Category: East Midlands

Anoth­er busy few months of sab­bing

Fox­es, hares, and our group alike had a few days off from the sick­en­ing dis­play of vio­lence and stu­pid­i­ty that is hunt­ing this Decem­ber and Jan­u­ary. Divine inter­ven­tion, in the form of snow, ice and frost meant that many hunts can­celled sev­er­al meets.

We were out again on Jan­u­ary 16th and had a go at find­ing some much over­looked bea­gles, with­out suc­cess. So we decid­ed to call in late on the Badsworth & Bramham Moor hunt. The hunt, who on this occa­sion totaled only 10 or so rid­ers and about 10 sup­port­ers, took one look at us, changed course and head­ed straight back to their meet!

We helped Cum­bria Sabs with a Mon­day vis­it to the Ull­swa­ter hunt on Jan 25th. This hunt had not been sabbed for 20 years due to their vio­lent rep­u­ta­tion, but on sight of around 15 sabs, they decid­ed to run, and hide in the car park of an agri­cul­tur­al col­lege — all day. Result!

We vis­it­ed the Quorn hunt for the first time in 5 or more years, with Mersey­side Sabs at the end of Jan. They too took one look at us and packed up imme­di­ate­ly, claim­ing the weath­er was­n’t suit­able for hunt­ing! With some sabs escort­ing the Quorn back to their ken­nels, oth­ers went on to the near­by Meynell & South Staffs hunt. At the Meynell a fox was seen by sabs and hunt staff in the same field as the hounds, but due to our pres­ence, the hunts­man hunt­ed the hounds along the fox­es’ scent, in the oppo­site direc­tion, leav­ing the fox to run free. Lat­er in the day we saw hunt staff again tak­ing action to ensure the hounds did­n’t hunt in front of our cam­eras. We know that this hunt (like all the oth­ers), kills fox­es when left to their own devices.

On Feb 6th we paid a vis­it to the South Wold hunt, who had not been sabbed for a long time. The hunt spent a good while lin­ger­ing round the back of a farm pon­der­ing what to do about us. Although they even­tu­al­ly shot off, los­ing us for a while, we caught up with them, took con­trol of their hounds, and packed them up ear­ly — a time­ly reminder to all hunts that though per­haps rarely vis­it­ed, none are for­got­ten. On the way home, keen-eyed sabs spot­ted a lurcher rac­ing through a near­by field. Jump­ing out of the van again, we found a guy out hare cours­ing, and swift­ly saw him off.

The next day we sabbed a group of about 8 fer­reters near Leeds. They had sad­ly killed at least 3 rab­bits before we arrived — a strong reminder of why sab­bing is need­ed. The group were clear­ly intim­i­dat­ed by our pres­ence and packed up as soon as they could retrieve their fer­ret from below ground. Fer­ret­ing is ful­ly legal.

In 2009, our vis­its to the South Notts hunt caused them to give up on attempts to begin hunt­ing Sat­ur­days. So when we turned up on a Mon­day this Feb, they weren’t best pleased! Unfor­tu­nate­ly though, they won this round by turn­ing vio­lent and forc­ing us to leave — more on that next sea­son (and below).

On the 17th, Not­ting­ham and Birm­ing­ham sabs made a week-day trip to the DNS Bea­gles hunt in Der­byshire. This caused them to can­cel their day of killing with­out even start­ing. All we had to do was wait out­side their ken­nels for a few hours, and endure some stern words from some not-so-brave offi­cers of the law!

We sabbed the Quorn hunt again on the 20th, with Man­ches­ter Sabs. We weren’t close enough to see it, but, after a few failed attempts at find­ing fox­es — to kill them with a “quick nip to the back of the neck” — the hunts­man fell from his horse, injured his neck and had to be air lift­ed to hos­pi­tal! The hunt con­tin­ued any­way, led and fol­lowed by mem­bers of the South Notts hunt, who were out with the Quorn (due to can­celling their own Sat meets). The South Notts hunt mem­bers were the very same peo­ple who had got nasty with us just 5 days pre­vi­ous­ly. So, we gave them what they deserved — a good sab­bing. We put our­selves in the fields to dis­tract the hounds sev­er­al times, and caused them to loose the scent of a fox that they attempt­ed to hunt.

