Brian Caffary Esq.,
Secretary to the
Committee of Inquiry
Into Hunting with Dogs,
e-mail: huntinginquiry @gtnet.gov.uk
February 17, 2000
THE CASE FOR THE COTTESMORE HUNT
By James Barclay, Joint Master
INTRODUCTION:
The Cottesmore Hunt can trace its origins back more than 300 years. A pack of foxhounds was brought down by road from Lowther Castle in Westmorland by Henry,Viscount Lowther to the East Midlands in 1666. The pack hunted widely in the area, and it was sold in 1695 to Mr Thomas Noel who was the second husband of the widowed Countess of Gainsborough. The Lowther family regained the Mastership in the late 18th century and retained a connection until this century when Lord Lonsdale, the famous "Yellow Earl" was Master of the Cottesmore twice until 1921.
The Cottesmore has survived and flourished in the 20th century not as a pack of hounds dependent upon aristocratic patronage, but as a subscription pack receiving support from the widest possible cross-section of the rural community, plus many visitors from outside the area, including overseas visitors, especially from North America and the European Continent. The Hunt has been dependent for its popularity on its deserved reputation as one of the finest foxhunting countries in the world, ranking as one of the premier Shires packs with its neighbours the Quorn, Belvoir and Fernie.
The Cottesmore has a special reputation for hound breeding achieved by Masters who hunted their own hounds as amateurs. Some of the most renowned amateur huntsmen and hound breeders in hunting history were in office at the Cottesmore for much of the 20th century, and left traditions of especially high standards of foxhunting at its best.
Foxhunting has undoubtedly shaped the nature of the countryside, since most the small copses and woodlands dotting the spacious acres of the Cottesmore country were planted as fox coverts, and some of their names are among the most famous and revered in the foxhunting world: Ranksborough Gorse, Ladywood, Prior’s Coppice, and Owston Wood.
The standard of hunting brought a strong residential element of foxhunters, especially to the small county of Rutland where the Hunt is based. Hunting lodges and other houses were also built specifically for foxhunters and their staff who came to live in the locality for the season and spent heavily on keeping large numbers of horses. This tendency grew in the 19th century and continued until the second world war.
Thus the Hunt had a major influence on urban and village architecture as well as the terrain. Several hundred horses were kept in Oakham for hunting during the season and many more elsewhere in the area. Livery yards and horse dealing have flourished in the area solely because of hunting, and the house market has always benefited from the influence of the Hunt.
The undulating country surrounding Oakham and Uppingham is especially suited to foxhunting, offering remarkable views as the horseman follows hounds after they have found a fox in one of the many well sited coverts.
Gated roads, green lanes, wide verges and a wealth of cut and laid fencing all helped the passage of the horseman across this area of the Shires.
The standard of recreational riding available in the area owes the standard of riding terrain entirely to the influence of foxhunting. Landowners and farmers have always co-operated with the Hunt and this has enabled hunting to continue on such a large scale for four days per week during the season proper, and six days per week during the autumn period. The west side of the country borders on the Quorn country and lies in Leicestershire.
Hounds from both packs frequently cross the Hunt borders in this area which contains some of the finest mixed woodland and grassland areas in the East Midlands, especially the areas lying along and below the escarpment at Burrough Hill.
The area of the country east of the A.1 road has long been largely an arable area between large woodlands. This continues to be hunted one day a week by the Cottesmore’s doghound pack, and has a devoted following, largely residential based in this area of Lincolnshire.
Since the second world war the terrain of a "sea of grass" changed to contain a large element of arable land. Yet despite this change, the country remained crossable on a horse. ‘The Hunt has had a major influence on the nature of the terrain still retained as pastoral, with traditional hedgerows lining the fields. This is due to foxhunting enthusiasts purchasing tracts of land and retaining them in this form for the Hunt. The additional conservationist value of such retention of pastoral land is immense, and again due entirely to the Hunt’s influence.
HUNT COVERTS
The Cottesmore Hunt itself owns six coverts which were bequeathed to the Hunt by past members. The Hunt spends considerable sums on maintenance of its own coverts, and makes a substantial contribution to work on coverts, hedgerows and fencing owned by others.
