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Middleton Hunt gathers for traditional Boxing Day meet, but riding across fields cancelled due to icy weather

9:38am Monday 28th December 2009 in


HUNT supporters met on Boxing Day, but did not head out for the fields and open countryside.

The ice and snow made it too dangerous for hounds and horses to engage in the traditional Christmas sporting occasion.

But that did not stop some hunt members turning out for their big outdoor social occasion of the hunting season.

Many foot supporters turned out to wish them well – which was appreciated by the riders who attended.

Joanna Hewitt, of the Middleton Hunt, said: “We did have a good time and we had our usual collection for the hunt staff.”

The nine riders who joined her made sure they and their horses looked their best for the occasion.

They started their morning in Malton’s Market Place before moving on to the Old Lodge Hotel; Old Malton; and an old people’s home, their traditional four Boxing Day stops.

Members of the Countryside Alliance said this year’s Boxing Day meets may have been the last under the Hunting Act 2004, which banned the hunting of wild animals with hounds.

They hope a Conservative Government will repeal the act, and allow foxes to be hunting once again.

But Annajoy David, Labour’s choice to contest the Scarborough and Whitby seat in the next General Election, said the next Government will have more important issues to deal with. She helped to launch a national campaign on Boxing Day to support the ban.

At the same time, John Rolls, of the RSPCA said: “The Hunting Act has never been about stopping the activity of riding to hounds in the countryside – it was to prevent wild animals being chased and killed for sport.”

He revealed figures showing that 48 people were convicted of offences under the act in 2007, more than eight times the number under other animal protection acts.

Comments(26)

Garrowby Turnoff says...
11:22am Mon 28 Dec 09

Wouldn't the sight of the splattered red blood of a dismembered fox add a needed soupcon of colour to the glistening white snowfields of Yorkshire?

But, after sixty odd years man and boy living in the country, why would I want to spoil the local Butcher's fun... Hmmm.

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Whistlejacket says...
12:49pm Mon 28 Dec 09

Was it a nut cutlet for Christmas dinner at Turnoff Towers Garrowby?
Or did you find a turkey that died of old age after a long life of unmitigated joy and happiness?

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bloodaxe says...
12:57pm Mon 28 Dec 09

Interesting that shooting-folk are not allowed to hit foxes on hunt territory because they're too efficient at culling them. So much for hunting being about keeping down "vermin". I'd have more time for these creeps if they admitted that what they really enjoy is pursuing small furry animals with lots of dogs.

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NoToHareCoursing says...
1:51pm Mon 28 Dec 09

I hope and pray that the Hunting Act is not repealed or otherwise undone. We British led the way in banning the slave trade and in banning slavery in the Empire, we led the way in banning bear baiting and **** fighting, and we led the way in banning hunting and hare coursing. We must continue to make progress and not let our civilisation take a backward step. And, besides, if Cameron, Hague, Herbert, etc., think that repeal would be a vote winner in rural areas, they are very much mistaken.

And please don't forget the vile 'sport' of hare coursing -

http://petitions.num
ber10.gov.uk/NoToHar
eCoursing/

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MHayworth says...
3:02pm Mon 28 Dec 09

bloodaxe - Could we use your quote for our website? We are collecting these for our cruelty page. If so, please let us know through the 'contact us' form at: www.campaignfordecen
cy.orgu.uk

You are absolutely right. Foxes could be shot accurately and humanely where necessary.

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MHayworth says...
3:03pm Mon 28 Dec 09

There is no case for repeal. Hunt numbers are up all over the country. Drag hunting is legal. The sense of community, pageantry, heritage, and jobs are all still intact and yet these disgraceful people can’t manage to enjoy themselves unless they are terrifying and killing animals.

Please if you support the hunting act, get your name on the R.O.A.R. (Register Online Against Repeal), an ‘all party’ list at: http://www.campaignf
ordecency.org.uk

Please make your voices heard!

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GoodDoc says...
4:13pm Mon 28 Dec 09

Uh-oh, here come the towny, anti-hunt brigade! It's going to get repealed, without a doubt. Locally to me, they still hunt, they hunt with hounds, they kill foxes. Last year's meet was the largest in living memory and they got a good bag. Far fewer sabateurs too. The law is unenforcable, unpopular, impractical and irrelevant. And personally, if you want to harp on about cruelty - I'd rather foxes were killed outright by a pack of dogs than have some untrained guy with a shotgun taking potshots from a distance. Accurately and humanely? Do you have any idea how difficult it is to kill a fast, lone, wild animal in one shot? That is disgustingly cruel, so until you can find an army of trained trackers and marksmen instead of bumbling farmers with 12 bores, keep your viscious suggestions to yourself!

