Photo: AFP
Photo: AFP
France remains the most dangerous place in western Europe to go for a country walk or cycle ride in autumn and winter and while there are many things that could be done to make people safer, it doesn't look like anything will happen soon, says veteran France correspondent John Lichfield.
Photo: AFP
Photo: AFP
Most of this article is absolute rubbish. I am English, have lived in France for 20 years, and passed my “Permis de Chasse” in 2001. And, believe me, it was not easy. I am proud to be a “chasseur”, have hunted with many all of whom have safety and politesse as an integral part of their behaviour. All of them are lovers of nature and I am, frankly, sick and tired of reading the rubbish which is being printed at the moment.
Nobody mentions the scores dying on Mont Blanc risking greatly the lives of those who try to save them and then risk again their lives collecting their bodies.
Leave us alone. We are part of France’s heritage.
Peter Smith
I was walking in the Ariège this weekend. On Saturday we came across some hunters, they were organized, had signs out and let the others in their group know by walkie talkie that we were coming their way, we did not feel scared at all. Sunday it was very foggy, we thought there might be hunters because of the SUV’s, no
warning signs were out, when we saw the hunters I tried to make contact and was
ignored, it was very foggy, we stuck together and made a lot of noise shouting and
singing, we were scared and relieved when we got to the other side of the hill, we
think there were only 2 hunters. A well organized considerate hunt is not the
problem, It is the individuals that go out with few lookouts and shoot at any
movement. Both days we were on a GR. Sunday a shot came very close to us. Not all hunts are the same.
People claiming to be lovers of nature and revel in destroying it need to educate themselves on the meaning of ‘love’. I have nothing but contempt for those who kill for pleasure, but were there licences to hunt ‘hunters’, I might well be at the head of the queue.
Mr. Smith and his ilk are not hunters. A true hunter uses his stalking skills, not a pack of dogs and human beaters to drive the game onto the guns. That is slaughter.
This article is spot on. It matches my experience as a country dweller in France for 20 years. The large game shooters with their rifles and the shotgun slingers fire dangerously close to people and houses with little apparent regard for walkers and cyclists. Macron’s charm offensive with les chasseurs is deplorable.
There is no discipline, and none of them shoot straight.They use rifles with sights but still just fire. They have no idea of the range.One od the past mayors said there is no respect and there is no one to enforce the law.My two thoroughbreds survived after the President of the Chasse helped put my land Chasse Reserve. I had found shooters in the oaddocks with the horses anothercso called rule broken. My dog is on a lead in the hunting season. Keep on alert!!