Safety at the hunt

[Polarengineer]

This guardian article https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... -accidents revealed the problem associated with hunt safety. A simple solution would be to hunt with an unarmed buddy. Hunters go out in twos, one a dedicated safety overseer, the other with the gun. They can change roles on alternate hunts. Both would be made more aware of safety and maybe stop that shot that be off limits.

[tagh]

Both without guns much safer!

[Polly]

……. and no booze until after the hunt has finished! Maybe there’d be many fewer hunts if that was the law!

[Quiksilver]

It's good to know that the UK press is taking such a close and constructive interest in the customs and heritage of a European country

[Bayleaf]

You wonder how some of them even drive, as there's zero tolerance to mixing alcohol with driving.

Just a slight digression, there's a real push to ban hunting on Sundays - according to a poll released to Sud Ouest Journal, 8 out of 10 French people (who were asked!) support this ban.

Watching with interest, but in the meantime, I think hunters in general are going to try to be on their best behaviour. On Christmas Eve, we had to call out La Chasse to help untangle a Stag that had got caught in fencing tape and subsequently in the hedge. I thought they would just shoot it, but half a dozen or so of them must have been enough to hold the fella down, while one cut the tape off (well, most of it). I can't even work out where the stag must have picked up the tape (I heard it crashing through the river, then watched it jump across three paddocks) - we're not missing any tape, but I still feel guilty!

[Antonia]

I was very anti hunt before I moved over here but after wild boars turned my field into a reenactment of the Battle of the Somme I was happy to hear the sound of the shotgun. I do think though there should be one hunt free day a week. Just one that's all. One day when the rest of the world could go about their business without fear of getting mistaken for game. That's not too much to ask surely.

[Headers]

I have taken to wearing a fluorescent hunters jacket when I go down the ‘garden’ . Our hunters now seem to gather on a Saturday. We have a new president of the chasse who is much more strict with his hunters and who actually lets us know when they are going to run a battu in our area. I will be interested to see if they continue to hunt in the spring as the area is overrun by boar.

[Bayleaf]

Is it true that in some areas, deer and boar are bred in captivity to keep the numbers up? Only then to hunt them when they become too numerous.

Call me old-fashioned, but I see a flaw in the logic here!

Edit - just been informed that if bred in captivity, they have to remain in captivity, for private shoots. It is illegal to release them into the wild....

[Lori]

Our new location appears to have quite a large group of hunters. We see them all over the countryside here. On our own street, they are here a minimum of 3 days out of the week. There are at least two hunter look-out posts on our street. We supposedly have a large population of deer, but we have not seen any yet.

The hunters all appear to be over the age of 60 - not sure what, if anything, that means, just noticed.

We would love to walk the GR that runs beside our house and over to the town of Beauregard, but it takes you directly through the hills where the hunters roam. So, we'll wait til the season ends. I do hope it actually does end as we love walking.

[Antonia]

One of my neighbours used to be the Chairman of the local hunt. We were talking about it over Christmas and he said the young'ins aren't that interested in joining. Would much rather stay in the warm and play shoot em up games on their computers.