Predator

[snotmonkey]

Why is there such a debate over protecting the right to kill one predator *fox and then protecting just about every other predator on the planet * whales, tigers, owls, hawks the list goes on. how about a bit of consistancy

[Lee_c]

Tell you what, why don't you all come live in civilisation, see how proper people earn a proper living and leave your hillbilly arguments and excuses in the coutryside. I am an animal lover but I would love to see a pack of guys with rottweilers chasing one of you huntsmorons or your dogs across fields for a laugh. A definition of Vermin as supplied my Mirriam Websters Dictionary... 1 a : small common harmful or objectionable animals (as lice or fleas) that are difficult to control b : birds and mammals that prey on game c : animals that at a particular time and place compete (as for food) with humans or domestic animals 2 : an offensive person As we are classed as mammals, I think that 1b and 2 are quite descriptive of the common or garden "huntsmoron", by that definition we should be entitled to hunt them down with dogs and rip them to pieces... problem solved in my book. I would say it also gives the non-hunting farmers a good enough cause to shoot the hunting dogs according to 1a, small and objectionable, I'd say so. Dawer... FYI Humans are generally "larger" than foxes which means that you shoot downwards at a fox... I think you might find the ground getting in the way of a bullet. You lot can't shoot them because you haven't developed the brain requirements to point a gun at an animal. There are "skilled" marksmen out there who can hit a fox, I assure you.

[lizziebinks]

just testing this works

[lizziebinks]

Please leave behind your preconceptions as to the type of peaple who partake in foxhunting. These comments are demeaning to your argument. Whether hunting with hounds is right or wrong is entirely separate to the type of person who partakes in this activity. Foxes are vermin and have no natural predator, therefore need control. Not because a few chickens get killed but because there are greater losses at stake. (Continued:)

[lizziebinks]

Farmers shoot game in the form of commercial and social shoots. Game shot IS sold and eaten by us, the consumer. To ensure the viability of shoots, farmers provide woods and hedgerows for breeding. No shoots - no woodlands/hedgerows. Afterall they don't make any money and would otherwise be turned over for agriculture. An old fox will naturally turn to easy prey- usually pheasants in a concentrated geographical area. A young healthy fox will hunt far and wide (they cover large territories) presenting little problem for farmers because the impact is minimal. The reason hunting with hounds is the most efficient method of contolling foxes is because a pack of hounds will only just catch an old/sick fox. A young/healthy one will outrun hounds - no sweat! This is a unique quality of hunting with hounds - it can discriminate between the 2 and therefore mimicks the natural selection process. Shooting cannot do this - afterall if you can get within 200 yards of a fox to shoot it you are doing well - so you certainly cannot tell if it is old/sick/young or anything else for that matter!

[lizziebinks]

A farmer invites the hunt onto his land to protect his shooting - robbing Peter to pay Paul you may say. People pay to hunt because it offers them a day out into the countryside, where they would otherwise be prevented from going and not to watch foxes die. These people are, believe it or not, human like the rest of us and not bloodthirsty vampires from another planet. The monies recieved pay the huntsmen - usually 2 or 3 - and food for the hounds. It is sad that the countryside has developed to the state it is now. Whilst we would all love to see plentiful woods and animals bounding about, the commercial reality is far of this mark. The countryside has to make a living too, just like the rest of us so they don't leave the woods/hedgerows in just because they look nice. It is because it provides them with shooting. Pheasants breed there. PROBLEM foxes eat pheasants. Hounds catch problem foxes. Problem solved. Ban fox hunting and you will tip the delicately balanced countryside equilibrium. I love the way English countryside is. No one wants to see every bit of forest and hedge ripped up and cropped twice a year using every chemical under the sun, but people appear to be blind to the state we are in.

[Art Vandely]

It seems that people on both sides agree that foxes are pests that need controlling, the debate is about the method. As far as I know the alternatives are shooting or trapping, but don't both these methods involve greater cruelties? Trapping leaves an animals, not only foxes, trapped in pain for hours until the gamekeeper arrives, while shooting creates the risk of allowing a maimed fox to die slowly and painfully from a nearly missed shot. Both methods eliminate the strong and healthy as well as the weak foxes. I'm in favour of hunting because if foxes have to be culled I regard an adrenalin fuelled chase ending in a quick death far more humane than the above, plus it weeds out the weak - many(strong) foxes do escape! I think people have trouble with the whole pomp and theatre of the a hunt because it brings a distasteful but neccesary deed to our attention - we'd all feel better with the groundsman quietly working in the small hours. This, in my opinion, serves the emotional well-being of mostly sensitve, sensible people more than it helps the strong, healthy fox.

[davver]

'chemically adjust their diet'? Haha! I'd be interested to find out, Squirrel, exactly how you intend to do that? Maybe you, as a woodland creature, could come up with a scheme involving your little bushy-tailed pals helping distribute impotency pills to their little brushy-tailed pals. Lee_c, if you want to pick on a petty point, for YOUR information, stalking, the usual way of shooting a wild animal, is generally carried out whilst the stalker is lying flat on the ground, therefore the 'marksman' would be lower than the fox. If you hadn't previously shown your ignorance by suggesting that towns and cities are the only places of civilisation and that everyone who lives in the countryside is a 'hillbilly' and a 'moron', then you showed it again. This is a prime example of the way, I'm sorry to say, that the 'anti' side of this debate, which purports to be about animal welfare, seems to be largely based on ignorant assumptions and prejudices rather than facts.

