AdorableAlice
Well-Known Member
I refer you back to land management.
Hunting is in a spot of bother
- Thread starter Tiddlypom
- Start date
I refer you back to land management.
paddy555
Well-Known Member
same for me. Many can't even get a farrier they have so much work on, vets are at a premium there are not enough of them, people do many activities on horses which would continue. I am not sure it would have a devastating impact or at least not in this area. Many who hunt would still keep horses and all their additional ependiture to ride in some other form. There may be a demand for less horses but ATM it appears people cannot find a horse to buy for love nor money.
I remember the arguments from before the hunting act, all these dogs shot, horses PTS, unemployment, damage to the rural economy etc etc.
paddy555
Well-Known Member
can you elaborate please? I cannot see how land management in our area would be any different if there was trail hunting or if it was completely banned. As there is no long fox hunting we no longer have to consider pest control as part of the argument.
Sandstone1
Well-Known Member
I think that there are lots of other horse sports that use all of the mentioned professionals. Hunting can not be the sole means of employment for most if not all of them.
AdorableAlice
Well-Known Member
I didn't say hunting was the sole employer, but it is a considerable provider of employment and would, if banned in all forms, have a substantial impact.
ester
Not slacking multitasking
given the amount of merging that has occurred in recent years what are the current numbers of employees for it to be considerable? Genuinely wondering because I wouldnt' have thought it so.
Jellymoon
Well-Known Member
This exactly.
An that is why, Koweyka, I don’t actually believe you when you say your sole motivation is fox welfare. I think you’d like to see everything to do with hunting banned and wouldn’t care two hoots about the people who would lose their livelihoods. This says something to me about your attitude to horsey and country folk, and your mental attitude towards other people in general. I don’t actually believe you own ‘many’ horses. Sorry, but no horse person would say that. All your posts on the H and H forum are to do with hunting.
And, may I ask, who do you come on a forum linked to a magazine which is in support of legal trail hunting? You do realise that the more people who come on this site add to their revenues?
Koweyka
Well-Known Member
Errrr ok I don’t give half a hoot what you believe about me because you are completely wrong and are giving many people that do know me quite a giggle.
I was a member of this forum many years ago as I needed some advice about one of the many horses I own, some people were helpful and knowledgeable, I lost my log in details, though I wonder are you going to stalk all the other thousands of members on here and ask why they are here if they aren’t hunting ?
palo1
Well-Known Member
You would think too that the vast majority of people would find some animal husbandry and slaughter practices utterly barbaric, disturbing and morally wrong but that doesn't appear to stop the same majority of people both in the UK and worldwide buying into those practices through consumption. It is not as simple as you present it. There is cognitive dissonance present in much of what we do.
The other problem that you have raised is that for some people involved in rural matters you will not convince them that hunting with hounds was cruel. The Burns Report which was commissioned to reach a conclusion on that score simply couldn't make that conclusion. Equally IF cruelty were the real issue, the banning of fox hunting and the banning of trail hunting would have such a microscopically small impact on animal welfare that you simply would not focus your efforts in that direction. I understand the problem with 'whataboutery' but in this case it is really relevant. If animal welfare was truly the mission of the anti-hunting movement then it would have packed up and moved over to a whole host of other, far more widespread practices of cruelty that could really make a difference to individual animals, the environment and other species.
I understand about the passion for foxes and for the need for any action we take toward a goal needing focus so I get that sabs want to stop trail hunting, but making a claim about the impact of that on animal welfare is just nonsense.
As for your assertion that change must come from the outside of hunting - I can't be anything other than horrified about vigilantism on this matter. It is similar to groups of vigilantes outside mosques (and earlier in our history Sikh temples) or other minority or marginalised communities. I have reason to feel very strongly about drink driving; people still do that with tragic consequences. Do I arrange for a group of like minded people to hound everyone coming out of a pub? Do I engage in harrassment of pub landlords (who undoubtedly contribute to drink driving offences)?. Do I attack verbally or physically those people in my community that I suspect of drink driving? Do I 'out' them to their work and family? Of course not, though if I was certainly aware of someone drink driving I would report it to the police. If they chose not to pursue that I might complain or campaign, possibly take it up with my MP. Vigilantism has NO place in a democratic society. Change must come from within and must come from the democratic process. I think you are profoundly wrong in so many ways.
tallyho!
Following a strict mediterranean diet...
Excuse my naïvety....
