Vets urging the govement to study the decline of foxes since hunting ban

New Avon Arms
old keeper said:
I've seen more foxes around here since the badger cull but whether that has had an impact I'm not sure. very few people shoot around here but I know from contacts elsewhere that in some areas fox numbers have declined.
The ever-increasing number of people shooting large numbers of foxes, far more than most, if not all hunts would get is bound to have an impact. I read reports of some shooting double figures in a night, that's an awful lot of foxes!
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Finch said:
I've never shot foxes unless there was a need - ie. near poultry farms or in lambing country.
In my view there are too many people who shoot foxes so they can have a gun, rather than having a gun because they need to shoot foxes.

A place for everything and everything in its place. Foxes have a right to their place. They are a native species and part of natural landscape. Like badgers, they need controlling but not eradicating just so that people who want to shoot will have something to shoot at. Urban foxes on the other hand are a different matter.

Not saying I either believe or disbelieve the report. But I do know that when statistics are pulled from opposite directions they will inevitably become distorted.
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"Can I? Should I? Must I?"

Seems to me there are a lot of people shooting foxes just because they can, regardless of whether they should. The widespread use of NV and Thermal surely makes for very efficient pest control, but I won't lie, it doesn't sit well with me that so many don't seem to draw a distinction between regulating numbers and wiping them out in the name of sport. It's surely vastly reduced the element of fair chase in recreational fox shooting.

When shooting is banned, folks will say "they" did it. Politicians and antis. But it will have been some of "us" and the way "we" act and think that gave them the ammunition to do it.
 
I know of several who are currently wetting themselves cause they will soon be able to start on this yrs cubs....."farmers want them shot" they bleet....bull#### is my answer.....im more let them be from end Feb right into November....there aint no cub takin a full size lamb!!
NV...will be death of all rifle/live quarry shooting its a free for all where man is now overtaking nature!! Thermal to see in bushes yip "great hunt there" drones to spot deer to save getting out of car.....lol
 
There is a decline in foxes 'cos the hunting crowd used to tell us (me anyway) not to shoot the foxes if I saw any when out stalking. That seems to have gone away and they get it. More effective than a fat lad on a horse anyway.

Having said all that, they aren't in decline on my permission.
 
I know of one small holding where there 22 foxes have been shot on 4acres this year.
The field is used by foxes as part of a circuit round the holdings.
Visiting each in turn to inspect the geese, hens and soay sheep.

The nearby village residents used to keep topping up food for the foxes most nights but were forced to stop when more rats started appearing.
Meant the foxes had to return to the countryside raiding where they can.
 
The rural Fox has declined massively after hunting with dogs laws where brought in . It stopped the hounds and hounds where the foxes protection in the countryside . Even keepers used to call our pack off after a good day as the boss man and his friends and family often hunted, Hunts never wanted the fox gone they wanted healthy foxes to chase and low enough numbers to minimise Farmers and pheasant keepers complaints.
Today we kill a higher part of the population on rural foxes, no grace given and NV use / thermals more common and all of this kit way better by the year .
Here we are looking for incomers from the town , with the amount of farm land being taken for new housing foxes are being forced out into farm land
Anyone else think they are seeing less mange ? Used to have a rule on farms where i stalked imposed by the owners , shoot the fox before the deer ! Nobody has said that to me in ages
 
SimpleSimon said:
"Can I? Should I? Must I?"

Seems to me there are a lot of people shooting foxes just because they can, regardless of whether they should. The widespread use of NV and Thermal surely makes for very efficient pest control, but I won't lie, it doesn't sit well with me that so many don't seem to draw a distinction between regulating numbers and wiping them out in the name of sport. It's surely vastly reduced the element of fair chase in recreational fox shooting.

When shooting is banned, folks will say "they" did it. Politicians and antis. But it will have been some of "us" and the way "we" act and think that gave them the ammunition to do it.
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There are a lot of us who off the back of shooting foxes get the stalking and pigeon shooting, both in my case...

I remember you joining and taking up the kind offer of free stalking and a DSC1..!With no hint of any pest control which is a very good background for stalking and it is free.

There is no fair chase in a fox taking young lambs or eggs from a ground nesting bird nest.

