Another muntjac killed by dogs

User00001

Well-Known Member
This is about number six or seven in the last couple of weeks that either myself or the Warden team have had to deal with on our National Nature Reserve. If I live to be a hundred years old I will never understand why people come out into areas of countryside only to abuse it and its wildlife.

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What a waste, nice sized buck too.
IMHO we should be able to shoot any dog that is out of control in the country side !!!

What really gets me is if you ask someone to keep their dog/s under control and they go in to the old 'well they aren't doing any harm'.

Really gets my goat.
 
Do you think it is intentional eg. lamping/lurchers/pikeys or just people with no idea how to control their untrained dogs?
Very sad either way
 
What a waste Glyn , wouldnt have thought you would get trouble from dog men down there or was it public on the eatate walking with dogs ?
We get it on a weekly basis up here in yorkshire must be the worst dog men/pikey county in the country.
 
Do you think it is intentional eg. lamping/lurchers/pikeys or just people with no idea how to control their untrained dogs?
Very sad either way

Not intentional, simply dog walkers letting Fido 'play' in the woods.

I have no desire to shoot anyones dog (I'm well aware of the legal position on this before anyone takes the discussion in that, unpleasant, direction) or, for that matter, even restrict walkers enjoyment of the countryside but it is so anoying when people are irresponsible.

Its only a matter of time before someones dog is killed by a muntjac on the reserve. I think that I am going to have to liase with our Conservation Manager about doing some posters or local media info.

We have an open access policy over large areas of the estate and I think that because of this generosity and goodwill that we show, it somehow makes it hit even harder when people abuse the priviledge.

Last month, during the snow, a walker left a gate open in the deer park and my best red stag escaped, he was loose for a couple of weeks until I was able to get him back in.
 
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what amazes me is when you try to explain to dog walkers about this its never thier dog that chases deer???
 
You do get some idiots.

Just after our new Scottish "access" laws kicked in we had two incidents (of a type never experienced before) in fairly short sucession, on the farm here.

The first involved a very ederly couple and their equally geriatric golden retreiver. They had decided to park their car in one of our field gateways (lovely folk) and were taking their pooch for a very vocally, noisy meander (loud English accents of a particular type, gibbering inanely to one another and their pets, have an unfortunate effect not only on my hackles but also on the peace of mind of our sheep, as it turns out)... The roadside field they picked had roughly sixty in-lamb gimmers in it, due to start lambing in a matter of days. It was a very nice, mild, sunny spring day and it seems the bold couple had walked all around the 15 acre field they had chosen. I actually heard them first, from the farm steading/lambing shed, over a 1/4 of a mile away and when I spotted them there were gimmers running a' ways. On going across and challenging them about their thoughtless and potentially damaging conduct, I was treated to my first encounter with the "we've every right to be here my good man, it's the law" attitude and they gave me their assurances, nay insistences, that their aged family pet was no bother to any one. I then asked them if they could possibly explain all of that to the puffing and panting, heavily pregnant young ewes that they had scared half witless and which were now gathered in tight little groups in various corners, with plumes of vapour rising from them... They seemed not to have noticed, or certainly gave the appearance of not having noticed the sheep before my mentioning them and they duly declined to give any reply to my further questioning. Then they left and never came back, that I'm aware of. Silly souls.