Why can't people just pay landowners to ride over their land, pay hunt organisers to organise a "hunt" ride and be done with the whole dog thing. I'd subscribe a lot of money to be able have a good gallop around the countryside without having to wear itchy tweed and watch a load of dogs accidentally kill wild fluffy things. Everyone will be happy. Landowners will have company if that's what they want, hunt organisers will have something to do and riders will have somewhere to ride. Call it a paid hunting "experience" or even better call it open-riding or something else less naff. Surely this would raise a heck of a lot more money for conservation, towards landowners income (lets face it farmers could do with that!) and a well organised club. It would take one club to completely commercialise the whole outfit, open up country riding for a whole raft of people who would love to do it but would never follow a hunt and help towards countryside stewardship and help prop up equestrianism instead of tearing the whole horse community apart.
Why can't people just pay landowners to ride over their land, pay hunt organisers to organise a "hunt" ride and be done with the whole dog thing. I'd subscribe a lot of money to be able have a good gallop around the countryside without having to wear itchy tweed and watch a load of dogs accidentally kill wild fluffy things. Everyone will be happy. Landowners will have company if that's what they want, hunt organisers will have something to do and riders will have somewhere to ride. Call it a paid hunting "experience" or even better call it open-riding or something else less naff. Surely this would raise a heck of a lot more money for conservation, towards landowners income (lets face it farmers could do with that!) and a well organised club. It would take one club to completely commercialise the whole outfit, open up country riding for a whole raft of people who would love to do it but would never follow a hunt and help towards countryside stewardship and help prop up equestrianism instead of tearing the whole horse community apart.
ycbm
Einstein would be proud of my Insanity...
Koweyka
Well-Known Member
Just when I think oh we have some common ground you pop up with more piffle.
Hunting has to change from within.
Would I out a drink driver errr yes and have done.
Would I shame a landlord for serving drinks and watching as they drove off in a car errr yes have done….
There has been a permanent camp outside the company breeding beagle puppies for unnecessary experimentation, have I been there protesting yes.
The plight of greyhounds, protests for cameras and regulation in slaughter houses, animals in circus’s there are so many many plights for animals that sabs support.
And as for comparing sabs to people that commit hate crimes against religious communities, what an utterly outrageous comment that is, it’s actually a new low for you.
palo1
Well-Known Member
Well it's a good idea for sure!! It wouldn't particularly appeal to me because the reason I go trail hunting is not to hang out in a gang of people galloping round the countryside (I think that is drag hunting...!!) but to watch hounds working a scent. Still it is a good idea and some of the bigger landowners could certainly develop it and profit from that with, as you say, all sorts of other benefits.
ETA - I adore tweed so I wouldn't be giving that up. In fact I love tweed so much I have a tweed riding coat (and for dog walking) that I had made a year or so ago. I never need another coat now!!
paddy555
Well-Known Member
I thought we used to call those endurance rides or pleasure rides for those who wished to go slower and for shorter rides.
paddy555
Well-Known Member
cannot see it would be many. Looking at our hunt which covers a large area I doubt there are many employees. Still trying to understand the land management mentioned in post 1411. Anyone?
AdorableAlice
Well-Known Member
We still do, organised by the hunt and a major fund raiser for the nominated charity. Air Ambulance in my area.
Tiddlypom
Carries on creakily
I have first hand knowledge of one Cheshire pack, and for that pack, Koweyka's post is absolutely true.
This will be IIRC the third season that the Cheshire Hunt has been genuinely trail hunting. Before that, they very much were not. It was indeed pressure from a major landowner which forced the switch after coverage of a lot of illegal hunting was plastered over FB, and the resultant bad publicity for landowners who permitted them access to their land to hunt foxes.
The antis, inc the group linked to earlier by Palo, are to be applauded for acknowledging that the CH had reformed, and for not disrupting the new trail hunting version as they find their way.
Hopefully both hunts and antis can learn from this. Hunts, stop fox hunting if you are still are at it, and antis, please recognise this if they do reform, and allow them to trail hunt legally.
palo1
Well-Known Member
Yes, the communication between us is deeply tedious I have to admit. The reason I compared sabs to people that commit hate crimes is clear; because attacking people, harrassing them etc for their beliefs and cultural practices in one setting is the same as doing it to another. In a legislative society such as the one we live in, that is how it works. The idea of a liberal democracy is for there to be tolerance for all groups of people and to use the democratic process to change things that become unbearable for that society, as the same time as protecting minority groups and interests. I suggest you read what Daniel Greenberg (who drafted the Hunting Act) has to say about it.