[saffstar]

So the general consensus from the pro-hunt peeps is that shooting foxes would be virtually impossible? Surely it must be more difficult to shoot birds seeing as how they're much smaller targets & are generally futher away. Yet it doesn't seem to be too difficult for game shooters to hit pheasants and the like does it? My local supermarket bring in marksmen to shoot the tiny little sparrows that get stuck in their store - if a professional can hit them, surely they could manage to hit a great, big fox?! Just an observation..

[oilman]

Belated reply / observation on saffstar's perfectly sensible point. The shooting comments (as far as I can see) have missed out one of the more crucial elements and saffstar therefore asks why shooters couldn't hit a great big fox when, after all, they manage to hit much smaller avian targets at greater distances. It is not the hitting of the target that would be in question, rather it would be whether hitting the fox would kill it outright and therefore humanely. The relatively small body mass of a bird means that a hit from any any ballistic projectile, even a sporting catapult, would almost inevitably result in instant death. This is not so with Charlie. There have been many well-documented / photographed cases of badly-wounded foxes being caught by the hounds : wounds including the lower jaw completely missing after being hit by a rifle bullet. It doesn't take a vivid imagination to realise that this unfortunate creature had been suffering a slow lingering death from starvation. I can only repeat earlier comments that it would take a very special marksman, using a fearsomely-powered rifle, to be 100% certain of a clean kill. Do we really want people thus-equipped wandering around our hedgerows? I don't... (PS : although a hunt supporter, I cannot ride and do not hunt).

[sherlock]

Until he extends his circle of compassion to all living things, man himself will not find peace.A.Schweizer.

[Caladon]

ok, admittance time, i can't be bothered to read the pages of squabble above, so here it is.......I often go out with the hunt, either to hunt, or merely to participate. We locate our foxes prior to the hunt itself. The hounds, and i must stress this point, the hounds NEVER kill the fox. There is always someone on hand to shoot it, then the dead carcass is given to the hounds. Forget the why the hunt is done, vermin or not. It is a tradition. And from an animal lover, and hating cruelty, I can positively say the fox is NOT ripped to shreds alive. It is shot first.

[Ed Moseley]

I think that Andy Hughes has a good point, its the moral issue that counts, not the immoral points. Also what in the world are you talking about? (Other people) There is no Upper class any more! The snobs in red-coats are stupid loasers who live in the country, they only have posh accents because they tried to follow the crowd years ago! Now they pretend to be upper-class.

[Ed Moseley]

Also how the hell is fox hunting a good way to die! The strong escape, huh? Well doesn't that mean that the children are all killed? Isn't that a bad thing? Soon they'll be a extinct species if you stupid people carry on the way you are now!

[Tha-Flash]

I hate fox hunters... Animals do what they have to do. How would the fox hunters like it if some massive animal chased them to exhaustion, ripped out all their organs and made them squeel to death. I dont think they would. I wish thats what would happen to them though.

[winned]

In reality, the amount of damage a fox does to the countryside is negligable, and they do much more good than bad. They kill chickens-bad, but they also kill rabbits(which breed quickly), moles, rats mice, bugs, beetles and many other pests which eat crops. So foxes prevent a heck of a lot of crop damage. Also foxes do not overbreed and in fact fox hunters encourage foxes to breed by creating artificial earths. It seems rather hypocritical that fox hunters say there are too many foxes, and then the next minute they're encouraging foxes to breed. Foxes eating sheep is a myth- they eat ALLREADY DEAD sheep, preventing disease from rotting bodies. Fox hunting therefore does hit farmers in the pocket, because of the reduces crop amount. To conclude, the dabate over fox hunting is big because fox hunting cannot be justified. I think the reason why people go fox hunting is just because it's tradition.

[winned]

The amount of bad foxes do (eating chickens) is negligable compared to the amount of good they do. (they eat rabbits,moles, rats, mice, bugs, beetles and many other creatures which all eat crops, causing crop damage) In the end of the day foxes don't just loose, but farmers do too.

[tonyple]

Foxes are pests. They must be culled in order to maintain a balance in the countryside. Fox hunting is a way of achieving this. Now if you listen to any hunt supporter they will tell you that the kill rate is pretty low (the fox nearly always escapes). Given that most hunt supporters are tory voters, surely they will appreciate the need for the culling of foxes to be contracted out to the highest bidder. After all that is the world we live in. Now let's say that we award a culling contract to the Beaufort Hunt. After the hunt has 'hunted' a farmer has a number of chickens killed by a fox, he then bills the hunt for loss of his stock. This then repeats itself across the Beaufort's area of responsibility. The contactor (Beaufort Hunt) then has to cut its costs. The fancy blazers are the first to go. Next the horses have to go as their upkeep is far too expensive as they are used very little. Scooters are brought in as you only pay for the fuel as and when you use it. Gradually the number of hounds is reduced as their upkeep is also excessive. Before long the employees are given rifles and told to shoot the bloody things. Fox hunting is one big lie. Culling foxes, ok, people see your reasons but dressing up and having a big social event over it is not cost effective.

[hansonwa]

My name is Will i'm a regular hunting and people who do not hunt think that they no it all but infact they don't. For example they think that people who go out hunting just do it for fun but they don't, they are controling the fox and the fox is a vermin. Last week I had six chickens which i grew from when they were hached, but last week the fox came along killed them all but he only broke their necks and left them. Another example is earliernon this summer was lammbing season. When the lambs went back into the feilds the foxs killed a lot of them eventually the foes killed so many that the farmer had to ask the hunt to hunt his land for him. Like with the chickens the foxes only eat a small amount of the fox. These are just some of the examples that the foxs does. This is why hunting should continue.