Is it wrong to shoot pheasant for sport?

FIVE Live BBC radio presenter Rachel Burden was right to take Sir Ian Botham to task over shooting pheasant and partridge (Mail). Why is fox-hunting considered to be killing for sport, but not shooting? A fox is a predator and a pest that will slaughter a pen full of chickens and kill newborn lambs. Gentle, hand-reared birds are flushed into the air and blasted from the sky and this is called a sport.

WENDY PARKER, Solihull, W. Mids. IF IT were not for the shooting of pheasants for sport that Ms Burden objects to, there would not be any game birds in the wild. Rearing game has been practised for centuries due to the low natural population. Being ground-nesting birds, they are easy prey for predators. The reared birds supplement the feral population, as not all of them fall to the sportsman’s gun. These become part of the natural population that are seen and enjoyed by the public. Some of the fees paid by sportsmen are used to buy young pheasant stock. What would Miss Burden prefer: a countryside devoid of pheasants, or one with a buoyant population of game birds for all to enjoy?