A hare-shooting ban would only scratch the surface
Shooting is only one threat to brown and mountain hares
On the 17th March 2021 the Telegraph reported that a partial ban on shooting hares is going to be introduced, according to “senior government sources”. The ban would mean that brown hares cannot be shot between January and August. Meanwhile the mountain hare, which is considerably less populated, would be protected all year round.
Chris Packham, of BBC’s Springwatch, is quoted in the article stating it was “great news” and that it is going to be “part and parcel of a series of regulations the shooting industry will have to accept”.
Not all are happy accepting this though. Tim Bonner, chair of the Countryside Alliance, is quoted in the same piece saying that the proposal is “largely pointless” and makes claims that the government does “little to tackle the epidemic of hare poaching”. This rhetoric is echoed in a statement published by the Countryside Alliance, which focuses on hare coursing and “associated trespass and criminality”.
These concerns for hares seem hollow considering the bloodsport lobby group’s opposition to the Hunting Act 2004, which would decriminalise the hunting of hares using packs of hounds.
The Ban
The Citro spoke to Sue Alderman, chair of the Hare Preservation Trust (HPT) about issues surrounding the protection of brown and mountain hares. She confirmed the severity of the decline of the species:
In 1880, the hare population was estimated to be 4 million. By 1995 this had dropped to c.800,000 – a national decline of over 80%.
The proposal to introduce a closed season for brown hares is not a new idea, Alderman explains:
Many groups and individuals have been campaigning for this for several years. Following the decline in brown hare numbers, they became subject to a Biodiversity Action Plan in 1995. This sought to double their spring numbers by 2010 and increase leveret survival – these aims have never been achieved.
However, a closed season wouldn’t solve the problem. Even though this would be welcomed by the HPT, Alderman has realistic concerns about how people may react:
It’s possible that landowners would shift their shooting calendar to cull hares later in the year, or apply for licences to shoot during the closed season.
This concern would be specific to brown hares. The law would protect mountain hares year round. Alderman explains why mountain hares would gain stronger protective status:
After culls take place, hare populations recover their numbers by the inward migration of hares from surrounding groups. However, English mountain hares are entirely cut off from other populations and [because of this] continued unregulated shooting is unsustainable.
Game shooting is most often associated with pheasants, partridges and grouse, but some may not realise that hares also fit into the category and are also consumed for their meat. The scale of hare shooting may also be surprising to many.
“to die a slow and agonising death”
Bonner made a bold statement in response to the news, saying that “there is little evidence of hares being culled in large numbers during the breeding season”. This rhetoric is echoed in a ShootingUK article, which quotes Shooting Times contributor Ed Cole:
The old fashioned hare shoot has become a thing of the past
Alderman counteracts this by stating:
Around 300,000 brown hares are shot annually. It is currently legal to shoot hares all year round, including throughout the main breeding season from February until September.
In February 2014, Norfolk/Suffolk Hunt Saboteurs exposed a mass hare shoot that took place at the Raveningham estate.
According to footage shared by the League Against Cruel Sports, more than 100 hares were killed which were “often left injured to die a slow and agonising death”. Claims of animal cruelty were also made after Norfolk/Suffolk Hunt Saboteurs released a video showing a marksman repeatedly trying to beat a hare to death after they had been shot.
Alderman explains the significance of shooting during this time of year:
Traditionally, hare shoots take place in February after the pheasant season ends despite the fact that many female hares are pregnant or feeding dependant young at this time. The subsequent loss of orphaned young is an avoidable and unacceptable cause of leveret mortality which contradicts the aims of the Species Action Plan.
This indiscriminate shooting can be seen in another video from the same day which is alleged to show a pregnant hare and her breeding mate being killed.
Norfolk and Suffolk Against Live Quarry Hunting posted details of the estate’s shooting of hares. The post also included pictures, which they claim show what saboteurs “had to endure” during shoots between 2010 and 2014.
In 2020, the organiser of the hare shoots, Jake Fiennes, was appointed as general manager of conservation at Holkham Hall. He described the opportunity as “#environmentalsucess”. Norfolk/Suffolk Hunt Saboteurs said that they “won’t miss you and your hare massacre”.
In their Facebook post revisiting the Raveningham Estate Hare shoot, the sab group stated that “the horrific barbarity witnessed will never be forgotten” and they were “under no illusion however that such shoots have stopped altogether”. In February 2020, multiple hunt sabotage groups disrupted another organised hare shoot.
But shooting is not the only threat to hares.
Hare Hunting
Based on data from Bailey’s Hunting Directory there are currently over eighty active harrier, beagle and basset packs operating in England and Wales. These packs are traditionally trained to hunt hares.
One hunt that caused controversy for years was the Easton Harriers, based in Suffolk. The hunt has been exposed multiple times by Norfolk/Suffolk Hunt Saboteurs for killing hares.
