Now they want to ban game shooting!

Lec and I were reading a copy of H&H from 1975 last night. It had a leaflet in it inviting people to join a campaign against them banning hare coursing! So this stuff has been going on since before we were born. I wonder how long it will be going on into the future.

Good old Torygraph imploring us to vote Conservative!

We release 20 million pheasants a year in this country, isn't that amazing?!
 
We've been discussing this in the Dogs room, please see Hanandhen's excellent description of Early Day Motions
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http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/forums/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/4971231/an/0/page/0#4971231
 
as someone whos father has a game estate in the highlands i can promise it will never ever happen!!! the amount of goverment ministers and rich bankers that come up to shoot !!!! they will never "shoot" themselves in the foot to ban there own hobbies and the amount of revenue it brings into the country = loads in tax which the goverment love!!!
it wont happen!!! although im sure folk said that about hunting;)!!!!
 
Sport, and the means of obtaining the most free range food available - game. I think the deer and pheasant would prefer to be wild than farmed somehow...
 
Eh? Game birds perhaps have the best life and death of any food animal on the planet...apart from maybe the cattle used to provide kobe beef.

I have spent a lot of time on estates and have seen it with my own eyes.
 
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I say BAN hunting of any kind.

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I trust you are vegetarian.
A colleague of mine was horrified when I said my husband was off shooting tomorrow.
Yet she will be off to McDonalds tomorrow with her kids to eat the chicken mcnuggets - I wonder if she is equally horrified about the thought of how that chicken lived and died?
I would personally MUCH rather eat a pheasant, deer, rabbit or partridge that my husband has shot - knowing it had a natural life and an instant death.
 
...and then it will be fishing, and rat catching with your own cat, butterfly catching, mini beast hunt......
I have never been shooting, Uncle used to be a gamekeeper and was always saying that if they bred 1000 pheasants to release them, 900 would probably be shot to be eaten so no waste and the other buggers would have a happy life in the country. Not sure if thats true, but they can't shoot everyone they release.
As far as I know its not just people taking potshots at the wildlife.
 
Well, the shoot around the corner from me, I say they must shoot 100 and 900 go free, because that's how many my dog has put up in the last year.

Message to my dog, you are in the PASTORAL group, you are NOT a gundog......
 
We do gun tests with a starter pistol, and years ago (not now) the dog got two goes, IE, if it was a shock the first time, they fired a second. My mum's old bitch was known as 'the incredible shrinking dog' because she looked like she had no legs by the time the second shot was fired because she hit the deck so fast
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The shoot my husband is on release 1000 birds a year, they shoot about 600, some are inevitably lost to foxes and road kill but others 'escape'!
All those shot are eaten, either by members of the shoot or they are taken to the game dealer who will sell them to butchers, restaurants and hotels so no waste.
Before the birds are released they are kept in the most luxurious of pens in the middle of the woods, the pens are huge and are protected from foxes. I really struggle to see where the problem lies with shooting, unless of course this is a class thing, except my husband is the total opposite to upper class!!
 
AuntieDeedee now you see, I've never been shooting or seen it done but thats exactly how I thought it would be. What annoys me is people who have never seen it or have no idea what its all abouot or just ask get on their soap boxes and try to ban things.
I think I'd quite like to try shooting, I know my dad has an inkling to go when he retires as he has asked for two springer pups as a retirement prezzie!
 
I'm sure a lot of the prejudice against shooting is through lack of knowledge. I studied an ecology degree at uni and there were quite a few fellow students who were against shooting on my course. As they learnt about the conservation involved, the way the birds were treated and the beneficial management of the woods etc, most of the 'antis' changed their views, in fact a fair few came beating with me!
 
hare coursing does really nauseate me though, hares are absolutely beautiful, they do no harm afaik (don't dig burrows for horses to break legs down, for a start), do farmers begrudge them the little bit of food they eat? considering that they are hugely outnumbered by rabbits everywhere....
can anyone justify hare coursing to me?
if they start on shooting they really should start on fishing, my OH goes fishing and i think it's pretty barbaric actually.
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of course they won't because it's so popular.
 
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hare coursing does really nauseate me though, hares are absolutely beautiful, they do no harm afaik (don't dig burrows for horses to break legs down, for a start), do farmers begrudge them the little bit of food they eat? considering that they are hugely outnumbered by rabbits everywhere....
can anyone justify hare coursing to me?
if they start on shooting they really should start on fishing, my OH goes fishing and i think it's pretty barbaric actually.
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of course they won't because it's so popular.

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Kerilli, hare coursing has been completely illegal since 2004 - brown hares are on the UK BAP list, so they are considered 'rare' in this country and therefore they have a (limited) degree of protection. There are many, many things more damaging than hares, I agree, but whilst I know of many farmers who shoot rabbits, (illegally) kill badgers/fill in their setts etc, I know of none who persecute hares.
 
ah, okay, thanks... isn't the Waterloo Cup still run though, i thought it was?
btw, good news... hear this firsthand recently, Cambs police are going all-out to catch hare-coursers, taking their crimes very very seriously and following up every lead, after coursers deliberately rammed a police helicopter with their vehicles...
 
Nope, last time it ran was 2005 (the Act which banned hare coursing was a 2004 act but did not come into force until later).

Most police forces now have a reasonably active wildlife crimes officer or unit - it is a massive change which I have seen since I started working in this industry. When I first became an ecologist prosecutions were few and far between and the big companies would routinely break the law because it was cheaper than sorting out the issue. Now the police take a much more serious view of these things, which is good (and keeps me in business!!)
 
South Lincs/Cambs has a serious hare-coursing problem and although I don't like it, in the main the hares get away as the people basically just want to run their dogs. Plus, unlike in coursing competitions, the hares have a fair chance as they are not "contained" so hares can run where ever they like.

I don't like any killing of animals in the name of sport - sorry but farmers just seem to want to eradicate anything regardless. Or they certainly do around here!!
 
I wish my son was interested in shooting, he would then want to encourage wildlife, woods, hedges, grow game crops (which also feeds other birds, etc.)
Shooting estates are very beneficial to wildlife in general (apart from foxes).

I had a nice cold partridge for my lunch. Much nicer than some factory-farmed piece of chicken.
 
I'm pro foxhunting but anti game shooting. I'm happy to be persuaded otherwise but cant see the point of breeding pheasants specifically for them to be chased by beaters and then shot. Then to cap it all when they've been shot, the majority of the carcasses are buried in a big hole because the people who shoot them dont want them and have never had any intentions of them being used for food!

I'm all for stopping game shooting if it involves game being specifically bred for the purpose of sport.
 
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