Tag: national trust

Hunting Office webinars | National Trust suspends ‘trail hunting’ licences

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The once seemingly impervious walls that fox hunting had built around itself with the invention of so-called ‘trail hunting’ are crumbling fast. Following on from the decision to suspend ‘trail hunting’ by Forestry England because of the secretly-recorded and leaked Hunting Office webinars, the National Trust has just announced that they too have paused ‘trail hunting’ on their land and will not be issuing any licences for the remainder of the season (which ends in March). This is another huge blow for illegal fox hunting. A highly respected charity has taken another look at ‘trail hunting’ and decided that – at the moment at least – it wants nothing at all to do with it.

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Mendip Farmers Hunt – hound killed on busy road

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Warning – distressing image in this post:
Wiltshire Hunt Saboteurs yesterday witnessed a hunting hound used by the Mendip Farmers Hunt – whose website proclaims “We love to see visitors and children and we hunt Wednesday and Saturday in the season” – killed on the busy A39. Apart from the absurdity of even being able to state openly that they ‘hunt twice a week in the season’ (‘hunt’ not ‘trail’ or ‘drag’ hunt, and how is there even a season for this disgusting hobby?), apart from the chilling notion of involving children in bloodsports, how – all right-minded people will be asking – if hounds were following a laid-down scent as they were supposed to be, how could they have ended up on a main road dodging cars?

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Two charged after fox killed during New Year hunt in East Yorkshire

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It’s not that we’re deliberately looking for stories linking Yorkshire with wildlife crime, it’s more that they just keep turning up. When it’s not the region’s gamekeepers shooting or poisoning birds of prey, it seems that its so-called ‘trail hunting’ fox hunters can’t help breaking the law either. As a report in the Hull Daily Mail puts it rather prosaically, “Two men have been charged after allegedly allowing dogs to hunt a fox in East Yorkshire”.

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LACS | The National Trust and Trail Hunting

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We’ve written many times about the National Trust (NT, one of the UK’s most important conservation charities) and its unfortunate affair with so-called ‘trail hunting’ (see a National Trust and Trail Hunting 101 for example). We’d rather not have to keep repeating ourselves, but so-called ‘trail hunting’ is a clear example of the war on wildlife, we exist to help tackle that war, and there is no good reason whatsoever for the NT to facilitate ‘trail hunting’ on its land. It’s not just us that thinks this of course: no-one outside of hunting thinks one of the country’s most respected charities should be allowing fox hunts to break the law on charity-owned land.

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National Trust and protecting wildlife

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The Guardian newspaper has a piece today about how wildlife has repopulated closed National Trust properties (the Trust is one of the largest landowners in the country, and with over 5 million members potentially one of its most influential). It says that “The National Trust is reporting that emboldened wildlife, from raptors and warblers to badgers, otters and even orcas, appear to be enjoying the disappearance of humans from its gardens, castles and waterways across the UK“. Is this the same NT that facilitates illegal fox hunting on its land? Indeed it is…

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Guest Post | Forestry England, National Trust, and Fox Hunting

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‘There are campaigns for an end to hunting on land belonging to both the National Trust & FE. Here’s an overview of the behaviour of the licensed hunts, along with the current and upcoming campaigning efforts calling on both landowners to ban hunting. Feel free to ask yourself whilst reading whether you think these so-called ‘trail hunts’ should be granted licences to hunt on government and charity-owned land.’ Guest post by Jack Riggall

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Podcast: Checking in with Nick Weston, League Against Cruel Sports

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Here at The War on Wildlife Project we were thinking that as us campaigners, conservationists, and activists can’t get out to meet and see each other now, how about creating something to bring the conservation community together – everyone from individuals to grassroots organisations to larger charities – something that reminds us all that we’re still out there, still working, but that also shows the human side of things during this COVID-19 crisis. We could think of them as ‘check-ins’ – as in ‘checking-in to make sure we’re all okay’.

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