Four of us headed out into Herefordshire yesterday as we had a rare tip-off about the South Herrie Hunt having a joint meet with the Crawley and Horsham Hunt near to Garway. We turned up at the meet to the surprise of both hunts and the opening speech confirmed that they would be using the C&H pack for the day. A couple of quadbikes were out, both with no number plates and overloaded with 3 or 4 people on each.
They spent a lot of time around Lady Wood, picking up on a couple of foxes who were holloa’d by the supporters. Hunt staff attempted to block us getting on to footpaths at one point but with little success. We rated the hounds when they checked by a road and they seemed to lose the fox they were after…
As they went back inland at speed we did lose sight of them on and off and a lot of time was spent on foot (which we’re fine with) as supporters blocked our driver from getting along various roads. At this point, friends from Bristol Hunt Saboteurs and South Wales Hunt Saboteurs arrived as they were in the area so we were able to keep more eyes on the hunt.
Having scared a number of flocks of sheep and a couple of fields-worth of cows and bullocks, they moved on, running a fox to ground in a small covert. With 3C sabs in the area they left, the sabs ensuring that there were no terriermen in the vicinity before catching up again with the hounds. Meanwhile our sab driver had eyes on the hunt and the hounds once again marked to ground, Bristol and South Wales sabs timing their arrival perfectly once more and running into the area, stopping the terriermen flushing the fox from a drain. We also had the pleasure of a visit from convicted terrierman James Smith and his equally lovely friend Liam Thompson and city-boy Luke James who had apparently been missing us since their departure with Lee Peters from the Ross Harriers! Always nice to see “the other Patrick” as well, over from the Cottie Vale.
With the groups now gathered, we split off again and headed round in front of the hunt. After drawing some hedgelines and vegetable fields, footsabs received a message from our driver that she suspected the terriermen were up to something. As one of the quadbikes accidentally power-wheelied away from the hunt, we picked up speed to catch up with the hounds. As we turned a corner, we heard more whistles (often used instead of holloas) and ran to get a view on what was going on: hounds were in a field next to the road and were getting interested in something, the huntsman encouraged them on and they went into cry around the area we had heard the whistles coming from.
Speeding off down a hedgeline, our sabs were about to run down the road parallel with them and try to intercept when the fox ran across the road in front of us and various hunt supporters. As we covered the line with citronella, the hunt photographer tried to grab one sab’s spray bottle but she carried on spraying before the two sabs ran to where the hounds were checking and rated them. We then believe they ran back on the heel-line, checking again when they lost the scent. Meanwhile, Bristol and South Wales sabs had come into the area from another direction, seen the fox and also heavily sprayed the field it ran through. One experienced sab described the fox as looking disorientated and unsteady. Immediately after this our sab driver radio’d through and told us she had followed a terrierman into the nearby woods who had been acting shifty and ran when she came into sight. At first she thought the lump under his jacket might be a dead fox, but we believe it was likely to be the sack they had released the fox from…
The hunt carried on and hunted until after dark(!) with members of the field wearing dark clothes on dark-coloured horses with children on ponies with them riding down country roads in the dark to pack up. A full day of naughtiness from both hunts! We’ll hand the C&H back over to our friends down in West Sussex Hunt Sabs now and hope we don’t have the pleasure of their company again anytime soon!
Update: Videos from other perspectives on our day out with the South Herrie and Crawley & Horsham hunts on Saturday. Videos are from one of our foot sabs and also our driver who spotted the terriermen behaving suspiciously and, as the video shows, there are two men walking quickly away from her, one with a bulge under his jacket which is not his beer-belly and the other with cable-ties in his hand. Add that to the fact whistles were heard just moments earlier and the fox seen running away from the hounds was described by an experienced sab as looking disorientated and unsteady and you may see why we believe the hunts may have been using a bagged fox.
Even other hunters will look down on hunts using bagged foxes. It’s bad enough if, like Mark Meladay from the Ledbury hunt, you have to gather your hounds and take them to where you’ve seen a fox run instead of casting them and allowing them to find the line themselves, but the use of bagged foxes shows a totally different level of incompetence and desparation as a huntsman. Indeed, Peter Beckford (whose work is often looked to as an authority in foxhunting) certainly did not think that the use of such foxes is sport.
But who can say for certain…? We’ll definitely be keeping a close eye on hunts from now on.