Hit report 22/2/2020
We joined up with our friends from Cheshire hunt saboteurs, Cheshire against blood sports, Stockport monitors and Independent monitors to pay a visit to the Wynnstay hunt after their midweek spree where they caused the death of a member of the publics pony and killed a fox in someones garden right in front of children. It would be safe to say the Wynnstay probably expected us after what they did a few days earlier. Some sabs turned up outside the hunt kennels, a large amount of hunt employees tried playing silly buggers and were sending vehicles out to try lead us in the wrong direction, we weren’t falling for this and sabs moved off to where we expected the hunt to be near Whitchurch. The North Wales sab van stayed near the kennels to watch what sort of antics the kennels staff have in mind. 3 police vehicles turned up at the Kennels to speak to the hunt staff but weren’t overly concerned by us. We even had a chap pull up admitting to being a hare courser and told us how unfair it is that the police target the courser whilst allowing the hunts to get away with it… I think he’s telling the wrong people here. With the hunt located and sabs and monitor already on them, their attempts to sneak out early hadn’t gone to plan. Bored of games at the kennels we headed towards Whitchurch to join the others.
We arrived to hear hounds had already been in cry on the scent of a fox. This hunt always seem to have a ridiculous amount of terrier men, today around 10 quad and Bob on his motorbike. The cocky terrier boys lost their confidence a bit once they realised we wouldn’t be putting up with their usual aggressive behaviour. The terrier boys spent most the day driving around like idiots in a convoy. You might have thought the hunt would have been on their best behaviour following the media coverage of their kills in midweek but this wasn’t the case, as arrogant as ever using the horses as weapons. As the hunt headed back towards the farm they met at a large police presence turned up including a helicopter! It initially looked like the police were going to target us as they blocked the road and approached sabs and monitors. One officer said we are not here to disperse you (usual means they are) or remove your face coverings although we’ve had reports of people masked up which isn’t nice, the irony was the hunts hired “Safety officers” thugs were stood next to us masked up. In a dramatic turn of events police officers actually entered the fields and told the hunt security they couldn’t stop sabs. As this was going on others had gone ahead to relocate the hunt after they’d caused this diversion to try shake us off. As we drove to where we thought the hunt had headed we bumped into other sabs who informed us they’d seen a fox bolt. It was clear we were in the right area as the terrier boys turned up, still in convoy like some sort of bumpkin carnival parade. Sabs entered the fields and soon came across hunt riders. We thought we may have heard hounds in cry but we could not quite be sure due to the noise of the police helicopter which was now above our heads. As we followed the riders who were hopefully leading us in the direction of the hounds, the helicopter had left us and we heard the hounds in cry on a scent of a fox. At this point using our gizmo and voice calls we took the hounds off the hunt and more importantly off the line of the fox. Around 10 hounds then went into a woodland, we were concerned as we knew of a badger sett in that woodland which we had already come across with hounds prints and digging all over. The whipper-in gathered the hounds and headed back towards the rest of the hunt. At this point we saw the fox running across the field. We masked the scent of the fox so the hounds wouldn’t pick it up. As we tried to catch back up with the hunt we heard the hounds go briefly into cry again, but thankfully we were informed by others that the hounds had lost that scent. The hunt then headed back to the meeting point and packed up at approx 1.40pm.
We then made the decision to head to the Cheshire hounds hunt who for the last few weeks had unbelievably been laying trails. A team had been left to keep a watch on the Cheshire hounds. On our arrival we were informed the hunt had seemingly reverted back to their usual ways. So sign of trails being laid and the hunt had refused to give the start and end point which they had been supplying the last few weeks. The first thing we came across was an injured hound who had jumped a barbed wire fence and got his/her leg entangled. The hunt picked up the hound and put it in the back of a vehicle, some hunt supporters took offense to us filming this telling us be didn’t support animal welfare, bizarrely not seeing the irony in their blinkered views. We hadn’t been there long when the hunt headed back to the meet and packed up!
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