Hare Coursing Cruelty Season Begins…

We, in common with all animal welfare/rights/rescue organisations and conservationist groups in Ireland are appalled that another hare coursing season has just been allowed to commence, with public hare-baiting sessions already having being staged at Liscannor in County Clare and Kilflynn in County Kerry.

Thanks to a license granted to coursing clubs by Arts and Culture Minister Heather Humphreys a few weeks ago, hares have been rounded up all over Ireland, violently snatched from their natural habitats in the countryside by gangs of men using nets that are spread across gaps in fields where the animals are known to dwell. Hares have also been trapped on offshore islands…and virtually anywhere else the coursing clubs can get their ghoulish claws on them.

Under the license coursing clubs can continue with their sickening abuse of a part of our precious wildlife heritage until the end of February. The captive hares will be terrorized, mauled, struck at high speed, pinned to the ground, and literally tossed into the air by the hyped-up, savage dogs…all for a gamble and laugh.

We consider it a perverse anomaly that it is the Department of Arts and Culture that issues the license permitting this national obscenity. It is a form of deliberate animal cruelty that has nothing to with either art or culture. It is an insult to both. In many jurisdictions, including Britain and Northern Ireland and most of continental Europe live hare-coursing is a criminal offence.

Beyond Ireland’s shores, drag coursing is pursued, in which a mechanical lure replaces the live hare in coursing. Earlier this year, the European Coursing Championships were held…thousands of fans attended and no animals were harmed. Likewise in Australia where live coursing was banned and immediately replaced by the drag version.

We also consider it ironic that Minister Humphreys issued the hare coursing license just 48 hours after a public declaration by her that the persecution of wildlife is "intolerable. Reacting to the illegal shooting of a protected peregrine falcon, she was quoted in the media on August 13th as saying: "It is intolerable for birds of prey and other wildlife to be persecuted, poisoned or shot."

The following footage (link provided) proves that hare coursing is not a humane, “regulated sport” as claimed by the Irish Coursing Club and government politicians. We again urge the Irish Government to back a total ban on this blood sport in Ireland.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLRkXOvbUPNNjMc6LShwi...MRElM

Hares can be coursed in the worst weather conditions...

Another hare come to grief at an Irish coursing event...

Independent Dail Deputy (member of Irish parliament) Clare Daly joins the protest...

Captured prior to coursing...