FAQ

The Hunting Act makes it illegal to use a pack of hounds to chase a live mammal (with certain limited exemptions).

However, just as with any law that criminalises certain behaviour, there are many who simply don’t obey it. Most hunts have continued under the pretence that they are trail hunting. Trail hunting involves the use of a fox-based scent (supposedly derived from fox urine). You can read lots more about the smokescreen of trail hunting here.

Hunts in Devon sometimes claim to be hunting a trail when challenged by the police. However, we have not come across any evidence that they actually do, and we have seen plenty of evidence of them hunting live foxes. Most of them are quite blatant about this and some even admit to doing so in our presence. Many hunt members will gloat about their recent kills and boast about getting away with breaking the law. We witness hunts breaking the law every week of the hunting season, with prolonged chases, dig-outs and kills.

Hounds that cross major roads, railway lines or stray onto land they have no permission to be on, which we also witness on a regular basis, are obviously not following a pre-laid trail but rather the scent of a live animal, as no trail layer would have laid a trail in such a dangerous place. A few years ago, six hounds from the Dartmoor Hunt were killed when they strayed onto mainline railway tracks in south Devon, and a few years before that seven hounds from the Eggesford Hunt succumbed to the same fate. Those hounds should never have been allowed to get to within a few fields of the railway line, and their deaths were preventable. In such circumstances, hunts will usually claim hounds ‘accidentally’ got onto the trail of a fox and that their deaths were an accident, just as foxes are only ever ‘accidentally’ killed. If hunts wanted to proactively stop this from happening then they would train their hounds to follow a non-fox-based scent. They could also muzzle their hounds to prevent them from killing foxes and other animals in their path. We receive frequent reports from distressed landowners whose pet cat or dog was ripped to shreds by a pack of hounds tearing through their garden, for example.

How else can you tell whether hunts are chasing live foxes? A giveaway is the presence of terriermen on quad bikes, carrying terriers, spades and sometimes guns, with the intention of digging out a fox that has been hunted to ground. The law is clear that there is no role for terriermen on a genuine trail-hunt, yet every hunt we sab in Devon is accompanied by them. We have also secured several convictions against terriermen for their illegal activities whilst out with the hunts, again providing conclusive proof that those hunts are breaking the law and hunting wildlife rather than a pre-laid trail.

There are 19 active fox hunts in Devon, most of them hunting several times a week during the main hunting season. However, in Devon and Cornwall there has not yet been a single successful prosecution for illegal hunting under the Hunting Act in the 20 years since the ban came in, despite the fact that illegal hunting is widespread. There are several reasons for this.

The first is enforcement. When the ban first came in, an internal document was circulated around the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) stating that forces would give the ban a ‘low priority’. Another concern outlined in material from Devon and Cornwall and Avon and Somerset Constabularies included worries that police forces were fundamentally weakened by officers who sympathised with fox hunting, or were hunters themselves. One email from a Devon and Cornwall inspector detailed how he dreamt the ban would be postponed, before waking up and despairing that foxhunting would be outlawed. In our experience, since the Hunting Act came into force, Devon and Cornwall Constabulary has consistently failed to act upon evidence given to them regarding illegal hunting. There are police officers in Devon who openly associate and ride with the local hunts, including officers at Launceston, Tavistock and Okehampton stations. We have documented several conversations with police officers (see our YouTube channel) who have stated that enforcement of the Hunting Act is “never going to happen” and others claiming that hunting is a matter for DEFRA or the RSPCA, or that it’s not a crime at all.

When we call the police to attend an illegal hunt we are regularly told that they would only attend if public order offences were reported. And even in situations where assaults or property damage/theft have been committed by hunts against sabs and monitors and evidence has been submitted to the police for investigation, video files conveniently get ‘lost’ or officers drag out investigations for so long that they simply run out of time to file them with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS). On top of that, we have many pro-hunt MPs in Devon, one of whom (Geoffrey Cox) even hosts annual meets of the Lamerton Hunt, who have twice been on trial for offences under the Hunting Act. That brings us onto the next important point: prosecutions for offences under the Hunting Act, just like many other animal cruelty offences, often fall to charities such as the League Against Cruel Sports and the RSPCA to fund, and the costs of these run into the hundreds of thousands. According to the 2014 independent review of the RSPCA’s policy on prosecutions, hunts up and down the country are engaging in “widespread and public disregard for the law”. Stephen Wooler, the author of the review, claimed that “The present situation is currently unsatisfactory. The volume of footage available (taken by hunt monitors) leaves the objective viewer in no doubt on the balance of probabilities that it is ‘business as usual’ for many hunts because enforcement is so difficult.”

The second problem is the Hunting Act itself, which needs strengthening so as to make it a more enforceable piece of legislation.

If hunts weren’t hunting foxes, we’d have no reason to sab them. Our sabs have many better things they could be doing in their free time and could turn their attention to other animal cruelty issues. However while they keep hunting, we will keep sabbing.

Not all hunt sabs cover their faces and for everyone it is a personal decision. It is also not true that hunt members don’t cover their faces. Most terriermen on the hunts we sab cover their faces, as well as most of the thugs hunts sometimes call in to accompany us during the day. You can find plenty of pictures of them on our Facebook page. Hunt sabs have learnt over the years that hunters and their supporters will stop at nothing to intimidate those who oppose them, including using physical violence, home visits, harrassing sabs’ families and employers, putting incendiary devices through letterboxes, and leaving dead animals on doorsteps. Most of these acts go unpunished but some have resulted in convictions.

