On Wednesday we teamed up with sabs from SDAR, Guildford and Norfolk to sab the traditional ‘commiseration of the hunting ban’ meet of the four Dartmoor hunts: Dartmoor, Mid Devon, South Devon and Spooners. We couldn’t however see any sign of the Spooners on the day. We’d heard that they’d been hunting and digging out the day before in the Princetown area, so perhaps there has been a falling out between them and the other hunts?
Mid Devon huntsman Duncan Hume was hunting his hounds, Robert Medcalf huntsman from South Devon was out as were the two Harrys from the Dartmoor hunt, Gosling the huntsman and Cook his whip.
The hunt met at the Two Bridge’s hotel and were met by a great group of protesters from Devon Against Hunting, and Action Against Foxhunting. News reporters from ITV were also present and interviewed the hunt who gave their usual trail hunt lies nonsense.
The hunt started off heading north towards Crockern Tor and spent a while drawing the nearby valley and gorse bushes. Three groups of sabs kept pace ready to intervene but hounds drew a blank. Sabs close to the huntsman introduced themselves and were told they’d “better like running”. Unfortunately for the hunt we had a great team of runners out from DCHS and Guildford sabs, enabling us to keep eyes on the hunt for pretty much all of the day.
The hunt continued north west past Higher White Tor towards Fernworthy forest. While drawing a gorse bush a fox was seen breaking and hounds quickly found the line and gave chase. Sabs raced to rate the hounds back, and with the help of the wind blowing the scent of the fox all over the place, hounds lost the line. The hunt and hounds then headed south back to the road at Warren House Inn. Hounds again picked up on a scent south of the road, and headed in cry towards Sousson Down. A team of sabs followed behind while others entered the woods from every direction to ensure we wouldn’t lose the hunt. We caught up to the hunt in the centre of the woodland, hanging around an area that smelt strongly of fox.
The hunt then moved off south to the area to the West of Grendon Farm. As sabs moved to keep with the hunt one sab encountered a ‘trail layer’. This man was riding a horse with a flimsy rag floating in the wind several feet off the ground behind him. How a rag not touching the ground is meant to lay any sort of trail is baffling. Unless of course trail hunting is one big lie… At the same time, another group of sabs were being told by hunt staff that the trails had been laid early that morning. Can’t get their story straight can they.
Deer were seen braking away from the hounds as the hunt moved south. Hounds got very excited in a large patch of gorse and sabs saw a fox fleeing for her life with hounds in pursuit directly behind. Sabs used horn and voice calls, rating, and careful use of the gizmo to help this fox escape, literally from the jaws of death. During this heart-stopping situation the hunt masters and followers were all close by watching and encouraging the hounds onto the fox.
Hounds then once again went into cry and headed north. Then the hunt moved west to the area around Castor Common. As sabs caught up hounds were once again heard in cry near Bellever, and sabs raced to the scene while our vehicle was pointlessly blocked by a support car, but hounds had gone quiet by the time we caught up and the hunt moved on.
It was here that we picked up our latest sab recruit Harlequin the hound. He’d been left behind by the rest of the pack and was running on the road so he hitched a ride with us to find the hunt and get him back with the pack. We flagged down a member of hunt staff to let them know, and mutually agreed that we’d take him directly back to the hound van as Harlequin showed no signs of wanting to leave our cosy vehicle. However some redcoats appeared and finally convinced Harlequin to reluctantly get out to join the pack. We were sad to see him go! Any hound is welcome to take a nap in our vehicles any time. In honour of our guest, that vehicle that has so far only gone by ‘jeep’ is now named ‘Harlequin’.
We followed Harlequin and the redcoats to join the rest of the hunt and hounds as Duncan continued to gather his lost hounds near Dury Farm. This gave us lots of time for cuddles with the hounds, with Harlequin coming over for some more affection. Sabs and hounds are best friends.
A massive thank you to all the sabs who travelled from far away to join us! It was brilliant working with you all.