draw the line between what is acceptable and what is not. You seem to find it acceptable for mice and rats to be killed by foxes, but not for foxes to be killed by hounds. How do you stand on hounds being destroyed because they are of no more use to the owners?

In another interesting development Peter Bradley, a ministerial aide to the rural affairs minister Alun Michael, admitted that the ban on fox hunting is about class war and not animal rights. He said:

"We ought at last to own up to it: the struggle over the Bill was not just about animal welfare and personal freedom, it was class war.
"This was not about the politics of envy but the politics of power. Ultimately it's about who governs Britain."

Mr Bradley attacked pro-hunting campaigners as "the priveledged minority which for centuries ran this country from the manor houses of rural England" and tried to keep people like him "in our place"

"But that old order no longer prevails. The old families have come to realise that though they may still own the country. they are no longer running it."

Must be big on animal rights that one!

(I'm not suggesting for a moment that vivien is not concerned about animal rights BTW, just wanted to make that point.)

Aztec.

0 Replies

Aztec wrote:

Not sure I believe the one about hunts breeding foxes for hunting, nor in fact about bagging foxes to be rereleased. Sounds like a bit of anti-hunt propaganda to me. What did they do? ask the hounds to corner the fox then have a chat til the hunt caught up? (Although I have seen some evidence that this type of thing has happened with stags, which is totally disgusting)

Although this article is more than two years old ...

Quote:

Hunters 'breeding foxes' to provide for the kill
Concrete chambers used as 'artificial earths' to ensure supply of animals for blood sport

Paul Harris
Sunday February 17, 2002
The Observer

Hunts across the country are breeding foxes in specially made dens to ensure an adequate supply of the animals, undermining claims that they are killed only in the name of pest control.
The 'artificial earths' are built on the territory of more than 50 hunts, from the Isle of Wight to Cumbria, including some of Britain's most prestigious such as the Quorn and Beaufort hunts.

The earths are usually sunken concrete chambers built into the ground and connected by a network of tunnels. Foxes are encouraged to live in them and are sometimes fed and given water. They are usually built in areas near to key hunt 'meets', for example in woodland that will be hunted on Boxing Day or other prime occasions. The earths ensure that foxes are always available for a hunt in a specific area.

Animal rights campaigners last night expressed dismay over the use of such a widespread national network of artificial earths, claiming that the policy exploded a key argument of the pro-hunting lobby, which campaigns on the basis that fox hunting is a form of pest control.

'Artificial earths are designed to ensure that hunts have a healthy population of foxes to kill. They are basically breeding these animals to be hunted. It is nothing to do with controlling a pest,' said a spokesman for the League against Cruel Sports.

The league, which has documented the earths, believes that their true number is likely to be more than 200. 'They are hard to find and we know we haven't come anywhere close to discovering them all,' a league spokesman said.

Sometimes the earths are concentrated in small areas. League members say they have found 31 on land hunted by the Thurlow foxhounds in Cambridgeshire, some of which are built with bricks. In a single wood owned and hunted by the Suffolk Foxhounds there are three artificial earths.

At some earths, foxes are fed by dumping animal carcasses near the entrances. League members have filmed and photographed two calf carcasses dumped within 100 yards of an artificial earth on land used by the Heythrop foxhounds in Oxfordshire, one of the country's most prestigious hunts. Near the bodies were animal bones, indicating that carcasses had been dumped on the site before.

'The proximity of the carcasses to an artificial earth where foxes were living is just too much of a coincidence. We believe they were put there to feed the foxes,' one league member said.

A spokeswoman for the Heythrop hunt said it did not deliberately feed foxes. 'I would strongly suggest it must be somebody else. The Heythrop does not put out calves' carcasses anywhere,' she said.

League members found a second artificial earth on the hunt's range which was one of the most elaborate they had documented, containing a 'dropping pot', which allowed terriers to be put in to flush out a fox. It included water bowls fed by hosepipe and was located in trees in a sheep pasture.

The league said it would be handing a dossier of its findings to the Department for Rural Affairs and local trading standards officers. Dumping carcasses in the countryside is illegal.

