Eggesford Hunt, 27.09.25

We sabbed Eggesford’s cub hunting meet at their kennels. As the main season approaches, Eggesford and all hunts are ramping up their days, now on horseback and hunting for longer.

A fairly small group left the kennels at around 8.30. Alongside huntsman Jason Marles were ancient hunt groupie Helen Dunn, troglodyte terrierman Tom Bounsall and several children. Really great parenting from the Eggesford supporters – Tom can show your 8 year old a dead fox and your 8 year old can teach him how to read.

They hunted around Labdon, Crossgate, Gosse’s farm and Kennydown farm for most of the morning. We kept track of them with our drone and foot teams. Near Gosse’s Farm a fox broke from a maize field and ran right in front of Marles and sabs. They were one of a few seen to safety throughout the morning. From Marles’ little quips he seems to think if he can’t see us we aren’t there. Maybe the children can teach Marles about object permanence.

Marles’ weirdly high pitched voice harmonises beautifully with his new whip Jade’s. We were “treated” to a bit of rural opera in North Down Plantation as they gathered some of the pack and went home, leaving several hounds to find their own way back.

Continue reading →

Eggesford, Chulmleigh Beacon, 20.09.25

With thanks again to Helen Dunn, we were able to sab another of Eggesford’s cubbing meets at Chulmleigh Beacon. The hunt set off towards Parsonage Cross to begin drawing thick hedges and woodland around Parsonage Farm.

Two foxes were marked to ground in the first hour. Terrierboy Tom Bounsall didn’t notice either of these marks, as he was too busy trying to impress the young blonde on the back of his quad by trying to run sabs over on the road. He also wasn’t aware of the fox who was later marked to ground in the valley by Horridge Moor. Having earlier threatened to “end” one of our sabs who merely said good morning to him, Bounsall tried to aggressively block one of our foot teams from accessing a footpath. To our surprise, he was told to pack it in by a female riders who was chaperoning a group of young kids on horses.

Having lost many of their older members over the last season, Eggesford are making an effort to groom the younger generation. When they’re not being brought along on ponies to witness animal cruelty, they’re riding around in Hugh Trerise’s Land Rover looking bored stiff. Hugh Trerise and Helen Dunn no longer ride to hounds and have now taken up the sport of road-blocking. In turn, they’re becoming regular features in the Operation Snap hall of fame!

Continue reading →

Eggesford Hunt, Honeychurch, 06.09.25

With thanks to hunt member Helen Dunn, we were able to sab Eggesford’s early morning cubbing meet at Honeychurch!

The hunt had parked on the side of the road north of Rowtry for a 7am meet. Foot sabs caught up with them west of Honeychurch where riders had surrounded a small copse, ‘holding-up’ in typical cubbing fashion to prevent foxes escaping.

When sabs approached, one young rider shouted “oh no, the sabs are here”, the rest quickly dispersed and huntsman Jason Marles pulled hounds out of the copse and headed north. A short while later, our eye in the sky witnessed a fox darting from this copse in the opposite direction. It’s highly likely this fox would have been killed if the hunt had been allowed to remain there for a few minutes longer.

For the next hour our two foot teams kept an eye on the hunt as they continued to draw dense field boundaries between Honeychurch and Cliston. Hounds ended up scattered all over the place, with one being seen on the road at Exbourne, where a local resident told our driver that she’d just had to chase the hound out of her garden.

Eventually everyone headed back to the meet for a few alcoholic beverages before getting in their vehicles and driving home. While we were waiting we met several locals who thanked us for being there and complained about the traffic chaos the hunt with their vehicles.

Gallery

Eggesford Hunt, Ellmead near Okehampton, 12.10.24

On Saturday the Eggesford fox killers met just outside of Okehampton, at the hunt chairman Hugh Trerise’s farm, Ellmead.

Three foxes were seen to safety today. Our runners successfully intercepted the hounds from chasing foxes on two occasions. Both times sabs sat quietly as the foxes passed them, before masking their scent line with citronella. Then as the hounds in cry darted towards sabs, sabs managed to rate the hounds off the line, sending the hounds back in the opposite direction, and allowing time for the foxes to leave the area. Another fox was seen later on bolting by our drone team. Our foot teams travelled 20km at this cubbing meet.

Our drone team was keeping a close eye on the hunt. After hearing the hounds intermittently speaking in the valley, they noticed the terrier boys on quad bikes had been summoned there. This location has a known sett, and fearing a mark the team quickly made their way down to check. What sabs found was a young cow completely stuck in thick mud, unable to move.

Continue reading →

South Tetcott Hunt, Black Torrington, 05.10.24

On Saturday, we paid a visit to the South Tetcott Hunt at their (not so) early morning cubbing meet at Highweek Farm near Black Torrington.

The hound van arrived at the meet shortly after 8:30am with supporters and riders slowly dragging themselves to the meet for the next hour or so, smiles wiping from their faces the moment they realised we were there to greet them. Even serial badger sett violator Ben Vincent of the recently exposed Axe Vale dig out made an appearance.

Thanks to the delayed arrival of some of the field riders, the hunt finally left the meet well after 9:30am. They made their way westwards and then north along the road towards Highweek Wood, where they entered through a supposed ‘Conservation Area’, a strange place to drag dozens of hounds, horses, and a handful of quadbikes through…

Huntswoman Amy Parkin attempted to draw the woodlands eastwards, but sabs were on her tail to keep the hunt moving. They proceeded to exit the woodland into a vast area of scrubland, which is where it all began to go wrong for Amy. As she attempted to draw the hounds through the scrub, tongue rolling as she went, the hounds began to scatter far and wide! Hunt members then had to spend ages going backwards and forwards, trying to gather the wayward hounds that much preferred the sights and smells of the surrounding woodland, to anything that Amy had planned.