Sabs cover their faces so hunts cannot take pictures of them, post them on the Internet and try to identify who they are and where they live. Covering our faces is not illegal, and it is not about cowardice or shame. It is also not about intimidating anyone, which we have no interest in doing, or “looking like terrorists”. It is a sensible measure some sabs take to protect themselves and their families from hunt retribution.

No. In an effort to make out that hunt sabs are not animal lovers after all, hunts have been spreading rumours and propaganda for years about sabs spraying hounds with chemicals, setting them on fire, throwing acid at horses, leaving broken glass on the roads to cut the animals’ feet etc. All of these accusations are complete fabrications and unsurprisingly none of them have ever been backed up with evidence.

One of our local hunts called the police a few years ago, claiming that we were carrying acid in our plastic spray bottles. Luckily the officers who attended the scene had passed their Chemistry GCSE and let us go on our way. Sabs do carry spray bottles but they contain water and citronella, a natural non-toxic plant oil also used in washing-up liquid, cosmetics, candles and even dog collars. It has a strong smell and is used by sabs to cover the scent of a fox. When a fox has been spotted fleeing from a pack of hounds, sabs spray the vegetation where the fox has run so the hounds lose the scent. The hunts are fully aware of how we use the citronella but they will lie to their supporters and to the public in an effort to discredit sabs.

It is astounding how their accusations persist without any evidence and how hunt supporters lap up these lies without questioning. Hunts document our every move with video cameras so one would think that evidence of sabs harming animals would be quick to make its way onto social media, so please ask yourselves why it never does!…

Hunting, on the other hand, involves systematic killing and cruelty, and not just to the chosen quarry. It is estimated that somewhere between 5000 and 7000 hunt hounds are killed every year when they reach ‘retirement’ age, usually around the age of 6. Many others are injured by getting caught in barbed wire, trampled by horses or killed when they cross roads or railway lines. We have witnessed hounds with broken limbs being tossed into the back of a vehicle and being shot when they arrived back at the kennels because the cost of veterinary treatment is considered too great. See here for more information: http://www.powa.org.uk/id82.html Terriers used by hunts also sustain horrific injuries when sent into fox earths. These dogs are tasked with keeping the fox at bay while the terriermen dig the fox out, regularly sustaining bite wounds to the face.

No. Sabs take great care in considering when and where it is appropriate to call. We do not call hounds across ground where there may be a fox, or across anything that may put them at risk. Whenever we have seen hounds on roads it is because they have followed a scent there and the hunt has failed to control them in time.

No. We take non-violent direct action to disrupt hunts. We have frequently been on the receiving end of violence and violent threats from huntsmen, terriermen, riders and hunt support. This happens too many times to count. In the last twelve months, for example, sabs from our group have been ridden at, grabbed by riders on horseback or people on quads, driven at by quads and cars, pushed, shoved, punched in the face, kicked, grabbed by the throat and more. This is before we even get started on the verbal abuse, racist and homophobic slurs and other bigoted comments we hear every week. Our vehicle has been damaged repeatedly, and our equipment has been snatched and at times stolen. During all this time we have not resorted to violence against hunts and their support. Our consistent experience with the police and media is one of total lack of interest in investigating or reporting on any violent incidents we have been subjected to, even where conclusive evidence has been supplied.

If hunts wanted, they could dissociate themselves from violent followers and tell them they are no longer welcome, but this invariably does not happen, with the same thugs seen week after week accompanying particular hunts. Even those riders who appear to be present mainly for the equestrian opportunities rather than the kill are observed doing and saying absolutely nothing while unprovoked assaults are launched on sabs in front of them. Despite certain hunts’ attempts to put on a public show of staying within the law, there is absolutely no condemnation on their part of violence directed at sabs. Instead they tend to make light of the situation.

Footage emerged a few years ago of another sab group being surrounded by drunken students of the Royal Agricultural College, who sang and chanted as they smashed windows, attacked sabs and tried to overturn their vehicle with sabs inside. Commenting in the Telegraph, Clive Aslet (editor of the Country Life magazine) dismissed these actions as nothing more than “rosy-cheeked, well-spoken students in tweed caps behaving in a yahooish manner.” This attitude is typical of hunt supporters who expect sabs to launch public condemnations of any hint of physical threat towards those who hunt, but ignore, gloss over or defend the very real violence regularly directed at sabs.

In the HSA’s history two sabs have been killed, with no one brought to justice For further accounts of hunt violence, see the links in question 3 above.

No. All our sabs are volunteers who give up their free time to save wildlife. They are not paid in packed lunches, paid in cider, paid by Paul McCartney, paid by universities, bankrolled by the Kremlin or any of the other ridiculous accusations we have encountered.

Funds raised for and by our group are used to keep our two group vehicles on the road and purchase necessary equipment.

You can find ways to donate here.

There’s lots of great advice on the Hounds Off website, especially for landowners who want to stop the hunt from coming onto their land: www.houndsoff.co.uk.

You can also report hunt trespass within Devon via our convenient form.

The following map shows the approximate boundaries of hunt countries in Devon. Although we can’t vouch for these boundaries being 100% accurate, they should help you identify the hunt you’re most likely dealing with:

It helps us a lot to know which land hunts are prohibited from going on, so please consider letting us know. If you know when and where the hunt are likely to meet in your area, please share this information with us as it may enable us to sab them.

Our social media presence exists to keep our supporters and those interested in getting involved informed of our activities. Posts or comments that are repetitive, offensive, spam or otherwise deemed inappropriate are likely to be deleted. Please be patient if offensive material doesn’t get deleted immediately. We all have busy lives. Do not use our pages to post pro-hunt propaganda. There are plenty of pages where hunters can spout their vitriol and gloat over killing animals.