This game is unfair (From Oxford Mail)

This game is unfair

10:00am Tuesday 7th June 2011 in Letters

Mick Heavey (Oxford Mail letters, May 26) quotes the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust, and asks if I could comment on the organisation.

Before 2007, this group was called the Game Conservancy Trust. Its original name makes its purpose crystal clear – the conservation of game, for, of course, shooting. Add in the word “wildlife” and it instantly sounds much more acceptable.

People will recall that the British Field Sports Society changed its name to the Countryside Alliance in the 1990s, changing its image in one stroke from that of a straightforward bloodsports lobby to a rustic, reassuring sounding organisation, which retained the same objectives.

I would advise Mr Heavey to consult the website of Animal Aid, where he will see a deeply upsetting film of the rearing of game birds in horrible, cramped conditions, their beaks pierced with metal bits to stop them pecking each other from sheer stress, followed by images of them being shot, maimed and then clubbed to death by shooting parties.

This website also has the facts about cruel Larsen traps, which I referred to in my earlier letter.

Animal Aid say Larsen traps are designed to eliminate a natural indigenous wild species in favour of large unnatural releases of artificially bred game birds, which are destined to be bred for sport.

Gamekeepers also kill foxes with appallingly cruel snares, and stoats and weasels with body crushing traps. They have, in the past, been responsible for the near extinction of, among others, pine martens, polecats and many species of raptors.

Illegally poisoned birds of prey are still regularly found in close proximity to shooting estates, as the RSPB will confirm. And all so that worthless idiots can pay large sums to satisfy their unnatural pleasure in killing.

Penny Little, Back Way, Great Haseley