On Saturday we took a trip across the Tamar (only just!) to pay a visit to the South Tetcott Hunt, whose huntsman Tim Ingram spent some time in hospital recently after being mauled by his own hounds. We were not surprised to hear about it. When hounds cower from human touch, it’s a pretty good sign of how they’re treated at home.
The meet was at Way Farm on the edge of North Tamerton and the hunt with their 12 field riders and handful of quadbikes spent most of the day going round and round the various small copses and valleys between Way Farm, Down Farm, Allisdon, Trepoyle, Haydon and West and East Balsdon, as well as the edge of the Tamar and Old Canal. Trepoyle is owned by agricultural feed merchant and badger cull director Bill Harper, so we were pleased to pay a return visit to this wildlife murderer’s farm too (he also runs an abattoir on-site).
With hardly any road access, it was up to our three foot teams to keep up with the hunt on foot all day. Our runners covered huge distances, as they always do, while other foot sabs were positioned strategically to intercept hounds when they were chasing foxes. This worked well, as numerous foxes were seen by sabs throughout the day, with one being chased at least three times.
That fox was first spotted by runners being coursed by hounds near Down Farm. Whenever sabs radio to say they’ve seen a fox being coursed (chased by sight, i.e. dangerously close) everyone prepares for the worst. But this fox was able to give hounds the slip and bought themselves a few minutes headstart. Hounds could be heard in cry shortly after though, meaning they had found the scent again. As the sound of hounds in cry appeared to be headed west, one foot team looking over a gate from a track heard a light-footed animal running at speed down the track behind them. As sabs spun around they caught sight of the tail of a fox disappearing through a hedge. Sometimes it’s almost as if they know to run past us so we can help. Sabs covered the scent line and prepared to rate hounds when they arrived a few minutes later. Unfortunately the scent remained strong, as did the hounds’ determination as they chased the fox via Peterspark Plantation towards Haydon, where they appeared to finally lose the scent thanks to continued intervention from sabs.
An hour later, enough time for the fox to have returned to the covert they were flushed out of, Tim returned to the original area and hounds chased this fox again. All three sab teams worked together to rate, call and spray, enabling this fox to get away a second time. When the fox was sighted on this second run they were already looking pretty tired, as were sabs by this point!
However, foxhunting is all about delighting in the suffering of wildlife, so Tim took great pleasure in announcing to our runners that he was going for another run. The same fox was again flushed from covert and chased north via Allisdon towards Haydon, and hounds were in cry for quite a while. Fortunately though, a very tired fox – we believe it was the same one – was seen having doubled-back and lost the pack. Sabs watched as the fox struggled across the field and went to ground in a small fox earth in a hedge. With the fox safely underground, sabs jumped into action. We knew how exhausted the fox was and so we emptied many bottles of citronella spray to cover their scent in the surrounding field leading up to the earth. This was the second fox to go to ground out of sight of the hunt on Saturday and on both occasions sabs were fortunately positioned to witness it.
The other thing that happened repeatedly at this meet was that hounds were getting caught on barbed wire. Sabs had to intervene on the first occasion when a hound was left dangling by her leg from the fence. Later another two hounds were seen with huge gashes on the side of their legs. And right towards the end yet another hound was left hanging with her leg caught in barbed wire. Hunt supporters and sabs worked together to free the poor hound.
See the video below for footage filmed on this day.
CONTENT WARNING: Contains footage of animals in distress
This was right towards the end of the day as it was already getting dark. Tim appeared to have given up by this point. Hounds were scattered all over the valley at West Balsdon and he was nowhere to be seen, neither were Sam Beasley and his other makeshift whip. After a bit of horn blowing we had gathered most of the pack in the field and waited for Tim to eventually arrive on the back of a quadbike to pick them up.
Quite a stressful day with lots of foxes being chased. We can’t be sure there were no kills, but it was one of those days where we know there would have been more if we hadn’t intervened.
Gallery
