Chance encounter with brown hare while walking in Wolds

THERE ARE several reasons why people travel a lot of miles to do their walking in the Yorkshire Wolds.

One is the obvious beauty of these rolling chalk hills with sinuous steep-sided chalk valleys, which have no equal in the North of England.

Another factor is the usual absence of hordes of other walkers, such a common feature in many parts of the North York Moors, the Yorkshire Dales and the Pennines.

A third reason, as far I’m concerned, is the excitement of a sudden encounter with a brown hare.

The Wolds are a UK stronghold of Lepus europaeus, and anyone familiar with the landscape will understand why.

Up on the high Wolds, huge open fields stretch as far as the eye can see and sort of replicate the tableland of central Asia from where the species is thought to have been introduced to Britain by Iron Age tribes as a ready source of meat.

They take full advantage of this largely unbounded space, reaching speeds of up to 45mph to evade predators like foxes or – too often these days – poachers’ dogs.

My latest chance meeting with a brown hare was while following the Centenary Way footpath along the top of Water Dale to the north of Fridaythorpe.

My binoculars had been rarely put to use on a breezy February day, with a couple of yellowhammers and one skylark the only movement of interest.

The hare was crouched low on a grassy verge between a low hedge and ploughed field, and had its back to me.

I suspect it was alerted to my approach by those characteristically long blacktipped ears which immediately mark them out from rabbits.

It was already in motion when I got the hare in focus.

But rather than bolting away from me on the bridle path I was following, it took off into the field, running at an angle of 45 degrees over the great expanse of chalk-flecked earth.

After a brief pause to look back in my direction it disappeared from view into the next field.

Hares are more often seen when there are crops like wheat and oilseed rape to conceal them, so I count myself lucky to have encountered one.

A century ago, the population of brown hares in Britain was estimated to be four million, and whilst their numbers have held up in the Yorkshire Wolds and East Anglia, there has been a steep decline elsewhere and today there are believed to be fewer than 80,000.

Hare coursing was outlawed in 2002, but sadly the so-called sport of hunting them with lurchers cross-bred from collies and greyhounds still goes on.

In just two months alone, Humberside Police received 200 reports of hare coursing in East Yorkshire.

The culprits are often found to be from the North-East, Lancashire or the Midlands.

Police mount patrols by checking the number plates of four-wheel drive vehicles parked in remote spots to see if they are from outside the area.

Vehicles are also seized if they are found to be used for poaching.