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A taxpayer says...
5:41pm Mon 28 Dec 09

Where do the antis stand on rats? York is overun with them, and they've become immune to poison.

Plants are living organisms, torn out of the ground so what do these anti-cruelty people eat?

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Garrowby Turnoff says...
5:43pm Mon 28 Dec 09

Whistlejacket wrote:
Was it a nut cutlet for Christmas dinner at Turnoff Towers Garrowby? Or did you find a turkey that died of old age after a long life of unmitigated joy and happiness?
I had a boned Turkey from my local butcher who hates the arrogant hunting bunch as much as me.

Just one question, why do the local hunt employ a gamekeeper to maintain concrete fox coverns built solely for breeding foxes? Could it be to maintain enough "vermin" for the hunt season? What a joke.

Lastly are you insinuating that I should eat dead foxes?

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again says...
6:24pm Mon 28 Dec 09

A taxpayer wrote:
Where do the antis stand on rats? York is overun with them, and they've become immune to poison. Plants are living organisms, torn out of the ground so what do these anti-cruelty people eat?
Standing on rats? How do they do that?

Anyway, most fox-hunters are townies really as there are very few real country folk left in our industrially farmed countryside.

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GoodDoc says...
6:35pm Mon 28 Dec 09

Worrying to hear you think artificial earths are used in the 'local' hunts. The only such earths I've heard about are few and far between and were established in the 80s as a kind of resettlement program, located on land where foxes would do the least damage - often on land which doesn't allow hunts anyway. I would only tolerate hunting in the many areas of the country where foxes do pose a genuine problem, and where their control is done by local farmers rather than blood-thirsty toffs. Licensing rather than banning would be the only interference that the rural populace should have to endure on this matter.

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pedalling paul says...
7:08pm Mon 28 Dec 09

A bombastic Hunt master once tried to stop me pedalling along a county lane near Buttercrambe, becuse I would confuse the hounds. I told him that only a uniformed Police officer had the right to stop me, and carried on (with frequent backward glances!)

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The Cat Amongst The Pigeons says...
8:21pm Mon 28 Dec 09

GoodDoc wrote:
Uh-oh, here come the towny, anti-hunt brigade! It's going to get repealed, without a doubt. Locally to me, they still hunt, they hunt with hounds, they kill foxes. Last year's meet was the largest in living memory and they got a good bag. Far fewer sabateurs too. The law is unenforcable, unpopular, impractical and irrelevant. And personally, if you want to harp on about cruelty - I'd rather foxes were killed outright by a pack of dogs than have some untrained guy with a shotgun taking potshots from a distance. Accurately and humanely? Do you have any idea how difficult it is to kill a fast, lone, wild animal in one shot? That is disgustingly cruel, so until you can find an army of trained trackers and marksmen instead of bumbling farmers with 12 bores, keep your viscious suggestions to yourself!
Oh ho! Here is the "charitable good doc" once again! LOL!!!! Just another blood thirsty mindless moron as we all know.

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GoodDoc says...
9:25pm Mon 28 Dec 09

Cat, do you think you could provide some kind of argument rather than immediately resorting to pathetic, second-hand insults? Could you stretch to that? Blood-thirsty, whatever. Where have I suggested that? No doubt I'm a toff as well. You shouldn't believe everything that's read to you. Grow up and try and engage with the issue rather than trotting out the usual rhetoric. See, if this is the level of the anti-hunt argument, it's small wonder hunting is far from dying out.

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Expat says...
10:00pm Mon 28 Dec 09

GoodDoc wrote:
Uh-oh, here come the towny, anti-hunt brigade! It's going to get repealed, without a doubt. Locally to me, they still hunt, they hunt with hounds, they kill foxes. Last year's meet was the largest in living memory and they got a good bag. Far fewer sabateurs too. The law is unenforcable, unpopular, impractical and irrelevant. And personally, if you want to harp on about cruelty - I'd rather foxes were killed outright by a pack of dogs than have some untrained guy with a shotgun taking potshots from a distance. Accurately and humanely? Do you have any idea how difficult it is to kill a fast, lone, wild animal in one shot? That is disgustingly cruel, so until you can find an army of trained trackers and marksmen instead of bumbling farmers with 12 bores, keep your viscious suggestions to yourself!
The hunt is a way of life. I used to go to the meet at Aldwalk it was a great sight see I hope the Hunt meet continues.

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piaggio says...
10:06pm Mon 28 Dec 09

A bombastic Hunt master once tried to stop me pedalling ???

dont we all wish you would

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A taxpayer says...
12:30am Tue 29 Dec 09

Why aren't these anti hunt persons in Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan protesting about the cruel hunting and shooting of innocent indigenous peoples by invaders intent on stealing their natural resources. Simple, a huntsman isn't going to kill you for interfering, but a government will. Anti hunt, climate change protesters etc, all the same, non working nimbys who you won't find anywhere they might be killed for their chosen cause. In the war years we called them cowards and executed them.

