Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
I’m top of the food chain – not the fox
Following heated protests at two hunt meets over the festive season, a local gamekeeper explains why he supports calls for a ban on the rural tradition to be repealed
Every year it’s the same. The huntsman and the pro-hunt supporters all have a pointless stand-off with the anti-hunt protesters. Every year the stalemate continues.
I am a pro-hunt supporter. I was born in the countryside and am active in the organising of game shoots around east Kent. This means that I have had a fair few dealings with foxes over the years.
I, for one, rely on the survival of my game birds throughout the summer and winter as a source of income.
I also rely on the birds that make it throughout the season without being shot (and there are quite a few!) to breed and produce young.
The fox is the number one predator of the game bird, although very closely followed by the ever increasing number of buzzards of late – but that’s another story.
Once the fox has found a steady source of food he will return until all food has gone. Normal predator instincts I hear you say? However, when his food source is my income and subsequently your food source then I have to play my predator card and remind him that I am top of the food chain and not him.
The methods we use to control the fox are to shoot them or trap them. These methods are generally humane but both have same end result – the fox will be shot. Most people, including both pro and anti supporters, do not know what happens on a “fox hunt”.
The anti supporters don’t really know that the people on the horses, or the houndsmen, do not have a bloodthirsty dislike for the fox. Quite the opposite.
They respect the fox’s sharpness, cunning and ability to slip away from them, leaving little trace.
Nor do they revel in the idea of watching a fox being torn to shreds. They enjoy the freedom of being able to ride their horses through the countryside, jumping fences and ditches, without the general boundaries associated with riding during the rest of the year.
Speaking as someone who has hunting dogs used to flush birds during the shooting season, I can confidently say that it is a pleasure to watch your dog work and do the job that it is bred and trained for.
The enjoyment doesn’t come from the killing of the animal, but the chase beforehand.
My argument here is that every bird that my dogs flush has a 50/50 chance to escape the dogs and the guns.
The fox when being hunted by dogs has a even better chance than that.
Yet, when being controlled by farmers, gamekeepers and the like, there is very little chance that it will get away.
The use of high-powered rifles and thermal imaging scopes has put paid to that.
I know of a gamekeeper who has dispatched almost 200 foxes in a four-month period on the same piece of land, no bigger that 1,000 acres.
I’m guessing that the hunt’s kill rate was never close to that.
All predators and nonpredators alike in the countryside need to be managed.
Let’s not forget that the countryside is a very managed environment.
The foxes, badgers, rabbits, squirrels, magpies, pigeons and cormorants, just to name a few, all have a negative effect on the land if not controlled.
No one likes to think of any animal having to suffer. However, the hunt rarely ever got its prey. The high-powered rifle and thermal scope does!
Let’s try to keep this in context and enjoy the traditional gathering of people and animals that has been a mainstay of English tradition for centuries.
Let’s not lose it to modernisation, like so many other rural traditions over the years.
I for one will be supporting the hunt, enjoying the horses, dogs and general social gathering.
Yet I will be smiling knowing that if the ban is ever repealed, Mr Fox will probably still live to see another day.
What do you think?email kentishgazette@thekmgroup.co.uk or write to Gazette House, Estuary View, Business Park, Whitstable, CT5 3SE