On the 24th we made anoth­er trip to Cum­bria, join­ing the local sabs, with oth­ers from Mersey­side and Birmin­ham. We found the Blencathra hunt after a bit of scout­ing about, even though they had changed their meet in a des­per­ate attempt at avoid­ing sabs. Upon our arrival, the hunts­man walked past all his sup­port­ers and drove off with the hounds, with­out say­ing a word to any­one! But, rather than dri­ving straight to the ken­nels, he drove way out of the way, with us fol­low­ing behind, and led us to the Cum­bria Bea­gles hunt! As soon as we got out of the car, the bea­gles were seen hunt­ing two hares, so we inter­vened and man­aged to call them off using whip cracks and voice calls, they packed up straight away after that! Some of the group had also stuck with the Blencathra, who were fol­lowed back to their ken­nels. This day demon­strat­ed just what an impact Cum­bria Sabs are hav­ing on the Ble­cathra hunt!

At the end of Feb, just a week after our first vis­it, we returned to the DNS Bea­gles, this time on a Sat­ur­day. As before, after a bit of a run around (in vehi­cles), they can­celled their plans alto­geth­er. Anoth­er day of relax­ation for hares in Der­byshire!

We sabbed the Bur­ton at their last meet of the sea­son on March 6th. We had to run/briskly walk all day to keep near the hunt, who were deter­mined to hunt and hide in a mas­sive wood. We took action to dis­rupt them when­ev­er we could, took con­trol of a good per­cent­age of the hounds sev­er­al times dur­ing the day and stuck at it till they fin­ished.

We vis­it­ed the Lunes­dale hunt on the Cumbria/North York­shire bor­der with sabs from sev­er­al oth­er groups on the 11th. This hunt had­n’t seen sabs for 20+ years, so they were prob­a­bly a lit­tle sur­prised to see us pop up in the mid­dle of the fells. We did­n’t waste any time, and upon sight of the hunts­man on a dis­tant fell ahead, took the whole pack of hounds from him just as they start­ed to pick up a fox’s scent. When the hunt man­aged to reclaim the hounds they went back to their meet and packed up! Watch video footage here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1HzzUzerwA&feature=channel

We fin­ished off the sea­son with around 30 sabs from our usu­al groups, Mersey­side, and oth­er areas, and sabbed the Grove & Ruf­ford hunt in Not­ting­hamshire, on March 13th. Dozens of police turned up — with motor­bikes, a heli­copter, vans, cars, hors­es, dogs and under­cov­er offi­cers at their dis­pos­al. They had come to pre­vent us from sab­bing the hunt, but inad­ver­tent­ly did it for us, leav­ing us to watch in dis­be­lief — as even the Grove & Ruf­ford hunts­man isn’t stu­pid enough to hunt in front of that many city folk!

So now we have a short break from such activ­i­ties, but, if any­one is up for help­ing out, we will pos­si­bly sab some mink hunters in the sum­mer; we’ll be work­ing to pro­tect bad­gers from bait­ing in South York­shire, and from culling fur­ther afield, from May; and we’ll begin the next sab­bing sea­son in August/September at fox cub hunts. Also if any­one can donate any funds or equip­ment, or help with fundrais­ing then please get in touch!

Sab group con­tacts:
Sheffield: sheffieldsaboteurs@live.co.uk
Not­ting­ham: huntsabs@hotmail.com www.nottinghamhuntsabs.weebly.com
Leeds: westyorkshuntsabs@yahoo.co.uk www.westyorkshirehuntsabs.wordpress.com
Mersey­side: (con­tact via) sheffieldsaboteurs@live.co.uk
Cum­bria: vulpuscarlisle@yahoo.co.uk
Birm­ing­ham: birminghamhuntsabs@hotmail.co.uk
Man­ches­ter: mcr-sabs@hotmail.co.uk
For oth­er areas:
Hunt Sabo­teurs Asso­ci­a­tion: info@huntsabs.org.uk www.hsa.enviroweb.org

Bad­ger pro­tec­tion con­tacts:
South York­shire Bad­ger Group: www.sybadgergroup.f9.co.uk
Coali­tion Of Bad­ger Action Groups: get-active@badger-killers.co.uk www.badger-killers.co.uk