[Image credit: @suffolkandessexhuntsabs] 

January is a harsh month. With the festive period over, combined with passing a mid-point in the hunting season, this month feels long and bleak. The especially cold weather at the beginning did see many hunts cancelling but hunting continued throughout the month as per, often in the presence of hunt sabs. As usual, we cannot cover everything but here are some highlights. 

Devon County Hunt Sabs had a difficult start to the month. They experienced two separate kills by the Eggesford Hunt in the first week of the year, just days apart from each other. Despite their best efforts, hounds killed a Roe Deer on the 1^st January and then a Fox on the 4^th. As upsetting as this is, the group continued undeterred and kept pressure on multiple hunts throughout the month with good success. 

How a hunt responds to presence of sabs varies of course. At their first Saturday meet of the year, the Grove and Rufford Hunt packed up almost immediately after attempting to hunt on foot, meaning a quick victory for Sheffield Hunt Sabs and local wildlife. It could be argued that this response is reflective of the morale of this hunt, who have been the targeted consistently for some time. With the job of huntsman being advertised online, it certainly seems that things aren’t going for the hunt.  

Likewise, this was also seen in the deflated hare hunting pack De Burgh and North Essex Bassets who quickly packed up after being apprehended by Suffolk & Essex Hunt Sabs on two separate occasions. Though the sab group were forced to take action when hounds were caught chasing a hare, the hunt had no choice but to give up. Foot packs such as Bassets and Beagles are particularly vulnerable; hare hunting has less supportive infrastructure (they are advised by their governing body to pack up if saboteurs turn up), barely get any foot supporters (which means less money and less morale) and attempt to maintain a low profile (making logistics even more difficult). And if the success of this dedicated campaign against this hunt continues, as seen throughout this hunting season, it is not what a question of if they disband, but when.   

Though they are vulnerable, it doesn’t mean they are any less capable. Northants Hunt Sabs received and published footage showing the Pipewell Foot Beagles killing a Hare, captured by a member of the public. According to the sab group, this hunt has been caught out multiple times throughout the season and are under police investigation. Though the outcome of this is yet to be seen, and the realistic impact and purpose of the authorities be rightly criticised, this undoubtably puts at least some pressure on the hunt. And every layer of pressure counts and can build up to something.  

One element of pressure that can be applied is exposure. Due to the logistics of sabotaging a hunt, it is not always possible to fully intervene. This is especially true with terriermen, who can disappear quickly for periods of time and get up to something dodgy. However there can still be an opportunity to keep an eye on them, as seen by sabs from Kent who used a drone to locate and record terriermen netting and bagging a fox during a meet of the Kent Hounds. This evidence is extremely important in destroying the false rhetoric that hunting relies on to try and maintain a specific image. The bagging of a fox is a grim standard practice within the world of fox hunting, which gives them the opportunity for a guaranteed kill if the hounds are struggling to locate a fox themselves. Together with footage published by South Thames Hunt Sabs from that same day, showing hounds in cry in dense woodland and digging at the entrance of a badger sett, paints a clear picture of what hunting really involves.  

Similarly, Northants Hunt Sabs caught terriermen getting ready to flush out a fox from a badger sett during a meet of the Cottesmore. They tactically placed themselves so they could gather the evidence, while remaining on hand to intervene if needed. In a post on social media, the group claimed that they took this decision as ‘showing exactly what happens when they think no one is looking is to drive a stake through the vampiric heart of the bloody Cottesmore’. Other evidence of digging out was also published by Cheshire Monitors which is believed to resulted in the killing a vixen, carried out during a meet of the Llansannan foot pack.  

Cheshire Monitors are another good example of a group who are concentrating their efforts into a specific hunt. Throughout the month they have continued to maintain a presence at the Wynnstay Hunt, who have hired ‘security’. Regardless, they have been able to take action and expose the hunt them, including trespassing and killing two foxes on separate occasions (one of which was thrown onto an A road by terriermen). However, in a reflective social media post, they claim that they have had an impact against them over time due which is seen in how the numbers of mounted supporters have decreased by half. Some may see this as minor but it is important to note that this means that their main regular income stream has been cut in half. And hitting the hunts pocket will always make them more vulnerable in the long-term. Some victories (like a hunt disbanding) can’t always happen overnight, but are ultimately still important to pursue. Reaffirming their efforts, they also published nice trail camera footage of two foxes which have been previously targeted by the hunt.  

Hertfordshire Hunt Sabs have once again exposed the Newnham Estate, dubbed ‘the plant farm’, which is the site of this year’s Vegan Camp Out festival. Earlier in the month, the sab group found two shooting pigeons on the estate but eventually packed up when they realised they could no longer continue. Around two weeks later, the estate was revisited and discovered a large shoot which was enough to require three gun buses. This estate has been exposed on multiple occasions for its direct use of hunting and shooting and isn’t the first time Vegan Camp Out have used a ‘venue’ that has this connection. For context, the organisers have previously banned hunt sabs from attending the event and have had the audacity to not only gaslight those exposing wildlife persecution and murder but also portraying it as something that should be accepted if people want an event to take place (as ‘all’ venues in the countryside are bad in one way or another) – a defeatist and untrue statement. The phrase ‘we don’t live in a perfect world’ continues to be thrown around and, though that there is large truth to that, it doesn’t mean we should not fight for it to be better.  

Many things can be said, but we will keep it simple as we have better things to focus our attention on. If you want to support a business-orientated event (that hosts some extremely problematic speakers) so you have a nice time eating expensive vegan food and dance (on the graves of innocent wildlife) and accept this defeatist idea that there is ‘no alternative’, then go to Vegan Camp Out. But if you believe real obtainable goals can be achieved in the animal liberation struggle, making the ultimate difference to animals both in captivity and in the wild, see the results of our collective efforts and can create alternative you want to see, then Vegan Camp Out isn’t for you. Perhaps EarthFirst! gatherings, animal rights and liberation conferences and other grassroots events are more fitting. 

Any information about hunts or shoots, wildlife killing fundraisers, the location of traps, tools and infrastructure used to kill and anything dodgy or suspicious relating to the interference or ill-treatment of wildlife should be reported to your local hunt sabotage group. Unsure of your local group? Contact the Hunt Saboteurs Association’s tip-off line at 07443148426 or via social media. The smallest bit of information could make the biggest different to wildlife life.

NO LIFE LIKE THE WILD