Among other things he has said, very recently: ' I was the drafter not only of the Hunting Act 2004 but of all the Government Bills that preceded it over a period of some years, and I well remember being struck by the fact that of all the legislation in which I had been involved since joining the Parliamentary Counsel Office, including Bills on matters medical, constitutional, social, fiscal and criminal, the first project in relation to which I felt seriously troubled from a moral perspective was over such an outwardly trivial matter in some respects as hunting. Let me be clear: the prohibition of hunting did not trouble me from a personal moral perspective: I do not hunt myself, and I would even go so far as to doubt whether I would personally be ethically justified in doing so, as I do not belong to a community in which it forms either a necessary part of pest control or a cherished cultural tradition. What troubled me was the fact that for the first time in my immediate professional experience the mechanism of the law was being deployed not to further some public policy objective – whether well-founded or not – but to inflict on the whole country the personal moral perspective of the 600 or so citizens who happened to find themselves in the House of Commons at the time....
If this had really been an animal welfare measure we would most likely have opted for a regulatory approach, possibly based around a licensing system: doubtless Of-fox would have been very popular, and the Chief Commissioner for Feral Foxes – or Foxcom – would have been a much sought-after sinecure. Joking aside, I suspect that most if not all organised hunts would actively have welcomed a properly founded licensing system as a way of showing their respect for the law, and for the welfare of all the animals and humans involved in the hunting tradition, which irrespective of whether the observer herself or himself chooses to hunt is clearly recognisable as being as respectable as any other community or cultural tradition, and a good deal more respectable than many.
Instead of an effective measure, therefore, the Act and the Bills for it were largely an exercise in what it has now become fashionable to describe as “virtue signalling” by persons who happened to draw their line in the sand of morality in one place in connection with animals, and many of whom would doubtless be incensed if a fortuitous majority of vegetarians in the House of Commons on another occasion sought to outlaw all those whose personal line in the sand stopped short of refraining from eating meat.
An exercise in intolerance, at a time when diversity and cultural sensitivity are meant to be more socially cherished and legally protected than at any other time in the history of the United Kingdom, indeed possibly in the history of the world.''
Of course, he has said more on this subject if you care to read it. THAT is why I compare intolerance of one group of people to another. I am very well aware of what hate crime constitutes and what it's history is in this country. I am glad to hear you are actively involved in campaigning and I hope peaceful, legal action on animal welfare; there is much more work to be done on that score in several areas of life.
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AdorableAlice
Well-Known Member
Very very wise words. In terms of licensing, would you expect or hope to see, legislation in line with the recent DEFRA 2018/Animal Welfare Act 2006, or totally new/stand alone licensing legislation for field sports ? and would you hope/expect to see the legislation administered at local or central Government level.
palo1
Well-Known Member
Gosh, that is an interesting question...I am not sure I have enough knowledge of licensing legislation etc to really have an informed opinion but I suspect that a somewhat more 'future proof' and identifiable licensing scheme would be aimed at field sports/aspects of land management that actively involve wildlife. That might help to provide a framework for some really difficult things including trapping etc which sometimes need to be carried out for wildlife protection and which have not had nearly enough rational discussion in my view. This may also be useful where large scale rewilding schemes find that they need to either cull or enable weak stock to fail and die (definitely not my preference).
Another example of where licensed management would be useful would be the LACS estate at Baronsdown where deer are so overstocked (through lack of management) that they are either escaping to their neighbours farms, causing some consternation as well as local disgust and upset at the level of cruelty and suffering. The licensing of management for wildlife and/or fieldsports might help to avoid those kinds of incidents across the board - from starving hill/feral ponies to active field sports situations.
It is horribly complex I think and of course the whole issue is locked into a static and somewhat polarised state.
DizzyDoughnut
Well-Known Member
I've been hunting a few times pre ban but don't really know much about it, it was only because I worked on a private PTP yard at the time and we had to go out to qualify the pointers and we generally just followed along at the back and tried not to disgrace ourselves. But I always wondered the people that says it's needed to control the fox numbers, why is shooting them not an option instead, hunting seemed to be a long winded way of doing something that could be done a lot quicker and easier with a bullet?
tallyho!
Following a strict mediterranean diet...
I already do those and they are minimal, and diminishing apart from those open by by goodwill and a lot of volunteers!!
I’m talking about the scale hunting is now, fully subscribed and managed as a viable commercial operation. Partnered with those preserving countryside. Incentivising stewardship maybe with paid roles.
I learned to ride as a child long ago on hunts but I never saw the horrible stuff and i wouldn’t like to now - if we are to continue the equestrian lifestyle without the old fashioned outdated stuff, train kids to be a bit less millennial about riding maybe we need to look to the next generation. Upgrade riding and make it work.
Hunts years ago killed foxes as a service to the rural community… perhaps hunts could provide a different kind of service and make riders welcome again through income.