The latest revelations come after league members last month showed deer carcasses being dumped near artificial earths on the estate of the Duke of Beaufort, a friend of the Prince of Wales.

Simon Hart, director of the Countryside Alliance's Campaign for Hunting, said it was not illegal to create artificial earths, but most of them were unused and dated back decades. He said that those artificial earths that were used were designed to encourage foxes to settle away from roads or poultry farms and not for the purposes of hunting.

'I don't see that there's any contradiction between countryside management, which includes the use of artificial earths, and the need to control fox numbers,' he said.

However, a spokeswoman for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals condemned the practice. 'There are a lot of artificial earths around that are still in use. The only benefit of doing that is to know where foxes live so you can hunt them. It shows that hunting is not pest control; it is just a blood sport,' she said.

Even some among the hunting fraternity admit that some hunts use artificial earths and leave out animal carcasses to ensure a plentiful fox population. 'A few hunts do it and I have to say that I disapprove of it totally,' said Janet George, co-founder of the Countryside Action Network. 'There is no need to encourage them to breed. They will breed anywhere anyway.'

Some pro-hunters blame the creation of artificial earths on farmers seeking to control their fox populations. But a spokesman for the National Farmers' Union said this was unlikely. 'I would be amazed if farmers were involved. If hunts are using artificial earths for foxes, that would anger farmers,' he said.

Last week the Scottish Parliament voted to ban hunting with dogs, prompting speculation that similar measures will be attempted in England and Wales. Pro-hunting groups have vowed to challenge such a ban.

Source

There were a couple of reports about this in the German magazines Spiegel and Stern as well, but those articles are in "to be paid archive".

0 Replies

thank you Walter for the evidence.

It is indeed pure fact, well evidenced and not speculation that foxes are bred to be hunted - also that when Charlie boy is part of the hunt a bagged fox is released to ensure a good day's 'sport' for him.

Foxes hunting rabbits etc are doing so to survive - not so the huntsmen who are doing it for the 'fun' of killing - a very very different thing surely?

The hunt saboteurs did not damage and were always careful not to do so when my daughter was with them

there are indeed many farmers who don't like the hunt on their land - there also those who are too frightened to object because of reprisals.

hunting issue is not a class issue - there are supporters and protesters from all classes and backgrounds, nor is it a rural/urban issue

I was brought up in the country and now live in the city and opinions are broadly similar in both. some city dwellers go out to see the hunt and support it.

Some people see it as a picturesque tradition and fail to see the barbarity behind it. Hanging, drawing and quartering of murderers or in France guillotining was once a popular and picturesque spectator sport along with bear baiting and dog fighting - in some parts of the middle east 'chop chop' where hands of burglars are cut off is also still a popular tradition -

tradition doesn't make a thing right and class is totally irrelevant.

0 Replies

Just this past weekend, a hunter in Wisconsin killed five other hunters over some issue of who was stationed where. Not a good argument for the pro-hunt side, but I suppose there will always be a few bad apples.

Then again, maybe the shooter wasn't a hunter at all, just a serial killer out for a little sport!

0 Replies

To clear this up: I'm not totally against hunting.

But totally against foxhunting like described here.

0 Replies

Can't they just be happy with the traditional upper-class pursuits shooting beggar-baiting, violating the virginal daughters of crofters and enforced buggery in the nations top public schools? Some people just want it all.....

Oscar Wilde about foxhunting:
The unspeakable in full pursuit of the inedible.

0 Replies

Good one, stilly.

0 Replies

Phew! Just goes to show how good the anti-hunt propaganda machine is eh? lol.

0 Replies

Aztec wrote:

Phew! Just goes to show how good the anti-hunt propaganda machine is eh? lol.

You mean the quoted article Question

0 Replies

Walter Hinteler wrote:
You mean the quoted article Question

Yes Walter, it was a tongue in cheek comment tho which obviously doesn't work on here! So my apologies for that.

I had no idea that this went on. Obviously I couldn't condone breeding animals for hunting. Except perhaps in the case of game birds for shooting, and only then so long as the birds are going to the table afterwards. After all a relatively happy life in a stocked wood is probably much better for most animals that the normal mass production farming methods.