Last season the Hunt completed a three year project on its own covert, Ranksborough Gorse, on a hilltop site overlooking the Catmose Vale, north of Oakham (The covert was famously the subject of a poem "Dream of an Old Meltonian" by William Bromley-Davenport).
The Hunt gained a forestry grant towards cutting back and re-planting this covert , the Hunt’s own expenditure being in excess of £5,000.
The Hunt carries out fencing work, puts in bridges, and new gates by agreement with farmers and landowners.
The Hunt employs a full time fencing man who lives in at the Kennels and has use full time of a Hunt vehicle, plus tools and fencing materials.
The Hunt organises an annual hedging competition, with prizes for the best examples of cut and laid fencing – a rural craft for which Leicestershire and Rutland are especially noted. A supper party is given for the prize winners and contestants after the annual prize giving ceremony.
It should be pointed out that maintaining coverts because they are habitats for foxes ensures that they are also habitats for other fauna and flora.
Such areas of traditional coverts, grass and cut and laid hedges, patched with timber fecing, are a significant break in the landscape achieved by large scale modern arable farming on a over huge expanses of land without hedgerows or copses which have become a feature of some areas of the East Midlands and East Anglia in the postwar years.
THE HUNTING TERRAIN
As stated above, the Hunt receives support from farmers and landowners to enable it to continue to hunt four-days-a-week throughout the season proper (from late October until late March) and six days in the autumn hunting period from late August until late October.
The Hunt’s Mastership maintains a close relationship with the farming community, and mounted followers are under the control of the Masters who ensure that the greatest care is taken not to damage fencing, nor interfere with farm stock, nor ride on cultivated land. On every hunting day members of the mounted field are specifically detailed to stay at the back to ensure that gates are shut and gaps in fences filled immediately so that farm stock do not escape. A wide berth is given to farm stock still in fields. Members of the mounted field, and the Masters, include people involved in farming who know how to avoid harming or interfering with farm stock, or growing crops,and re-seeded land.
If a fence should inadvertently be damaged by horses crossing the country, the Hunt’s own fencing man and helpers are informed on the day this occurs, and repairs are carried out to the satisfaction of the farmer/landowner.
The increased use of permanent jumping places, using substantial timber, with the agreement of land owners, has greatly decreased the possibility of other rails being damaged.
Hunt followers are similarly instructed frequently not to hold up vehicular traffic on roads and lanes, and great care is taken that horse transport bringing horses to meets is properly parked.
The Hunt carries very substantial public liability insurance, but there is no record of a claim being made on this policy in the past ten years.
THE FOX
The Cottesmore Hunt is expected by the overwhelming majority of farmers and land owners to catch foxes. The Hunt is therefore an accepted agent for culling the fox on behalf of farmers in this country. The fox is regarded as a pest by the farming community, and although arable farming has increased, there is a substantial element of sheep farming, and some cattle farming, plus free range poultry and pig production. The Hunt’s access to privately owned farm land has always been associated with its role as a controller of the fox population,and this still obtains. This is why the Hunt crosses considerable areas of land farmed and owned by people who do not actively take part in the sport themselves.
Stock farmers in particular regard fox control as essential, especially those involved in sheep husbandry.
In the 1998-99 season the Hunt killed 118 foxes; in the current season, up to February 14, 2000, the Hunt had killed 93 foxes. As well as controlling foxes by culling the fox population, the Hunt performs a useful role in dispersing fox populations. Foxes can live in close proximity, thereby intensifying the effects of hunting by individual foxes in an area. Dispersal of colonies of foxes is much appreciated by farmers and significantly lessens the nuisance factor of foxes in stock rearing areas.
The Cottesmore Hunt hunts foxes strictly according to the rules and code of conduct laid down by the Masters of Foxhounds Association.
From a welfare point of view, the fox is either killed or it escapes completely unscathed. Most foxes are killed above ground by the hounds. It is a fact that most foxes are killed by hounds at the end of the shorter hunts, sometimes a very few minutes, especially during the autumn hunting period when much of the hunting is within woodlands. There is absolutely no evidence of foxes suffering physical stress from the effects of a longer hunt from which they escape. Foxhounds hunt the fox by scent, and therefore a longer hunt of more than a few minutes hunt is not conducted at one inexorable fast pace. There are often frequent checks when hounds have to recover the line of scent, which may be exceedingly difficult on poor scenting days.