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The Cat Amongst The Pigeons says...
1:54am Tue 29 Dec 09

GoodDoc wrote:
Cat, do you think you could provide some kind of argument rather than immediately resorting to pathetic, second-hand insults? Could you stretch to that? Blood-thirsty, whatever. Where have I suggested that? No doubt I'm a toff as well. You shouldn't believe everything that's read to you. Grow up and try and engage with the issue rather than trotting out the usual rhetoric. See, if this is the level of the anti-hunt argument, it's small wonder hunting is far from dying out.
LOL!!! I rest my case!

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pedalling paul says...
9:02am Tue 29 Dec 09

piaggio wrote:
A bombastic Hunt master once tried to stop me pedalling ??? dont we all wish you would
Tch...tch...only one riposte. You're all a bit slow on the uptake but never mind..can't expect everything.

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GoodDoc says...
9:58am Tue 29 Dec 09

Cat - wonderful. Well done. I take that as a 'No I can't' then!! With your articulate, intelligent and systematic argument you've shown us that hunting really does deserve a ban! Haha. Poor kid, you just wanted to feel part of the debate like the adults!

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tell the truth says...
11:06am Tue 29 Dec 09

The Cat Amongst The Pigeons wrote:
GoodDoc wrote:
Uh-oh, here come the towny, anti-hunt brigade! It's going to get repealed, without a doubt. Locally to me, they still hunt, they hunt with hounds, they kill foxes. Last year's meet was the largest in living memory and they got a good bag. Far fewer sabateurs too. The law is unenforcable, unpopular, impractical and irrelevant. And personally, if you want to harp on about cruelty - I'd rather foxes were killed outright by a pack of dogs than have some untrained guy with a shotgun taking potshots from a distance. Accurately and humanely? Do you have any idea how difficult it is to kill a fast, lone, wild animal in one shot? That is disgustingly cruel, so until you can find an army of trained trackers and marksmen instead of bumbling farmers with 12 bores, keep your viscious suggestions to yourself!
Oh ho! Here is the "charitable good doc" once again! LOL!!!! Just another blood thirsty mindless moron as we all know.
Hey Cat, this is much more fun than fox hunting!!

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GoodDoc says...
11:21am Tue 29 Dec 09

Tell, you clearly have a very interesting life!! No pubs near you?

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GoodDoc says...
11:22am Tue 29 Dec 09

PS; Don't knock what you haven't tried! Fox-hunting is a HOOT! Especially when you get to smear the blood around your face like we always do!

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The Cat Amongst The Pigeons says...
3:31pm Tue 29 Dec 09

GoodDoc wrote:
PS; Don't knock what you haven't tried! Fox-hunting is a HOOT! Especially when you get to smear the blood around your face like we always do!
Oh do keep em coming Doc, Class P1llock.

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The Cat Amongst The Pigeons says...
3:33pm Tue 29 Dec 09

tell the truth wrote:
The Cat Amongst The Pigeons wrote:
GoodDoc wrote:
Uh-oh, here come the towny, anti-hunt brigade! It's going to get repealed, without a doubt. Locally to me, they still hunt, they hunt with hounds, they kill foxes. Last year's meet was the largest in living memory and they got a good bag. Far fewer sabateurs too. The law is unenforcable, unpopular, impractical and irrelevant. And personally, if you want to harp on about cruelty - I'd rather foxes were killed outright by a pack of dogs than have some untrained guy with a shotgun taking potshots from a distance. Accurately and humanely? Do you have any idea how difficult it is to kill a fast, lone, wild animal in one shot? That is disgustingly cruel, so until you can find an army of trained trackers and marksmen instead of bumbling farmers with 12 bores, keep your viscious suggestions to yourself!
Oh ho! Here is the "charitable good doc" once again! LOL!!!! Just another blood thirsty mindless moron as we all know.
Hey Cat, this is much more fun than fox hunting!!
I agree, especially in this weather!

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GoodDoc says...
5:29pm Wed 30 Dec 09

That's the problem with internet message boards. Amongst those of us engaging in modest, intellectual debates there is ALWAYS a group of bitter, lonely geeks tapping away to wind people up! Very sad, but always true.
And for the record, fox-hunting never seems so appealling as when I'm talking to bunny-huggers like yourselves! "LOL" as you popular kids would say.

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Members of the Middleton Hunt meet in Malton for the traditional Boxing Day meet at The Old Lodge, Old Malton Members of the Middleton Hunt meet in Malton for the traditional Boxing Day meet at The Old Lodge, Old Malton

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