3 hunts and a shoot Packed up.

Hit report 1/10/22
3 hunts and a shoot Packed up!

Our morning started at 5.30am when we went to have a look at what the Flint and Denbigh hunt were up to. By 7.30am horseboxes had started congregating at Penpalment farm on the Upper Denbigh Road in Trefnant. Not the best place to have a meet given this hunts record of causing chaos on the roads. At 7.55am the hunts smokescreen trail layers left Penpalment and headed towards Plas Heaton estate, the hunt followed shortly afterwards. The hunt then demonstrated textbook smokescreens. The hunt actually followed a trail they had laid. This is what the leaked webinar referred to as “one in the bag”. To lay a trail and film it then when you’re caught out later use the excuse of “trail hunting”. The hunt moved off at pace and left the Plas Heaton estate crossing the Upper Denbigh Road again and headed into Plas Newydd estate, where they’d blatantly and illegally hunt. Huntsman Robert Medcalf took the hounds into a woodland where he knows perfectly well he’s likely to come across foxes, the field riders sat on their horses in the next field with the terrier quad, and the whippers stood on-point. It was at this point the hunts smokescreen trail layers were seen heading in the opposite direction and crossing the road back into Plas Newydd estate. The hounds then started to speak and terrier man shot off to get a better position. The hounds had rioted after deer, thankfully there was a sab on hand to point out to the whipper-in that this was all on video. The hunt then headed to the next woodland where once again they picked up on a scent and this time it was a fox. The hounds went into cry as the huntsman hunted them on and gave chase. Matthew Briggs acting as whipper-in shouted to Toby Dunn “Get to the main road”. Toby was caught by our driver stood on-point on the A525 in almost the exact stop we filmed them illegally hunting last season, Toby looked nervous and didn’t have an answer to why he was stood on-point on the main road as vehicle drove on the wrong side to road to avoid him. The hunt had seemingly lost the scent of this fox, but Stuart the gamekeeper of the estate mistook one of our sabs for a member of the hunt! Telling the sab which way the fox had run and explained he was looking for deer to shoot. The grateful sab returned the favour by sending Stuart the total opposite way to where the deer had run. As the hunt rode by Stuart informed the hunt riders where the fox had gone. The fox had run through a small wooded area and out the other side, the hunt then picked up on the line of the fox as the huntsman hunted them on towards Plas Newydd Hall. As the hounds searched in the overgrowth for the fox, a sab informed huntsman Robert Medcalf that this was all on film, it was only at this point he called the hounds out. The sab told Medcalf that the smokescreen trail layers had left this estate 20 minutes ago and had crossed the road back into Plas Heaton. Medcalf replied “I don’t know where the trails are laid” the sab said well now you do so go over to Plas Heaton and try to follow them, which is basically what he did. We went back to Plas Heaton and didn’t even bother attempting to hunt before heading back to the meet point. By 10.20am he’d boxed up and left. Sabs stayed in the area making sure they’d all left and checking Stuart wasn’t too lost. Now we can all go home right? We how received a tip off that a hunt was 15mins away near the Sportsmans Arms on Denbigh Moors.

As we drove around the area looking for the hunt we thought we’d come across the filming of the new “the hills have eyes movie, but soon recognised one of the guys stood at the side of the road as a supporter of a Llansannan footpack, rather than the gunpack they claim to the police to be, they clearly had no guns and an illegal (more that 2) amount of hounds to flush to gun. The hunt supporters were talking to a farmer who got rather defensive when we told him he could be prosecuted under section 3 of the hunting act for allowing an illegal hunt on his land. The farmer said he was nothing to do with the hunt and was just telling them not to go on his land and through his field of cattle, which was odd as that’s exactly what they did. We then spotted the hounds crossing the road and through a field of panicked sheep. As sabs closed in the huntsman went on the run, over ditched, over barbed wire fences, through boggy marshland and through the field of cattle whilst badly blowing his horn to try retrieve his hounds. The huntsman who was hiding his face (we managed to get a photo of him later) then headed back to the road and put some hounds in the back of a pick-up, he hadn’t had nothing to say to the sabs in the field but then called our driver a “f###ing b##ch”. The huntsman still looking for the rest of his hounds got in the pick-up and drove straight into a meet of a shoot…..

With 2 hunts already backed up we observed the shoot from the road who had stopped for lunch. They then illegally loaded up a horsebox with people in the back and loaded people including children on to the back of a pick-up. The shoot vehicles then headed straight towards us! The illegally loaded vehicle now on the road and some of the drivers started to film us whilst driving, also illegally. A member of the shoot then stood in the middle of the load obstructing a public highway, illegal again. The shoot entered a field at Wern isa farm and set up to start shooting. We went tobget a better look, but were soon confronted by the shooters who also had a film crew out with then who seemed to be enjoying encountering saboteurs. The hunt weren’t that confrontational well apart from one or two of them, and the shoot said they’d call it a day as they didn’t want to be observed blasting birds from the sky. By now an angry bumpkin claiming to the landowner had turned up….It was very difficult to make any sense of what he was going on about but he asked us “what would happen to all these birds if I hadn’t bred them?” Ermmm is that a trick question? He then admitted to allowing the hunt on his land and admitted it was illegal.
With the shoot heading back to the meet to pack up the landowner then followed us back to the public highway which he also claimed to own, very strange indeed! With 2 hunts and a shoot already packed up we’d heard the Wynnstay hunt were having an afternoon/evening meet at Springbank Farm Halghton Lane near Wrexham sp we thought we may as well drop in on them.

As we arrived at Halghton Lane around 5pm we were spotted by a member of the hunt. We checked Springbank farm but the hunt have fby the huntsman and the hounds, the looks on their faces said it all. The huntsman was straight on the phone to presumably tell the terrier men to pack up as all the hunt and supports and the terrier men returned back to the meet point packed up and took their sour faces back home. It’s Jeremy Scatterpack Reed we feel sorry for, driving an hour from the Flint and Denbigh hunt to try avoid us then getting packed up by us at the Wynnstay. As we went to get a photo of Springbank Farm the landowner Antonia Potts came out the Farm, we explained to her she could be charged under section 3 of the hunting act for allowing an illegal hunt on her land, she replied “I’ve been prosecuted for worse”….

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