18th February 2017
Golden Valley Hunt
South Herefordshire Hunt country
Michaelchurch Escley
We heard that the Golden Valley were planning to hunt in part of the country that the South Herefordshire would normally hunt, so off we went towards Wales for the day. We had heard a great many stories about this hunt, so expectations were high…
They met near the Bridge Inn, which has held a number of South Herefordshire meets in the past, in the village and hunted the woods behind Michaelchurch Court initially. It was a pretty warm day out in the open and much of the time they drew blank.
At one point, up on the hills, about 8 hounds came running towards us on a line, so we called them up out of the trees, away from the fox who we believe went to ground nearby, and into the open part of the field, surprised that no hunt support were encouraging them on… then we realised that no hunt staff were anywhere to be seen. Or heard. We spent some time trying to keep hounds out of nearby fields of sheep – it was in South Herefordshire Hunt country that the SHH hounds killed several sheep just a few seasons back.
On the way back down the hills soon after (sab driver had been in touch to say she had spotted huntsman with about 3 hounds in tow down on the road…) we had loose hounds running around in various fields, still no other hunt staff in sight.
Into a valley and up on to another hill and we watched as the pack split on 2 separate lines, hunt staff and riders making a choice and riding off with one half of the pack, abandoning the others speaking in woodland a few fields back. Needless to say, the pack are supposed to be hunting as one.
Even when the hunt were ‘in control’ of (almost) the entire pack, it seemed all on horseback were to be involved… Any good huntsman should be able to keep his hounds together with the odd horn or voice call, whippers-in doing their job by stopping hounds straying from the rest when being held up. With this hunt it appeared that the (over-)use of holloa’s was the preferred method, most riders whooping away excitedly for more than a minute to attract stray hounds (mostly unsuccessfully it should be added) whilst other riders rode off at speed, having allowed stray hounds to get a decent head start, rating and whipping madly to stop them.
Confused by their strange behaviour, we kept an eye on them in a nearby field and overheard talk of trails being laid. With a rider and quad bike heading into the wood, we kept an open mind and the hounds did indeed pick up a similar line to that taken by them. However, as hounds headed through the wood, we spotted a fox breaking cover away from rider and quad and, sure enough, the ‘trail layer’ began to holloa, indicating the sighting. Hounds appeared, took the same line, we rated and the ‘trail-layer’ changed her mind and started to rate hounds off the scent too. Sab driver asked what was going on inland… at that point we’re not sure the hunt even knew. What were they hunting? How does hunting work? Who is in charge? With the GV, dog only knows…
Hunt support informed us that the hunt rarely catch anything and explained that the 3 vehicles and handful of riders was about right for one of their meets. Much of what we saw today is a complete contradiction of what we’ve previously been told about the hunt. So we’ll be sure to come back again before we form a proper judgement.
We hope that all sheep in the area are OK after the hunt’s incompetency in keeping any vague element of control over the pack today… A little worrying to see huntsman Darren Foxley looking happy as Larry at the idea of having 3 of his hounds paying attention to him!
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