Continue reading →

Eggesford Hunt, Westacott, 03.10.24

A small team of us went out yesterday morning to check up on the Eggesford Hunt, who were meeting at Westacott on the edge of Riddlecombe. With it being a mounted cubbing meet, we didn’t expect them to go far, and indeed they stayed almost exclusively on the Middletons’ land between Dolton Beacon and Riddlecombe.

Within minutes of leaving the meet, hounds had marked a fox to ground in a large badger sett that is well-known to us from years of sabbing the hunt here. The sett bears the scars of repeated digouts over the years. Because we knew it was almost a certainty that a fox would go to ground there, we positioned ourselves well to witness exactly that and to pull the hounds off the sett when it happened.

Minutes after the hunt moved on from the first sett, the fox bolted and ran off. Unfortunately we knew this was likely only the first of multiple laps of these woods. Sure enough, a short while later what we assume was probably the same fox came darting back across the field in direction of the sett, with hounds in pursuit. Huntsman Jason Marles congratulated his hounds for putting the fox to ground again and allowed them to remain on top of the sett, scratching and digging at several holes for long enough that they did considerable damage to the sett entrances.

Continue reading →

Torrington Farmers Hunt 28.9.24

A few days after exposing the Torrington Farmers’ ties to now-convicted paedophile Andrew Webber, the Torrington Farmers’ huntsman and his assistant assaulted one of our sabs yesterday morning during their cubbing meet.

The hunt had met at Alverdiscott, on land between West Woodland and Alscott Barton. When we arrived the hunt had already unloaded their hounds and begun drawing one of the gullies on foot. Hounds were scattered and quadbikes and 4x4s were lined up either side of the gully to spot for and push back any foxes trying to escape.

We soon put a stop to that. Within 5 minutes of dropping sabs into the field and sending the drone up over the hunt, they gave up and started walking in direction of Alscott Farm, run by John and Mandy Ridd. “We’re just exercising the hounds” and “we’re hunting a trail” were muttered almost simultaneously in protestation by members of the hunt who had got up before sunrise in order to satiate their bloodlust.

Unable to get their fix, the hunt turned their anger on sabs. One of our runners was bundled to the ground by Steve Craddock and his mate, who proceeded to rip off the sab’s mask and hat as he was lying on the floor.

Sab being assaulted by Steve Craddock. Still from bodycam.

Continue reading →

Torrington Farmers Hunt Caught Cubbing on National Trail Hunting Day, Webbery Barton,14.09.24

Well, well, well… Even on Smokescreen Saturday, the Torrington Farmers Hunt couldn’t help themselves from sneaking in an evening cubbing meet.

We caught them on Haddacott Moor, on the edge of Alverdiscott, holding up a covert and hunting hounds on.

Fortunately, as soon as our drone went up and started filming them, huntsman, whip, quadbikes and other followers gathered for a quick huddle and then ran away back to their meet at Webbery Barton.

We also caught the Stevenstone Hunt cubbing on the edge of Stowford near Bulkworthy on Friday evening.

Continue reading →

Terriermen From Vile Axe Vale Digout Attend South Tetcott Cubbing Meet, South Tetcott, 07.09.24

We heard Ben Vincent and Dave Shillam were going to be making an appearance at the South Tetcott cubbing meet at East Park (near St Giles on the Heath) last Saturday evening. So of course we weren’t going to pass up an opportunity to keep an eye on what they get up to.

We caught Ben digging out at the Eggesford cubbing meet just last week and together with Mendip Hunt Saboteurs we filmed Ben and Dave digging out at the Axe Vale (where Dave is a regular) just a few months ago. See the HSA’s post about that.

Ahead of National Trail Hunting Day (aka Smokescreen Saturday) this weekend, the footage we filmed at the Axe Vale exposes what hunts up and down the country really get up to, week in, week out, when they pretend to be ‘trail-hunting’.

Continue reading →

Eggesford Hunt, Northlew, 31.08.24

On Saturday we caught the Eggesford Hunt digging out after dark, with young children watching.

The hunt had met at Lower Gorhuish farm, east of Northlew, for an evening cubbing meet. Some members of the hunt started leaving as it was getting dark, but hounds could still be heard in the valley. The hound van and several support vehicles were also still in the yard. Sabs converged on the Longfield Copse area in pitch-black darkness from multiple directions, guided only by the occasional barking and squealing from the hounds.

As we got closer, we could hear voices and the sound of spades digging into hard ground. It was pretty clear we were walking into a dig out situation. As sabs emerged from the darkness, huntsman Jason Marles gathered up the hounds that had been waiting at the dig out site and hastily marched them back to the farm. The terriermen packed away their equipment and scarpered on their quadbike. As you can see from our footage, two entrances had been blocked with soil and a third was left open, presumably to allow for a terrier to be entered into the earth. There was also a patch of disturbed ground with clear spade marks, which turned out to be a backfilled dugout crater.

Two of those taking part in the digout were Ben Vincent and Emily Harland, the same deranged couple whom we’d caught digging a fox out of a badger sett at the Axe Vale Hunt earlier this year. Police have since dropped their investigation into that incident – something Ben can also be heard gloating about in our footage. Much more on that soon!

We cannot be certain whether Saturday’s dig out was aborted when sabs arrived or whether the fox was sadly killed by hounds just minutes before. The sound made by the hounds as we were crossing fields to get to the site leads us to worry that a kill might have occurred.

What we found particularly shocking was that there were several young children who had been brought along to watch the dig out. Some of these were Jason’s own children. Forcing young children to take part in an illegal activity is bad enough. Taking them along to witness an animal being torn apart by hounds is nothing short of child abuse and clearly intended to desensitise them to animal abuse at a young age.