© 2024 Hunt Saboteurs Association
Pro-bloodsports group the British Hound Sports Association (BHSA) claims it will hold a ‘National Trail Hunting Day’ on Saturday 14th September 2024.
The coordinated series of events – dubbed ‘Smokescreen Saturday’ by the HSA – will see fox, hare, stag and mink hunters gather in around 30 locations across the country.
Each of these carefully stage-managed events will involve laying a scent trail in front of an invited audience of journalists, police and politicians. Of course, such activity bears no resemblance to what hunts get up to in the hunting field nor does it bear any relation to ‘trail hunting’ as described on the BHSA’s own website!
Potential attendees should therefore ask themselves why they are warmly invited to this event yet denied access to the 12,000 actual hunt meets that take place – in total secrecy – each year.
Journalists might also want to ask why the BHSA has appointed hardcore hunters Julian Barnfield and Richard Tyacke as national organisers for the day.
In December 2012, Heythrop huntsman Barnfield pleaded guilty to four separate counts, on four separate occasions, of unlawfully hunting a fox with dogs. In the same case, the entire Heythrop Hunt Ltd. was also convicted – the first time a hunt has faced corporate charges.
Tyacke was a leading contributor to the infamous Hunting Office ‘smokescreen’ webinars, advising hare hunters to pack up when hunt saboteurs appear because this “is far better than a court case.” He has remained involved since the Hunting Office changed its name to the BHSA in 2022.
The inept BHSA does not seem to realise that the ship sailed on so-called ‘trail hunting’ years ago. It is using thousands of pounds of its member’s money to employ a PR agency – Media House – to promote the event.
An HSA spokesperson commented,
“National Trail Hunting Day is just the latest iteration of the smokescreen that hangs over trail hunting. The BHSA strategy is clear: in offering up this sanitised and stage-managed event, they hope to direct the attention of journalists, police and politicians away from the cruelty and criminality of the real hunting field. It won’t work: Smokescreen Saturday is already a hopeless – and expensive – failure.”
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