On the 13th February 2016, a saboteur attempted to save a hare while hounds belonging to the hunt attacked the creature. Later that year, Lydia Freeman, hunt master of the Easton Harriers, was caught on video concealing what appeared to be a dead hare in her jacket after they were hunted by the pack of hounds. Other claims of hare kills by the hunt during the same year were reported on 19th November 2016, and seen in videos dating 26th November 2016 and 31st December 2016.
The hare killing continued. According to a Facebook report by Norfolk/Suffolk Hunt Saboteurs, the Easton Harriers killed a hare on 4th November 2017. The following year, on 14th November 2018, the hunt “chased and killed a [hare] leveret in front of sabs”. Not long after, on 26th January 2019, the huntsman was filmed “running away from the scene” as hounds killed a hare.
At the end of 2019, “following pressure from hunt saboteurs the [Easton Harriers] decided to disband and discontinue” according to an article published by East Anglian Daily Times.
The Easton Harriers aren’t the only hunt who have been caught hunting hares.
In November 2019, East Kent Saboteurs reported that the Bolebroke Beagles killed a hare. West Kent Saboteurs later published drone footage, which shows the hunt continuing after the alleged kill.
The most recent allegation of a hare being killed by a pack of hounds was in September 2020. Norfolk/Suffolk Hunt Saboteurs, who published footage of the incident, claim Dunston Harriers killed a hare “within minutes of leaving the meet”.
It is seemingly obvious what the intention is in having a pack of hounds, especially when they are involved in special hunting events like the Alston Hare Week.
In 2014, the Alston Hare Week was “abandoned” due to a campaign by multiple sab groups. Berkshire Hunt Saboteurs also exposed two hare hunting events the following year: Severn Vale Beagling Festival in February and the Christ Church & Farley Hill Beagles “pre-season hunting holiday” in September.
In March 2019, the Ilminster Hare Week, which is described as a “hare hunting festival”, was shut down by the presence of over fifty hunt saboteurs. Kevin Loader, master of the Ilminster Beagles, claims in a video that the hunt chase hares because “the hounds need to know what a hare looks like”. Frustrated by the success of sabs, a similar hunting event was attempted a week later but “packed up shortly after realising that sabs were everywhere”, according to a Facebook report.
Going around in circles
As well as hunting using packs of hounds that rely on scent, hares also fall victim to coursing, which uses hounds that hunt by sight. Both forms of hunting are illegal under the Hunting Act 2004, though the majority of convictions are for coursing rather than formal hunting.
Prosecutions of hare coursers are often focused on the “associated trespass and criminality” rather than the cruelty inflicted on individual animals. Indeed, Coles confirms in a cruel sense of irony that the “main factor driving anyone wanting to cull hares of any kind would be to prevent coursing”.
Alderman confirms another ironic element:
Some people are concerned that the introduction of a closed season will somehow increase hare coursing – this rural crime issue is already a huge problem in many parts of the country, particularly in the Eastern Counties. However, culling large numbers of a species to prevent its persecution cannot be seen as a sound method of conservation.
She continues by commenting on the complications of policing:
There are concerns that all forms of persecution continue in quiet rural areas where crimes can often go unnoticed. We also recognise that rural crime teams, where they exist at all, are overstretched. However, the low priority often given to wildlife crime is something which needs to be addressed at a higher level.
Wildlife and Countryside Link also echo the low priority status of wildlife crime in a recent annual report. It suggests that police forces lack understanding of wildlife persecution and data on criminality, and don’t have the necessary legislation for the acts.
The hunting and coursing of hares often happens out of sight, but other threats to the species are even more concealed. Snares, wire nooses used to trap animals, are indiscriminate and can trap hares, as seen in reports by Hertfordshire Hunt Saboteurs in 2019 and 2020. Tim Birch, conservation manager of Derbyshire Wildlife, recently stated that he has also “personally witnessed dead mountain hares in snares” in the Uplands and the Peak District.
In addition to multiple forms of persecution, hares are also under threat from a variety of other issues, Alderman explains:
Loss of habitat, intensive agricultural practices, the use of pesticides and herbicides, and frequent silage cutting all impact hare populations. In recent years stewardship schemes have helped mitigate some of these issues.
Hare numbers are also affected by disease. Worrying levels of brown hare mortality have been recorded since autumn 2018. Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease, type 2 (RHD2) and European Brown Hare Syndrome (EBHS) have been identified. Outbreaks of RHD2 can reduce populations by 80%.
Preservation not persecution
Alderman summarises the current situation:
Legislation for hares in England & Wales is inadequate and fails to prevent further declines in populations, let alone aiding recovery as set out in the species action plans for both brown and mountain hares. We are waiting for confirmation of the details from Defra, but hope that decisions will be based on recommendations for the preservation of hares and the recovery of their numbers, and not hindered by the challenges of introducing new law.
A statutory partial ban on shooting hares is welcomed by many, including the HPT and other conservationists. This would, however, only scratch the surface of addressing the myriad issues threatening the species. It is a step in the right direction, but a lot of work still needs to be done.
-
Want to support The Citro? Click here to contribute.
-
Headline and main images via Hare Preservation Trust Investigations