Riders stay out of town centres for annual hunting gathering (From This is The West Country)
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Riders stay out of town centres for annual hunting gathering
8:06am Tuesday 28th December 2010 in News By Steve Sowden
THERE was disappointment for hunting supporters on Monday when riders and their horses were unable to gather in the town centres of Chard, Crewkerne and Ilminster because of safety fears.
Hunt organisers decided that the roads were too slippery for the horses, due to the recent adverse weather conditions, and so the annual colourful spectacle of red-tunic riders on horseback was postponed for this year.
But large crowds gathered in the town centres for the Cotley Hunt in Chard, the Seavington Hunt in Crewkerne and the Taunton Vale Hunt in Ilminster and there were cheers as the hunt staff raced off with some of the hounds.
There was a small and peaceful protest staged by anti-hunt campaigners in Fore Street, Chard, as the hounds of the Cotley Hunt prepared to move off.
The Boxing Day hunts were moved to Monday because, by tradition, no hunts take place on a Sunday.
Comments(12)
ChardCentral
says...
8:31pm Wed 29 Dec 10
Surely, in 21st century Britain, we've moved on from this!
Nell Bennett
says...
5:29am Thu 30 Dec 10
Chardian
says...
9:24am Thu 30 Dec 10
Foxhunting is barbarism dressed up as 'spectacle', cruelty dressed up as 'sport'.
Jen Forsyth
says...
6:27pm Thu 30 Dec 10
jobsworth
says...
2:29pm Sat 1 Jan 11
cerdicboy
says...
6:38pm Sat 1 Jan 11
The body that overseas Foxhunting the Master of Foxhounds Association (MFHA) wrote to all 800 Hunt Masters asking them to get landowners and farmers to breed more foxes as they were a shortage of foxes to hunt.
As Nell and Chardian stated ‘Its cruelty dressed up as a sport’!
Nothing to do with so called Pest Control.
Chardian
says...
8:09pm Sat 1 Jan 11
We then give Jobsworth a five minute head-start and set 50 huntsmen, 30 horses and 100 hounds onto him.
As he's cornered by hounds baying for his blood, he'll soon realise how cruel foxhunting actually is.
A few hundred people turned out to watch the hunt the other day.
Many thousands of people did not, which speaks for itself.
ChardCentral
says...
10:19pm Sat 1 Jan 11
Around 16,000 people in the Chard area didn't.
The latest independent Ipsos MORI survey for the League Against Cruel Sports shows 76% of the British public think fox hunting should remain illegal.
sharon23
says...
10:49am Sun 2 Jan 11
Hunting falls into the same category of being pitiless and cruel as badger-baiting, ****-fighting, etc were. It is clear that a majority of people consider that hunting offends our sense of decency, regardless of how much pleasure it gives a certain minority.
The Countryside Alliance can only seek out the margins of these activities to hide the real horrors that exist in the countryside.
Hunting should remain banned.
Nell Bennett
says...
4:22pm Sun 2 Jan 11
cerdicboy
says...
8:21pm Sun 2 Jan 11
Claims by the anti-hunting lobby that more than 20 of the new intake Tory MPs would not support repeal have caused particular anger.
The pro-hunting campaign group Vote-OK, which poured supporters into a hundred marginal seats, say they made the difference in more than 20 constituencies.
Not only is David Cameron’s Witney constituency in the hunting country, but the hunt chairman, Viscount Astor, is also Samantha Cameron’s stepfather and David Cameron used to rider out with the Heythrop Hunt.
So they are dark moves afoot to bring back hunting, like all these deep unnecessary cuts they will try and bring back hunting when people are distracted by the jobs losses due to the bankers mess.
cerdicboy says...
6:44pm Wed 29 Dec 10
All gathering to celebrate the wonderful act of setting a pack of hounds on a small wild dog not much bigger than a **** cat; again this year the official hunting was off due to the weather. But still they closed the main A30 drag though Chard while a few huntsmen drank some liquor and chatted for half an hour.
Perhaps next year all the riders will be in town riding high on there horses and I wonder if the library will still be open and people still rejoicing as the public spending cuts begin to bite; with VAT at 20% and fuel and energy costs soaring to new dizzy heights.