If a fox is marked to ground by the hounds it is either left alone, or if it is the wish of the relevant farmer or landowner it may be destroyed with an approved gun in the earth.
Foxes are also killed in the Cottesmore country by game-keepers who wish to protect game birds, and use snares to catch foxes, destroying them when they collect them from snares after they have been caught during the night; There are other un-monitored ways of controlling foxes, some involving the use of terriers and digging by individuals not subject to the rules and code of conduct strictly adhered to by the Hunt.
Some people engage in night time "lamping" (where bright lights are shone at foxes lured by false fox calls, and then shot in the glare of the light). Sometimes people raid fox earths and destroy litters during the breeding season.
Many foxes and other wild life are found dead on roads in this area, killed by traffic, sometimes dying after severe injuries.
It is clear that no other method employed in the Cottesmore country offers the fox a form of control in which the fox is either killed outright or escapes unscathed. The Hunt maintains a strict close season during the foxes’ breeding period and it spends considerable resource on preserving and protecting coverts where the fox has its habitat. There can be no doubt that a ban on hunting with hounds would cause a considerable increase in unmonitored forms of fox control which would overall entail far more suffering and would result in a major diminution of the present level of fox population which is kept by the Hunt at a level acceptable to most farmers and landowners.
FLESH COLLECTION:
The Cottesmore Hunt maintains a seven days a week service collecting fallen stock from farmers throughout the Hunt country. This is greatly appreciated by farmers who find it increasingly difficult to dispose of such stock which have no marketable value.
The Hunt feeds some of the flesh to its hounds, but there is a considerable amount of waste since BSE regulations came into being, and this waste is collected by commercial renderers who charge the Hunt increasing amounts for its collection and disposal.
Currently the Cottesmore Hunt is spending over £35,000 a year on flesh collection. Staff and transport are the main costs. Cutting up and skinning the flesh at the Kennels is part o the labour cost.
The service was so much valued by farmers that they willingly co-operated by paying a small charge for each carcase collected by the Hunt, but this by no means covers the cost. Currently the Hunt is considering investing in a large incinerator to dispose of the waste material, as many other Hunts have done.
RECREATIONAL AND SOCIAL CONTRIBUTION
The Cottesmore makes a considerable, and significant contribution to the recreational and social life throughout the rural area within its extensive hunting country. A veteran hunting supporter has stated that a ban on hunting would "kick the heart out of this area".
The Hunt has a vigorously active Supporters Club which organises dances, social gatherings, sponsored rides, cricket and skittle matches throughout the year . The Club’s Christmas lunch is an especially important date in the calendar. This year the Club is running a cabaret evening.
Separate committees run for the Hunt its annual point-to-point, one of the best supported in the East Midlands; an annual team ‘chase; a major hunter trials; a Farmers’ supper evening; a Farmers’ Ball; and a Summer Ball.
The Cottesmore Pony Club is one of most active branches, and has a close relationship with the Hunt which holds special meets for children in the school holidays. Parents within the Hunt are among the most active in organising the Pony Club’s own extensive programme of riding competitions and other activities.
It must be stressed that the involvement of the local farming and landowning community through the Hunt is highly beneficial because land is readily made available for the riding competitions which the Hunt runs for the benefit of the entire community. Entrance to the riding competitions and social events is not restricted to Hunt members.
An annual open day at the Kennels involves terrier races, sideshows, a horse show, and Pony Club mounted games. It is always heavily supported.
Above all, the rural community talks about the Cottesmore hounds as our hounds. The Hunt is never short of volunteers to "walk" the hound puppies – the age old tradition in which young hounds are boarded out free with local supporters who bring them up in a farm or semi-domestic environment. This sharpens the hounds’ intelligence by close human contact at an early age, and provides a useful sponsorship of their cost at a crucial stage.
When they return to the main pack an annual "Puppy Show" is held at the Hunt Kennels, again a major occasion, accompanied by a tea party, when prizes are awarded to the "walkers" of the most hounds selected by visiting judges. This is a hallowed occasion in the hunting calendar.
As well as those who ride to hounds, the Cottesmore has a large following of former hunting people, and many others who have never ridden, who take great pleasure in following by car to watch proceedings from roads and lanes.
