| 5.6.02: Cumbria -
'Fox Feeding Racket' Probed |
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Undercover investigation reveals fell
hunt fox breeding programme
Farming community challenged over carcass disposal practices
The pest control claims of England's
'upland' fell hunting packs are today exposed as fantasy
after a major undercover investigation by the League Against
Cruel Sports established that foxes are being bred and
fed for hunting in Cumbria.
In a damning indictment of the country's
mountain based foxhunts and the practices of farmers who
support them the League has uncovered a widespread programme
of fox breeding and feeding within the territories of
several Lake District hunts - including the prestigious Blencathra Fox Hounds based at Keswick.
Breeding and feeding sites containing
artificial earths (man made fox homes typically consisting
of pipes sunken into the ground connected to a central
brick built chamber), stick piles (temporary lying up
area for foxes), and/or animal carcasses dumped as potential
food for foxes have been located on land within the territories
of the Blencathra Fox Hounds, the Cumberland Farmers Hunt
and the Ullswater Fox Hounds.
The explosive findings make a mockery
of claims that 'upland' fox hunt packs are concerned only
with carrying out a pest control service for farmers and
could now ensure that mountain fox hunts receive no concessions
in the forthcoming bill to ban hunting, something ministers
had previously hinted at. Animal health officials today
confirmed that they are investigating claims of carcasses
being dumped at several locations in the Keswick area
of Cumbria.
And the revelations come as a substantial
League report into upland hunting, Fun On The Fells, is
made available to MPs and ministers. The report undertakes
a forensic examination of mountain foxhunting and reveals
a catalogue of evidence suggesting the pastime is cruel,
ineffective and riddled with hypocrisy and misinformation.
CARCASSES
Following a four month long probe, which saw undercover
investigators infiltrate several Cumbrian hunts, the League
located and secretly filmed animal carcasses dumped only
yards from a man made fox breeding site (containing an
artificial fox earth and stick pile) in woodland immediately
behind a regular meet of the Blencathra Fox Hounds in
the village of Orthwaite, near Uldale, Cumbria.
Dozens of sheep, lamb and deer carcasses
were filmed thrown into an uncovered pit adjacent to a
wooded covert containing the artificial earth. Sheep were
filmed dumped near to a stream and thrown over wire fences
in an apparent attempt to create a ready supply of food
for foxes. One half eaten carcass was filmed within spitting
distance of the artificial earth entrance alongside dozens
of animal bones - implying the dumping has been carried
out over an extended period.
Investigators have established that the
fox breeding site, known as Orthwaite Plantation, is owned
by Jonathan Hope, a prominent supporter of the Blencathra
Fox Hounds and who last year had hundreds of animals,
including cattle, sheep and a goat, slaughtered after
foot and mouth disease ravaged the region. Mr Hope entertained
Prince Charles at a private hunt with the Blencathra hounds
at Orthwaite Hall Farm only weeks before FMD closed the
countryside early in 2001. The farmer now faces the attention
of animal health officials for a second time after the
League confirmed that information had been passed to trading
standards officers.
Under legislation drawn up in 1992 all
animal carcasses must be rendered, buried or incinerated.
Dead animals must be removed "without undue delay"
and a failure to do so amounts to a criminal offence with
a maximum £5000 fine for each carcass. The burial
of animal carcasses is soon be outlawed altogether after
the BSE and Foot and Mouth crises prompted ever tightening
regulations relating to agricultural animal health issues.
Dozens of animal carcasses were also
recently filmed dumped in woodland near to a second popular
meet of the Blencathra Fox Hounds - Causeway Foot Farm,
just outside of Keswick. Fresh and rotting sheep carcasses
had been placed in a small covert just yards from a busy
road and surrounded by numerous bones and adult sheep
skulls. Equally disturbingly, the League has been passed
footage previously showing a large number of sheep and
lamb carcasses dumped on land at Priests Crag - a mountain
area within the territory of the Ullswater Fox Hounds.
The investigation also saw the documenting
of the largest and most elaborate artificial fox earth
known to exist in England at Millbeck, a regular meet
of the Blencathra hounds. The fox breeding complex - which
the pro hunt lobby told the Government Inquiry into hunting
had long been ruined - contains upwards of 120 meters
of piping, has over 10 entrances and continues to be capable
of holding many foxes. Footage obtained by the League
shows the Blencathra hounds being cast through the site
on two occasions.
CARELESS FARMING
Douglas Batchelor, League Chief Executive, today said:
"The findings of this investigation blow apart claims
that upland fell hunting is concerned with pest control.
The breeding and feeding of foxes for hunting is hypocritical
and immoral anywhere, but the fact that we've uncovered
that it is taking place in upland areas where hunts have
repeatedly claimed to be different exposes a grave deception
on the part of the pro-hunt lobby in Cumbria." He
called on the Central Committee of Fell Packs to immediately
suspend any hunt under suspicion of being involved in
activities that are against their own rules of hunting
or in breach of the law.
Mr Batchelor also challenged the upland
farming community to immediately end practices that encourage
a healthy fox population for hunting: "We believe
that animal carcasses are being deliberately dumped as
food for foxes in Cumbria by people connected to foxhunting.
But we also believe that the careless practices of dozens
of farmers are contributing to this situation. The shoddy
- and often illegal - discarding of carcasses in open
pits, in fields and woodland and on mountain crags is
tantamount to laying on a fast food meal for foxes and
not conducive to keeping fox numbers low.
" It is hypocritical and immoral
that upland farmers carelessly dispose of their dead animals
then claim that supposedly spiralling fox numbers require
the 'essential' services of foxhunts. What we're seeing
in Cumbria is at best a farcical cycle of countryside
mismanagement on the part of farmers and hunters and at
worst a racket designed to ensure good hunting in the
region."
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