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I am in favour of urban fox hunting. People should be going around south-west London shooting them from the open tailgates of Range Rovers. If they catch the odd local resident along the way by mistake, no matter.
Either that, or Merton Council should give us all wheelie bins to stop these pests gnawing at our rubbish bags and messing up our road.
Extensive research has shown that less than 5 percent of lamb deaths are due to predation (that's ALL predation, not just foxes) and that only 0.7 percent of free range chickens are lost to foxes.
Rabbits are a genuine pest to farmers because of the damage they do to crops.
Around 45 percent of a fox's diet (in the countryside obviously, rather than in towns) is rabbit.
So foxes are actually useful to farmers.
And on the subject of the hunt itself... what do those people that support fox hunting think about other "traditional" "sports" ? Would they like bear baiting, dog fighting and cock fighting brought back too?
Exactly. And the harder the farmers make for the foxes to reach their garbage and livestock, the more rabbits the foxes have to eat. The foxes are basically like people, they are lazy too, why waste energy hunting rabbits if there's dinner ready on the table.Quote:
Originally Posted by CharlieJ
This reminded me of when the Chinese though sparrows were eating their crop, so Mao ordered the Chinese to kill the sparrows. Said and done. After the sparrows were gone, insects ruined the Chinese crop and there was famine. Turned out that sparrows also eat insects.
Not all farmers grow crops.Quote:
Originally Posted by CharlieJ
Take my brothers farm as a case. This year he has had over 700 lambs. The average value of a lamb is around £30. If 5% are killed by predators, then thats over £1000 lost every year.
How many of them have been killed by a fox this far?Quote:
Originally Posted by Brown, Jon Brow
I don't know, I haven't been counting :dozey:
I think the truth is that hardly anyone would be bothered about fox hunting if it wasn't a sport traditionally favoured by the upper classes and if it (and they) didn't look a bit stupid to a lot of people when shown on the TV. If it was just an ordinary farming practice, the issue would never have come up.
Still, there's nothing wrong with a bit of class prejudice from time to time...
I have nothing against hunting to control the population of foxes and other animals, I just don't like that there's been made a game out of it.
Just out of curiousity, how many foxes are killed by hunting every year? I can't imagine it's all that many?
Afraid I'm going to be a pain in the bum and answer each post individually as I've not mastered multi-quotes yet :dozey:
Eki - foxes don't hide food for the future like squirrels. They kill for fun, just like cats, and leave death and injury behind when they've had enough. They look at it as practice for when they need to tackle more difficult prey. Personally I don't begrudge them that, but then again I've never kept chickens.
Two reasons Drag Hunting isn't anything like the real thing. The first is cost. Land owners don't want Hunts in without the tradition and chance of a fox less on their land. If you have Drag packs use your area, you'll get illegal and uninvited lampers at night, so having a real Foxhound pack on your land basically advertises the lack of foxes (which is nuts, but does seem to work). As Leon said, Hunting damages land and fences. Without fewer foxes the land owner will charge more than jump fees (payment for broken timber) and Drag packs charge about twice what Fox packs charge for cap fee. You have to pay the bloke with the stinky sack (pun intended) too, as he's doing some pretty nifty running to stay ahead :p : If I'd had to Drag Hunt I simply could never have afforded it.Quote:
Originally Posted by CharlieJ
Secondly, where's the danger and fun in a planned route? Talk about take the thrill out of a day :mark:
Point to points are different. They have zero to do with Hunting. You may aswell have asked why not buy a car and rally instead.