They willingly pay a "cap" contribution to the Hunt, and constituent a loyal back up of people from a very wide range of occupations and backgrounds in the locality. Some still follow on foot or by bicycle. These people are often among the most knowledgeable on the subject of venery, the science of hunting a pack of hounds. Keen hunting people discuss the prowess of a huntsman, and compare him with his contemporaries, with the same passion and interest as other sports fans discuss football or cricket players. There are accepted and well known standards of venery, and the most skilled practitioners are highly regarded in the foxhunting fraternity. Generally they are able to exercise an "invisible thread" of communication and control of a pack of hounds, which comprises some 30 to 35 animals in the hunting field, a far more difficult feat than the layman may imagine.
THE HUNT ORGANISATION
The Cottesmore runs its affairs strictly in accordance with the guide lines laid down by the Masters of Foxhounds Association which means that it is mandatory for its Masters to be members of the Association, and its hounds registered with the MFHA’s stud book.
The Hunt Committee is elected by members of the Hunt who are defined as "landowners and farmers over whose lands the hounds and followers are allowed to hunt, and hunting subscribers".
The Committee has 15 members – five subscribers, five landowners and five farmers; the Committee appoints its own Chairman who may hold office for a maximum of five years.
Committee members serve for three years and retire annually by rotation. The Committee is responsible to all the members, and gives a detailed financial and management report to the annual general meeting.
The Committee appoints the Masters on a contract basis which allots to them the management of the Hunt premises, the hounds, and the horses ridden by the Hunt staff, and the all important task of maintaining a liaison with the farmers and landowners. The conduct of the sport in the field is the responsibility of the Masters, but they are responsible to the Committee in carrying out all the above tasks satisfactorily, and this system of checks and balances works well.
The Hunt Chairman holds a monthly finance committee meeting which carefully checks income and expenditure, and other management problems, and the Hunt Committee itself meetings about quarterly to receive reports and take management decisions. Additionally the Hunt Committee appoints three Trustees to be financially reponsible for the Hunt Kennels and stables, and other property such as the Hunt coverts.
The Cottesmore Hunt’s annual turnover is currently about £230,000. Subscriptions are levied on those who ride after hounds on a varying basis depending on which days individuals hunt. Additionally, the Hunt runs a six day visitors’ scheme, and takes individual contributions called "caps" for one day visitors. As stated above, visitors come from all parts of the UK and abroad. The Hunt has especially close connections with certain American Hunts who use the Cottesmore bloodlines in breeding their hounds.
Those who visit the Hunt often stay in hotels in the area, and the Hunt’s own use of hotels, inns and other premises makes a substantial input to the local economy, apart from the huge spend by its subscribers in maintaining and keeping their horses.
A significant part of the Hunt’s income is derived totally from fund raising, and without this element the subscriptions charged would be insufficient.
The Cottesmore currently has five Masters who between them purchase the horses ridden by the Hunt staff – a professional huntsman, and two professional whippers-in. These three individuals live in the Hunt’s own accommodation at the Hunt’s premises, as do five other members of staff – a kennelman who feeds the hounds and collects the flesh; a full time fence builder and terrier man; a stud groom, and two other grooms; plus additional part-time labour. At least three of the above have their families in residence with them.
Altogether the Hunt retains at least 12 to 15 horses in the Hunt stables for the staff. The Masters keep their own horses at their own premises.
Currently the Hunt has applied for planning permission to sell the present Hunt Kennels complex because the buildings date from 1890 and are far too large for modern requirements; they include some 50 horse boxes. The fabric is highly expensive to maintain. The Hunt plans to move to a more rural setting than the present site which has become crowded by such modern developments as a prison, a Council road yard etc.
It should be emphasised that running such a major establishment is a considerable task requiring much voluntary as well as professionally employed labour. The Hunt is not short of subscribers, and indeed could hardly accommodate many more because of its obligations to farmers and landowners to keep the size of mounted fields crossing the country within certain limits in the interests of farming practice.
Tuesdays are the most popular days because they are held on the grass country south of Oakham. Mounted fields on these days can number up to 150, with a large percentage of the field bringing two horses, and changing to second horses during the day. The cost of maintaining and transporting such horses is very considerable. Second horses are also used by some subscribes who hunt with us on Saturdays. Most followers bring one horse each to the meets on Thursdays and Mondays which attract smaller mounted fields, but they are just as keen and devoted to their sport.