(Aztec waits for a lecture on the realities of Grouse/Pheasant farming)

"Even some among the hunting fraternity admit that some hunts use artificial earths and leave out animal carcasses to ensure a plentiful fox population. 'A few hunts do it and I have to say that I disapprove of it totally,' said Janet George, co-founder of the Countryside Action Network. 'There is no need to encourage them to breed. They will breed anywhere anyway.' "

Good to see the practice isn't too widespread isn't it?

Aztec.

0 Replies

Aztec wrote:

"Even some among the hunting fraternity admit that some hunts use artificial earths and leave out animal carcasses to ensure a plentiful fox population. ......

Good to see the practice isn't too widespread isn't it?

Aztec.

now that IS tongue in cheek!

and I wouldn't buy a used car from her.

0 Replies

Quote:

Mass hunt protests to mark ban

Friday, 10 December, 2004, 17:25 GMT

More than 250 hunts will meet legally the day after the ban on hunting with dogs comes into force, campaigners say.

The Countryside Alliance said the 19 February meets would show the new law was "impossibly difficult to determine" and open to different interpretations.

The move comes after the first man to be tried under Scottish anti-hunting laws was cleared of wrongdoing.

In a test case a court ruled that Trevor Adams, 46, from Melrose, was not "hunting", but "searching" for a fox.

'Absolute nightmare'

The ban on hunting has been welcomed by animal rights activists, many of who have campaigned for a ban for decades.

But the Countryside Alliance's chief executive Simon Hart told BBC Radio 4's World at One that everyone hunting on 19 February would still be able to do so within the law.

"Anybody who suggests this is going to be an exercise in law breaking is going to be very much mistaken, he said.

He said policing and enforcing the ban would be "an absolute nightmare."

The campaign group said the ban would mean it was legal to hunt rabbits, but not hares.

It would also be legal to flush out a mammal with two dogs to be shot, or to "simply take your hounds on exercise".

Test case

Earlier on Friday, Trevor Adams was cleared of deliberately using a pack of hounds to hunt foxes.

He was the first person to go on trial accused of breaking anti-hunting laws, introduced in Scotland in 2002.

He denied the charge and claimed the hounds were used to "flush" out foxes so they could be shot.

In November, the use of the Parliament Act led to moves towards a total ban on hunting with dogs in England and Wales.

However, many pro-hunt activists remained defiant after the law was passed, saying they will ignore the ban and continue to hunt.

Source

0 Replies

Though I've never done it, I imagine it would be a lot of fun to go racing off with a pile of other people on horseback. Most times there are slow hunters & fast hunters, places where you have to jump big, but nearby, places to jump small or not at all. I hope that the horsemen & women of the UK can realize that a hunt is still a fine way to spend a day, even if it is only a drag-hunt.

We have drag-hunts here... a burlap bag that has been scented with fox odor is pulled across the countryside. They use the land of Fort Lewis, which seems to me, a much better use of military land than other things I can think of. Live hunts of fox are just not done. Last time I saw a fox was earlier this year, loping down our driveway; they're definitely around. We had to quit raising chickens because it was impossible to keep them safe. Last time, some creature just tore the roof right off our little henhouse and all we found were some bloody feathers.

I guess, for full-disclosure I should point out that when cougar hunting with dogs was banned in this state about five years ago, the first thing that happened was a lot of dogs were destroyed. The hunting guides couldn't afford to keep them (they're big hound dogs -- often well over 100 pounds) if they weren't earning their keep. The second thing that happened was cougars started to come back. Now many people are much more cautious about going out in the woods. It turns out, it is awfully hard to track a cougar without a dog. So now, the state bought up the last of the cougar hounds to track problem cougars -- those would be the ones who rip into the muscular haunches of a live horse or cow... or just eat your smaller livestock. Very upsetting to see the photographs of cougar attacks.

I am against killing wild animals but I understand the thrill of riding to a hunt and I understand that those few people who still raise livestock have a big problem when they can't keep their animals safe.

0 Replies

Today the British Parliament bans hunting with dogs

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know