Letter: Staghunters at bay

Staghunters at bay

Sir: The chairmen of the staghound hunts (letter, 1 October) argue that the recent work done by Roger Harris demonstrates that the Bateson study is no longer a sound basis for banning deer hunting on National Trust land.

As I understand it, the Harris study purports to show not that hunting produces no stress on the animals, but that the degree of stress was not as great as had been claimed by the Bateson study. It was said that the stress produced could be found in other activities such as football and horse-racing.

The stress imposed on footballers is consented to. The stress imposed on racehorses might just squeeze under the moral wire because racing is not intended to result in the death of an animal, and running with other horses could be described as natural for the horse.

It is true that some animals in the wild are hunted and killed by packs of dogs, but this is a natural event motivated by the need to eat. The hunting which is at issue here is organised and indulged in not for reasons of hunger, but purely for the thrill of the chase

The hunt chairs urge us to believe that their hunting is motivated by a concern for the "welfare of the West Country's unique deer herds". If that welfare depends on a periodic culling of the herd, shooting by expert marksmen, bringing death swiftly and painlessly to those animals selected, is the only morally defensible alternative.

STANLEY TYRER

Bury, Lancashire