A short trip ‘over the bridge’ yesterday to team up with South Wales Hunt Sabs. The hunt of choice was the rarely sabbed Curre and Llangibby, who were hunting not too far from Chepstow. Due to the large amount of snow still on the ground in the area they were out on foot instead of horseback.
Upon arrival at the meet we were instantly greeted by a few angry looking terrier boys, one of whom assured us that we would ‘get our heads kicked in’ as soon as the camera stopped rolling…when a couple more sabs arrived he wasn’t so vocal, and all of our heads are still in perfect condition. You’re gunna have to try harder than that!
They tried to give us the slip straight away, boxing the hounds back up and driving the hound van to a small wood about 10 minutes away. The large number of support vehicles in the car park next to it suggested to us that we had found our target, and for a while after we monitored them…not much to report apart from possibly a few foxes bolting.
After a while the two groups entered the field from different directions and descended upon the huntsman, the whip and the hounds. As we performed a perfect pincer movement, their faces dropped.
From then on we were right on them, making sure that they weren’t hunting. After an hour of following through some very difficult terrain (including knee-deep snow, paths resembling streams and some thick brambles) the huntsman made his way back to the road, jumped on the back of a quad and headed back to the near-by kennels. Job done!
Until next week…