P.s. tweed optional ? we shouldn’t restrict people to just Lycra as is the craze these days… don’t want to look like cyclists on horses now would we
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palo1
Well-Known Member
Well yes, shooting is an option of course. There has been some research around that which suggests that shooting does not offer a gurantee of no-suffering. You really need a high velocity rifle to do that and there are plenty of folk who want to shoot foxes. That may, in fact, account for some of the drop in fox numbers since the hunting ban. Shotguns are not favourable though and that is the kind of weapon that most farmers etc own; a high velocity rifle is an exceptionally dangerous weapon potentially and is far more specialist than a bog-standard shotgun. Most farmers don't want or need a rifle but it is easy to get people in who have a rifle and want to shoot foxes. It is a 'sport' in itself these days.
Back in the day of fox hunting it was never about the number of foxes killed but the way in which hunting with hounds affected fox behaviour; this is a phenomenon that has been widely studied and reported; not by hunters but by ecologists etc and the way in which a trophic cascade works is something people are really interested in currently - particularly around re-wilding and the benefits of that for an eco-system. The basic idea is that having a 'top predator' (simulated by a pack of hounds when fox hunting was legal) changes the behaviour of animals all the way down the chain, generally for the better of the entire ecosystem. The key place this has been studied is in Yellowstone National Park following the very controversial re-introduction of wolves. The idea of a trophic cascade is pretty established but aspects of it remain, as always, somewhat contested!
Hunting with hounds 'benefit' if you like, for foxes and their populations had a number of different impacts. For individual foxes, the outcome of a hunt was entirely binary - the hunted fox either got away (and learned lessons in survival) or died. Foxes were not hunted during the breeding season so vixens feeding cubs were not hunted, nor young cubs. Fox cubs have always been killed actually in other ways by a variety of people, as have feeding vixens but that was certainly not a part of hunting culture. The seasonal nature of hunting ensured a healthy number of foxes in any hunt country.
Weak, old or sick foxes were hunted easily thus ensuring that competition for resources, mating etc remained amongst a more healthy stock of animals.
Predation on foxes by hounds mimicked very closely what foxes were evolved to cope with; predation by a larger pack of animals such as wolves. Whilst being hunted was undoubtedly stressful it was not unnatural for a fox nor essentially 'different' to the wholly natural experience foxes had in more pristine environments.
Gallop_Away
Well-Known Member
Would just like to point out, I would not be so concerned with employment within the hunting industry if all forms of hunting were banned (although this would obviously affect the livelihoods of many people and is a legitimate concern), but rather what happens to the tens of thousands of hounds? They can't simply be rehomed and would more than likely be pts.
Surely if we accept antis are in it for the purposes of saving animals then by saying they want to see all trail hunting banned, their argument falls flat on its face. What about the lives of hounds or do they not matter?
Surely if we accept antis are in it for the purposes of saving animals then by saying they want to see all trail hunting banned, their argument falls flat on its face. What about the lives of hounds or do they not matter?
AdorableAlice
Well-Known Member
I think you will find the welfare of hounds and horses are not top of the list. You only have to watch the organised anti hunt groups calling hounds onto roads or throwing ball bearings under horses. So no, the lives of hounds don't matter and they certainly won't make pets.
Aside from on the massive privately owned estates, the lack of country will eventually see the demise of all hunting and other horse sport. Green belt is being built on big time regardless of what Johnson says. Many of the smaller packs have amalgamated but country is ever closing in, ie, the HS2 route.
tallyho!
Following a strict mediterranean diet...
If the lives of foxes matter then so should the hounds and horses and I’m sure they will find a place.
AdorableAlice
Well-Known Member
Where do you suggest a few thousand hounds are rehomed ?
Gallop_Away
Well-Known Member
Adorable Alice i very much agree with you, as in my own experience antis don't really care about saving animals.
It's something I have always wondered, when they claim to be in it for the animals, why the lives of foxes matter, but not the lives of the horses or hounds? Perhaps some of the "Monitors" on here could enlighten me?
I've no issue with anyone saying hunting needs to change. I completely agree that that illegal hunting needs to be condemned by all if hunting has any hope of a future. But I would be devastated to see the sight and sounds of hounds disappearing from our countryside forever.
There is much work to be done.
Gallop_Away
Well-Known Member
Such as? These are working animals, not pets. Used to living in packs in kennels. Some maybe rehomed but not all. Where is their "place" then?
Sandstone1
Well-Known Member
Maybe hunts should start thinking ahead and slow down breeding now. IF trail hunting is going to survive they are going to have to prove they are trail hunting.... Fox hunting has been illegal for years it has too stop.