MADAM,
You can't get much more beautiful or serene than the Monnow Valley several miles upstream of Monmouth on an autumn day in November. Sadly, it's that time of year again when large gangs of men and sometimes women and children with all the up to date weaponry take on a chicken-like creature called the pheasant. Although being a bird, it's taboo for the pheasant to fly, a feat punishable by death. Therefore, it's with great reluctance, having been beaten and terrified, that it takes to the air only to be blasted from this earth in the name of sport. Come on lads - any kid with a lollipop stick can knock 'em down: there's more sport shooting ducks at the fair. You could also win a coconut and you won't have to dig a hole and bury it!
Very few of the birds killed are edible. On one big shoot in the Midlands they used a JCB to bury thousands unfit for humans because of the antibiotics fed to them, bred and slaughtered just for fun.
Being an ex poacher, you could call me a hypocrite although I've only taken salmon and have had the spoils of deer but it wasn't for the fun of the kill: nothing was wasted.
The lame excuse of the fox hunters is that we have to get rid of the fox so let's all enjoy it. Rubbish, of course, but the pheasant shooters have no excuse as they breed them.
What sort of person pays £20 to £30 to rear one beautiful bird so they can blast it from the sky and make it worthless, and sadly, what sort of country makes it legal?
I've had the misfortune of being shot with two barrels at 40 yards and I can assure you when those lead pellets leave the gun they are red hot. You can imagine the pain the bird goes through.
They could, of course, go clay shooting but then what would our Queen have to strangle?
Ashamed to be British,
R L Clarke
Tudor Road,
Wyesham