Posted on 09/29/2008 11:45:56 AM PDT by JZelle
RICHMOND | In a state considered the American birthplace of hunting with hounds, George Washington's favorite sport has become a target for some landowners who say baying dogs and their owners are trampling property rights.
Even other hunters object to a Virginia right-to-retrieve law viewed as the most absolute in the nation: Hunters have free reign to chase after dogs that stray onto posted private property.
Proponents are rising to protect their right to hunt, mindful that other Southern states have already limited or eliminated certain forms of the sport because of complaints from property owners.
Courtly fox hunters and down-home bear and coon hunters — an unlikely coalition — contend their heritage is at stake.
“If we have a major defeat in Virginia, I think it would hurt hunting with hounds in every state. Therefore, we will fight it at every turn,” vowed Kirby Burch of the Virginia Hunting Dog Alliance, an umbrella group for 450 hunt clubs claiming more than 30,000 members.
A big part of the friction involves loss of rural habitat due to development. In Virginia, land is being developed at more than three times the rate of population growth, according to “Hunting with Hounds in Virginia: A Way Forward,” a state-commissioned report.
The upshot: More dogs are running on private lands, riling property owners.
Some forms of hound hunting have been banned from Washington state to Massachusetts, and Southern states have followed suit — in part because of opposition from animal-rights groups, but also from landowners. Texas banned hunting deer with dogs in 1990, and Alabama, Georgia and Florida more recently have restricted the sport.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Let the hunters hunt on their own property and stay off private property. No problem.
Nothing personal, but someone’s right to hunt ends where my property line begins.
If I wish to allow someone to hunt on my property, they will. If I don’t wish them to hunt on my property, they won’t.
Site history, tradition, or anything else you want. Property rights trumps it.
The hunters should do as I did and teach their dogs to read. My dog sees a "posted" sign and he won't cross it.
Get smarter dogs. The ones that avoid posted land.
Heard of the same problem in upstate NY where I have friends who bow hunt for deer. Local "fox hunt" club used to have someone pull a cloth drag through the woods with fox scent on it, so the hounds would have something to follow. Then the rest of the "hunters" on horse back would chase around the hounds like a bunch of morons. Of course the stupid hounds would follow the scent of the "fox" until they saw a live deer and then would start chasing the deer, crossing on to private property where they had no permission to go.
Several deer hunters in the area objected, as the fox hunters had no hunting licenses but were in effect harassing deer in deer hunting season. The fox hunt club was asked by local landowners to curtail their make-believe hunting for the duration of the four-week bow hunting season, but they refused.
Pretty soon, dogs started to go missing, with their empty collars mysteriously appearing on fence posts alongside the road a day or two later. Quite suddenly, the fox hunt club decided it was best to stop their make-believe hunting during the bow season.
To be fair, if this particular hunting right has existed since before you bought your property--and probably since the land grant was first made conferring private property rights--it's almost as though you've never really had absolute property rights to keep hunters off your land. It's like you bought it knowing there was an easement allowing others some use, so you can't really cite property rights as a reason to prevent that use.
Nonetheless, it does seem like a pretty silly law.
The whipper of hounds keeps the hounds in check and good hounds ignore deer that they scare up and track the fox scent instead.
I recall one hunt in S. MD and the hounds had scared up a beautiful buck and he jumps the fence and the hounds jumped along side of the buck. The deer went one way and the hounds went the other, after the fox.
This is just to recover the rare hound that goes astray to retrieve. Most country people call up the club and restrain the hound for the club for retrieval.
Ever see “Cool Hand Luke”? He crossed and recrossed a barbed wire fence. The hounds crossed and recrossed the same fence, tearing themselves up pretty good.
It isn't a matter of “training” or “control”; it is a matter of a dog doing what it was bred to do.
Purchase a clue.
Ever see “Cool Hand Luke”? He crossed and recrossed a barbed wire fence. The hounds crossed and recrossed the same fence, tearing themselves up pretty good.
It isn't a matter of “training” or “control”; it is a matter of a dog doing what it was bred to do.
Purchase a clue.
Hmmm, a coon hound following a trail is not controllable? An out-of-control animal can be dangerous and is a menace to wildlife, especially when roaming private property without permission.
Like I said in my original post, I've heard talk that a person can rapidly reestablish control over an uncontrollable coon hound, simply by shooting it with an arrow. Such hounds suddenly become really good at performing tricks like "lay down" and "play dead". Personally, I don't advocate violence against domesticated animals.
Because dogs lack any advanced mental faculties, they need to be trained and controlled by a human, who is supposed to possess enough intellectual acuity to understand abstract concepts such as "private property" and "no trespassing". Maybe the coon hunters can pay thousands of dollars to lease hunting rights on large plots of land. That's one way to solve the problem.
But it seems that the inconsiderate "hunters" in the article are basically enjoying all of the free-roaming privileges of land ownership, while not having to purchase the property or pay property taxes on it. Sounds like a pretty sweet deal, if you're a selfish slob.
For purists who like to let animals run in an uncontrollable frenzy and chase whatever strikes their fancy, I'd suggest the purchase a large plot of land surrounded by a 6-foot fence. That way, the impact of their disregard for the property rights of others will be minimized. Failing that, they have to expect to lose a dog now and then. I guess the loss of a dog is still cheaper than buying/leasing a property to hunt on.
And thanks for cluing me in on the "Cool Hand Luke" storyline. That certainly is a factual film and it's worthy of reference. Is that movie the hillbilly version of Encyclopedia Britannica?
I watched “Cool Hand Luke” last weekend as a tribute to the passing of Paul Newman.
And yes. I am a California hillbilly. Log cabin. Shooting deer. The whole nine yards.
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