This is my first and will be my last comment on hunting, but it is about an aspect that needs to be highlighted because so many people outside the country " and many inside it " have either never heard of it or do not know what it is, and many believe it was banned, no longer happens and will never do so again.
I refer to that part of hunting with dogs known as Beagling " the chasing and killing of hares for sport. This has nothing to do with hare coursing, though the end result is the same. Hare coursing is a form of racing and it is indeed banned and the ban is usually followed up swiftly if the police get wind of a meeting.
For those who do not know, Beagling is exactly the same as fox hunting, with humans following a pack of dogs that are scenting out and chasing " hounding to death, an animal " only this time, a hare. The other difference is that the beaglers walk, whereas (apart from some fell hunting) fox hunters ride.
I am ambivalent about fox hunting but I do know that foxes have to be controlled. They are a rural menace " they attack poultry, lambs and game birds, causing carnage. Anyone who has ever kept hens which have been attacked by a fox knows that a desperate scene is left behind - mutilated and dying hens strewn about and needing to be finished off, blood, gore and feathers and decapitated birds everywhere. It is, for the fox, far more a question of sport than of food. Foxes carry disease, and urban foxes are becoming perhaps an even greater problem than rural ones. There is no question of hunting them with packs of dogs but something will soon have to be done about those in most cities, and London in particular.
The sight of the hunt is a fine one and one of the great traditions of the country but I entirely respect the arguments of those who disapprove and the ban has largely " though not entirely " been respected by the fox hunts. But the police take no action even if it has not. They have ignored their role in the enforcement of the ban on hunting entirely.
But let us go back to beagling. Beagle packs have in many instances ignored the ban altogether and continued to hunt down and tear apart hares, across the country. They can do it easily. People do not know they are there and many do not recognise them for what they are, they tuck themselves out of sight in far-flung fields and they make little noise " no clattering of hooves. Fox hunters at least do it upfront.
The hare does no one harm. It is a timid, gentle and beautiful creature and in many parts of Britain its numbers are on the decline. It is not a threat to human or other animal life, it carries no disease, it disturbs no one. Yet it is hunted down by men following packs of dogs, to be torn apart amid cheers. This is the most vicious form of hunting there is in Britain, vicious and unnecessary. Deer stalking is not unnecessary " deer have to be culled, old stags cannot allowed to go through harsh winters and die slow deaths of starvation and pain, the survival of the species requires some culling. This is not true of hares.
There is nothing to be said for beagling and those who practise it deserve to be treated with contempt. Why are they not the same legal outcasts and social pariahs that hare coursers are ?
If you want to get up in arms about the evils of any country ways, do it about Beagling. Give me any petition against it and I will sign. In both my names.