The second such event happened about six weeks later. I had turned a batch of twenty, or so, limousin x bullocks out to grass a couple of days earlier and they were in grand form, and of course full of the joys of spring. This time it was one middle aged lady who had decided to abandon her car and take a very boisterous Boxer for a spot of off the lead exercise. The bullocks got wind of the dog and being the inquisitve beasts that they are (did I say they were Limmy crosses? ... do you know anything about the intelligence and mentality of that breed?) they duly decided to investigate this "boisterous" hound... limmy bullocks in the first days of spring grazing are more boisterous than most hounds, btw. Anyhoo, I was actually busy repairing a fence in a far corner of the same field when I saw the events start to unfold. Fortunately for her, this pooch first tried facing up to the bullocks but as the thundering stampede got closer chickened out and ran for cover... toward a good netting fence with an electric wire on top. I guess it had never met an obstacle like this before and stopped at the fence and then tried to climb it. 5,000 volts and a silly dog generates a very loud and long sequence of yelps and by now the bullocks have identified a "thing" that must be "dealt" with. Of course they know better than mess with a trained collie but this thing was just too much fun and/or danger to resist and it was running away. By this point, I had scrambled to the Landrover in anticipation of the worst case scenario.. and sure enough her dog spotted it's mistress and bolted towards her this time. Fortunately, I managed to drive quickly enough to put my landrover between her and roughly 9 tons of 80 hoofed danger that was now heading straight for her silly dog, and ultimately her, at about 30mph. The dog had the sense to keep running but the woman did not have the sense to stop screaminig various unheeded commands at it and near simultaneous profanities toward me, but no-matter... I did manage to make myself heard and she did climb, quite willingly, into the passenger seat of the landrover. Then having by now done almost a full lap of the field the cattle followed the dog which had made it's escape through the fence I had been mending... So, a few moments later the fence now utterly destroyed. Do you city folk not realise that a fence is really just an act of faith between a stockman and his cattle? They can actually totally demolish mere fences (even good ones) at will, if they are so inclined and acting en mass. The woman in question now started to launch into a tirade, quoting my supposed responsibilites (un-be-f'in-leivable) by some chance co-incidence my patience expired at the same moment. She was duly informed of her own responsibilities and her gross negligence, foolishness and foolhardiness... after finally tracking her dog down in a wood a couple more fields away and returning her to her carelessly parked car I required her to give me her name and address that I may "hold her responsible" for the access she had just, so spectacularly, taken. She declined to give it... maybe I wasn't her type... And never a word of thanks to me either...:rolleyes: As far as I know she's not been back... And then folk moan about farmers and their "ger offa moi lan" attitude.... Choice! ... I ask you.

Funnily enough though, and barring only one other incident, involving sheep and possibly the single most arrogant and idiotic, horse mounted, human being I've yet encountered, we've not had any such bother since. I say this assuming that she is actually of our species, of course she may not be. That one took the Police, numerous "helpers" and about 4 years, in total, to completely sort out.

Happy days... :D
 
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Whenever you meet folk like that with a dog out of control,have you noticed it's never their pocchiewoochie that does the harm is it, he would never chase sheep or kill deer!!! a few years ago now we had a couple move in to a cottage near us they brought two adolescent dogs with them a lab and a border collie ,i found them in the lambing fields a few times and chased them home they committed mayhem on a neigbours ewes and despite polite discussion they denied all .it turns out they used to open the door and let them out for a while , damm things would run the half a mile to our ewes have 5 mins mayhem then be back home before they were missed ! i didn't :cool:
 
We get the same problem exept with roe, the amazing thing is the same people with the dogs, say they don,t see as many deer as there used to be:doh:
 
W get the same around thetford forest with deer, and our sheep get routinely attacked. Found another one last week, still alive but with both flanks stripped of wool and badly gored, we have now got the point of threating legal action ( and meaning it) one dog owner who was witnessed with an out of control dog attacking our sheep, to be fair to the owner, they were distraught and offered voluntarily to have the dog destroyed, we declined, and I suspect it was enough of a shock that they won't be doing it again, but it is not just local to you Glyn, seems to be endemic in the county!
 
The "General Public" thinks that the "Right To Roam" is literally a right to roam freely and exercise their dogs wherever they feel like going on private land.....
Every farm I shoot over has at least one public footpath crossing over it at some point and I am aware of these footpaths and always avoid shooting near them but very often I find that people have decided that they have a right to exercise their dogs on areas of farmland that do not have public access anywhere near them. I have had people pull up with a horse box, unload and begin leading ponies around with children on them......archery lessons with uncle Fred......tobogganing.......fireworks displays........kite flying.........jogging........badger watching........camping in tents........archaeologists with shovels!!......and treasure hunters with metal detectors.......
some of the more regular trespassers know me on a first name basis now and although I've made it quite clear that they are trespassing and potentially putting themselves in danger (not from me but from some of the other idiots that shoot on the same land) it never seems to sink in.
I think perhaps I'm too polite.
 
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