Ireland’s animal cruelty review…time to ban blood sports!

The Irish government has launched a “public consultation” to see how it can best update animal protection laws in Ireland.

Please ask it to include a ban on the cruel practices of hare coursing and foxhunting, which continue in Ireland despite decades of campaigning.

Hare coursing involves the capture of thousands of hares each year to run from dogs in public parks or enclosures. Many hares are mauled, have their bones broken, or are tossed about like broken toys as fans cheer and mark their betting cards.

This happens despite evidence that the Irish hare is under threat from loss of habitat and has been in decline as a species for the past half century. 

Foxhunting involves chasing foxes for miles across country until their lungs give out and exhaustion delivers them to the pack… to eviscerate. Foxes that escape underground are dug out and thrown to the dogs.

The “sport” has no pest control function. Its sole purpose is to provide entertainment for the hunters and hunt followers.

Please make a submission to the public consultation on animal welfare, asking the Irish government to ban hare coursing and foxhunting as part of its updating of animal welfare laws.

You can write your own message/submission or, if you wish, use the following sample message:

Attn:

Public Consultation Feedback, Animal Welfare Division, Irish Department of Agriculture.

Dear Sir/Madam,

  In addition to updating and enforcing existing laws to protect domestic pets and farm livestock, I urge the Irish government to outlaw hare coursing and foxhunting, two extremely cruel activities that make an absolute mockery of the claim that Ireland has a robust animal protection regime.

Foxhunting as you know involves chasing a wild dog, the fox, for miles across country with a pack of hounds until it falls down from exhaustion. It is then either ripped apart, or forced to seek refuge underground, from where it’s retrieved with the aid of spades and terriers.

Cub hunting, which precedes the official hunting season, is equally cruel. The cubs are flushed out of their coverts, with the aim of training novice hounds and giving them a taste for blood.

The native Irish Hare is subjected to appalling cruelty for “sport.” The law permits coursing clubs to capture thousands of them annually so that dogs can be set on them. in parks or wired enclosures.

The hares are mauled, tossed about, or pinned to the ground by the dogs, resulting in broken bones, other internal injuries, or death… as the fans laugh and cheer, or mark their betting cards.

If the government wants to make Ireland a safer place for animals, it must outlaw these cruel practices.

I trust that you will heed the voices of compassionate people everywhere, and protect all animals-whether domestic, agricultural, or wild- from man’s inhumanity.

Thanking you,

Send you message or submission to:

animalwelfareconsultation@agriculture.gov.ie

or in hard copy to Public Consultation Feedback, Animal Welfare Division, Department of Agriculture, Food & the Marine, Kildare St, Dublin 2, D02WK12.

Thanking you,

Sincerely,

John Fitzgerald

(Campaign for the Abolition

Of Cruel Sports)