The vast number of town foxes who are "released" into the rural setting does not and to quote yourself
" doesn't sit well" with myself and many others so they get shot with these days with NV :old:
 
Bowland blades said:
The rural Fox has declined massively after hunting with dogs laws where brought in
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I can only speak of the 500-acre farm at the bottom of my garden, I've shot & hunted on this patch on and off for the last 42 years, I even did a few years as the part-time keeper on there, and there are more foxes now than there ever were when the hunt was in full swing, we always left them alone because it was the first place the hunt looked at the start of the morning, the hunt has long since stopped coming so close to the village.
 
Finch said:
I've never shot foxes unless there was a need - ie. near poultry farms or in lambing country.
In my view there are too many people who shoot foxes so they can have a gun, rather than having a gun because they need to shoot foxes.

A place for everything and everything in its place. Foxes have a right to their place. They are a native species and part of natural landscape. Like badgers, they need controlling but not eradicating just so that people who want to shoot will have something to shoot at. Urban foxes on the other hand are a different matter.

Not saying I either believe or disbelieve the report. But I do know that when statistics are pulled from opposite directions they will inevitably become distorted.
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Yes partly agree but i think the thing with shooting foxes is you get out and actually see the foxes

There are so many more about than many / most people realise
 
No doubt a thermal and NV has made my fox control more effective. There however seems to be no shortage - they keep coming. I/we shot 40 in the run up to our ewes lambing, and that kept loses to a negligible level.

I’d be interested to see the robustness of the research cited - and how many of these Vets that signed the letter actually get out there, at night, with thermal to spot or count - or to have any real idea of fox numbers. After all stand in my lambing fields and I hope you wouldn’t see any or maybe an odd one, however we are surrounded by unmanaged land where no doubt there will be a good number.

So unless the research was extensive in nature it’s worth little
 
Irrespective of any decline in fox numbers there’s definitely a discussion to be had about the use of thermal IMHO.

My feeling is there are a lot of people who have permission to shoot vermin but who are not subject to the pressure of attempting eradication. This affords the Hunter an opportunity to adopt a more challenging and frankly rewarding approach that is daylight fox stalking where you really have to work for your trophy pelt.

This is not to say there’s no place for thermal.

K
 
Tim.243 said:
The decline of foxes is due to the vast amount of people with NV/thermal, defra used to pick up foxes from me and robert b
I was using a lamp. Big Tim gets his numbers filled in a short time these days.
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Yes there's probably some truth in that Tim,
There are more people out shooting them now, back in the day it was keepers and farmers, but these days its a sport in its own right with many shooters out with NV and thermal.
Not sure the population has dropped as I see just as many as I aways have!
 
cookingfat said:
Yes there's probably some truth in that Tim,
There are more people out shooting them now, back in the day it was keepers and farmers, but these days its a sport in its own right with many shooters out with NV and thermal.
Not sure the population has dropped as I see just as many as I aways have!
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You hardly (or never) see a farmer in the winter sitting in the cold on osr hoping to get over 20 pigeons.
They will let the "pigeon shooter" go as they will be on a driven day..lol
The keeper will pick a day on the flailed cover crop (or sell it) lol
I never got on one farm for pigeons until he rang me up and asked if I could get "the fox" who was eating x2 reg legs a night.
They went out in a gator flashing a red lamp and missed it 3 times .I went with a blue filter on foot and got it 20 mins after turning up. Got the pigeon shooting with the best bag of 318 picked..
Nothing is for free but it is nice when you are given something in return.
@SimpleSimon
 
Klenchblaize said:
daylight fox stalking where you really have to work for your trophy
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A lot of people seem to struggle to even come home with a deer for the larder let alone manage to shoot a fox in daylight, and deer are plentiful in Norfolk. It would be an inefficient method in my part of rural Norfolk for controlling foxes.
 
cookingfat said:
Yes there's probably some truth in that Tim,
There are more people out shooting them now, back in the day it was keepers and farmers, but these days its a sport in its own right with many shooters out with NV and thermal.
Not sure the population has dropped as I see just as many as I aways have!
Click to expand...
To be honest whilst some may occasionally go and have a look for a fox most aren't all that fussed.
I'd say the ones that do stick at it are few compared to many that only visit occasionally .

I know lads locally that probably only go out a few times a year or others turn up but never return again.
Me on the other hand this weekend. Two late nights and a 4am start out hunting.
 
There is no shortage on the permission I look after, I very rarely see no foxes whilst I'm out at night, There is a couple of us shoot the land but I tend to park up and walk and usually always see a couple, the other lad tends to park up in a spot and watch from the car then reports the next day that there's nothing about, They're always there it's just getting out and finding them, or at least they are where I shoot.
 
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