The 1997 report by Produce Studies Ltd on the "Economic Contribution of Leicestershire Hunts" includes the Cottesmore country. The report noted that of the annual total of £9.2 million spent by the Hunts in Leicestershire and Rutland, some £3.9 million is spent on direct employment; over half of this is in full time jobs, the remainder part time – a total of 750 jobs; £3 million is spent on local services such as farriers, veterinarians, maintenance and livery fees; £2.3 million is spent on feed, saddlery and riders’ clothing.
The Cottesmore Hunt is one of the three large four-day-a-week packs in Leicestershire/Rutland and therefore is one of the packs generating a major proportion of the above expenditure, directly but very considerably through the monies spent by its followers on their sport.
Hunt Saboteurs
For well over a decade the Cottesmore country has had occasional visits from Hunt saboteurs. These have varied from very large groups engaging in a "mass attack", to very small numbers causing little or no nuisance.
Hunt saboteurs have endangered our hounds by blowing horns on the roads which may distract hounds to cross roads. Saboteurs in the past have attacked the hounds with sprays which damage the hounds’ eyes, and have even attacked the hounds with whips. There have been occasional confrontations between individuals when saboteurs have seized horses’ bridles, used highly provocative and abusive language to women and children in the mounted field, and have sabotaged vehicles bringing horses to and from the meets.
In recent seasons the level of saboteur activity has been much lower and does not materially interfere with hunting, but the Hunt has to be constantly aware and defensive about such activity. It says a great deal for the restraint of those who hunt with the Cottesmore that confrontations have been very rare indeed, and that Hunt followers do obey the Masters’ firm instructions that it is to be avoided at all costs. Hunt members are immensely restrained compared with the likely reactions of say, a modern football crowd if outsiders suddenly appeared with the express purpose of disrupting and halting the sport.
THE DRAG HUNT "ALTERNATIVE"
It must be stressed that the Cottesmore Hunt cannot "change to draghunting" at the behest of a government, or any other edict. The Hunt’s constitution, its practice, traditions, income and its place in the countryside is totally involved in the sport of foxhunting.
Legally if hunting were to be banned, the Hunt would have to disband. Whether or not a drag hunt, as a totally different organisation, were to be set up in the area is another matter, but it is certain that it would not have the same access to land as the Cottesmore Hunt has enjoyed for 300 years; a drag hunt would not need to own and maintain coverts; its income could not allow it to invest in the extensive fencing and hedging work paid for by the Hunt; nor would a drag hunt be able to engage in a flesh collection scheme.
The members of the Cottesmore Hunt could go draghunting now, but they do not wish to do so. It is a completely different sport, and it does not appeal to them. There are drag hunts to the north of Leicestershire, but the followers of the Cottesmore Hunt are firmly involved in foxhunting. In many cases their families have been foxhunters for generations, starting as children, but even those who have taken up foxhunting as new comers, later in life, are just as firmly entrenched in the sport which involves a way of life and a 12 months’ calendar of activities.
It is absolutely certain that the element in hunting which would benefit least would be the local fox population. Without the presence of the Cottesmore hounds the alternative forms of "control" would be exercised in far more draconian fashion, and there would be a sharp decline in the number of foxes in the countryside in this area. Shooting estate in areas of England where there is no hunting are an example of this.
The Cottesmore Hunt exercises the closest possible liaison with Shoots within its boundaries and urges game keepers to exercise the lightest possible cull of foxes, so that the two sports can, and do, co-exist. Removing organised foxhunting with hounds from the equation is bound to be highly detrimental to the fox population in the Cottesmore country.
CONCLUSION
The Cottesmore Hunt is an integral part of the rural scene in its extensive country in the East Midlands.
To ban foxhunting with hounds will do nothing but harm to the fox population. Furthermore it will wreak irretrievable damage to the social and recreational structure which has flourished, and continues to flourish, in a deeply rural part of England. It would be gravely unjust and exceedingly damaging for any government to allow the ill informed prejudices of those who oppose foxhunting to achieve a ban on an activity which continues to play such a constructive and enhancing role in rural life in the East Midlands.
ends.
Michael Clayton,
Chairman,
Cottesmore Hunt
February 15th, 2000
Date uploaded to site 12 May 2000