Bad news for the Irish Hare this evening as Culture and Heritage Minister, Josepha Madigan, gives in to pressure from pro-bloodsports TDs and announces that cruel coursers will be given permission to catch up to 500 hares, supposedly to "assist the study of RHD2 in Irish hares", with a view to “informing the possibility of limited licensing during the coursing season”.
The announcement comes just days after it was confirmed that a third hare was found dead with the deadly and highly contagious RHD2 virus which Minister Madigan last week confirmed “has the potential to wipe out the hare population completely”. Her National Parks and Wildlife Service department previously warned that RHD2 could prove “catastrophic” for the Irish Hare which is unique to Ireland.
Speaking on RTE’s Morning Ireland on September 25th, Dr Ferdia Marnell, Head of Animal Ecology at the National Parks and Wildlife Service, stated that the virus can be spread on soil, shoes, clothing and on "nets and boxes" (which are used by coursers to catch and trap hares).
“Unusually with this version of the disease - some animals survive and that, in some way, gives us more concerns because then you may have animals carrying the disease that don’t apparently have any symptoms,” he added. “And that is one of the reasons, I suppose, that we have taken the step of not issuing the coursing licence this year because the risk associated with bringing hares together from various areas and keeping them in a park was considered to be too high a risk to take particularly given that some of those animals could actually be carrying the disease unawares to the coursers.”
Speaking in the Dail a few days later, Minister Madigan stated: “As a Minister, I will not have it on my conscience that I could be responsible for exterminating - for want of a better word - the entire hare population."
As the virus continues to kill rabbits and hares and threatens the future of the Irish Hare species, it emerged that open coursing, the hunting of hares with packs of hounds and the shooting of hares is still allowed, with an “open season” extending from the end of September to 28 February.
Shame on the Irish Government, at this critical moment, for facilitating the sadistic minority intent on persecuting wildlife, instead of siding with the majority who want wildlife protected and preserved and bloodsports banned.
Read more in the Irish Independent article below and please respond to, and share, our renewed action alert. Don’t let the fate of the Irish Hare be that of the curlew. The curlew has all but disappeared in Ireland. Not until 2012 when the bird was on the brink of extinction, with numbers having fallen by up to 96 per cent, was a ban on hunting them finally introduced.
ACTION ALERT
Email "I support a total and permanent ban on cruel hare coursing, hare hunting and fox hunting" to josepha.madigan@oireachtas.ie; leo.varadkar@oireachtas.ie; finegael@finegael.ie
An Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar
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Josepha Madigan
Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht
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Ireland - Ban cruel hare coursing
www.change.org/p/ireland-ban-cruel-hare-coursing
Ban Bloodsports in Ireland
https://www.change.org/p/ban-blood-sports-in-ireland
Sinn Fein: Support a ban on cruel hare coursing
https://www.change.org/p/sinn-fein-support-a-ban-on-cruel-hare-coursing
Save Ireland’s hares from extinction
https://www.change.org/p/prime-minister-of-ireland-save-ireland-s-hares-from-extinction
Government to catch up to 500 hares for high-security study after heated meeting over ban on coursing
Irish Independent, October 10 2019
By Fionnán Sheahan
Arts Minister Josepha Madigan has been forced to conduct a high-security study of hares after a heated meeting of Fine Gael ministers and TDs over a ban on coursing.
The Government is now going to catch up to 500 hares and keep them in secure paddocks, monitored by CCTV, with biosecurity measures to assess the spread of a virus affecting rabbits and hares.
Coursing is currently banned due to an outbreak of Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease, RHD2, described as ‘rabbit foot and mouth’.
The start of the coursing season has been delayed due to the threat of the disease, which is not harmful to humans.
Ms Madigan has now put together a “road map on greater understanding of impacts of RHD2 on the Irish Hare”.
The study will involve the capture of 100 wild hares at five locations around the country.
Each hare will be microchipped under veterinary supervision and have swabs taken before release into a “hare park”.
Ms Madigan’s department is in charge of wildlife and the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NWPS).
The Arts Minister and Agriculture Minister Michael Creed held a meeting of Fine Gael Oireachtas members on Wednesday afternoon attended by about 30 ministers, TDs and Senators, including eight junior ministers.
Ms Madigan is said to have been left under no illusion this was a big problem in rural Ireland.
“She is under an awful lot of pressure. I’d say she got a bit of a land. The Taoiseach even mentioned the meeting at the parliamentary party meeting,” a TD present said.
Dublin Bay South Kate O’Connell was described as speaking “the most vociferously and cogently on the topic, remarkably for a Dublin TD”.
Ms Madigan and her officials were pressed on the rationale behind the ban.
“I haven’t seen the likes of it for years. The minister was warned there was a fair amount of heat. I don’t think this will be enough for the coursing club. The temperature was high. She said she wants to find a resolution to this issue,” a TD said.
“It was hot and heavy. Some of the officials in the room were questioned hard. The points from the coursing club were put to them. It was a good listening process.”
In a memo to Fine Gael TDs, the minister said the NWPS and the Department of Agriculture will conduct a series of “controlled science-based field tests” for three to four 4 weeks.
“Hare paddocks shall be secured, be monitored by CCTV and nominated identified personnel so that the behaviour of the hares can be observed and recorded at all times.
“Appropriate and agreed biosecurity measures shall be put in place beforehand and maintained throughout,” the minister’s memo to TD says.
In a letter to Fine Gael TDs, the minister said hare carcasses found in Wexford and Dublin have tested positive for the disease.
“We are finalising a roadmap which would allow for the collection of hares in a number of locations to assist the study of RHD2 in Irish hares. Working with the Irish Coursing Club, this will inform the possibility of limited licensing during the coursing season,” she wrote.
Clubs need a licence to catch hares for coursing meets.
Without any hares being netted and collected, there can be no coursing.
The ban on coursing licences follows the suspension of the promotion of greyhound racing in tourism marketing due to animal welfare concerns.
Last Sunday night, a rally of over 600 greyhound industry supporters, addressed by Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and Independent TDs, demanded the lifting of the ban on catching hares.
But campaigners say there is research showing hares do not transmit the disease.