On Puppy Walking
Foxhound whelps—tiny creatures that in a few short years will be the very ones we rely on for our sport—are making their entrance into our world as we slide into the tailing end of the season. Hunt members and hunt supporters—”puppy walkers”—will be taking the lucky ones from the kennels to their own homes and farms to start the puppies’ education in a free and pleasant environment.
Puppy walker Heather Kuenzi wants to do her best for her huntsman and her puppies. She writes:
“I was recently asked by our huntsman to bring two puppies (Penn-Marydel bloodlines) to our farm for the winter and walk them out! Any words of wisdom, or training tips for when I’m out walking the fields with them? I’m curious to know if hounds are simply born “biddable” or if there are things I can do to work on developing those traits. I’d like to continue to walk puppies for our hunt with future pups and am working hard on returning them as honest members of the pack! I also have a half-foxhound house dog who is also enjoying “helping” me with raising them!
What? No Music?
I wasn’t fortunate enough as a child to have horses or to be from a horsey family. However, we lived in rural Cleveland County, North Carolina, where a great many people had horses. Being the son of the local Baptist minister, I knew everyone in the community, and, between the ages of eight and thirteen, I was allowed to ride the horses of various church members. At the age of ten or so, I distinctly recall telling Carl DeBrew that I wanted to foxhunt when I grew up. I lived next door to Carl’s wonderful grandparents, who had a true family farm. They enriched my childhood more than any other people, including my own grandparents. Mr. Lee and Miss Carey DeBrew treated me like one of their own grandchildren, and I was allowed to ride their mule anytime I wanted (when it was not working!). Carl had two horses and was great about letting me ride them.
Songs of Foxhunting—Country Style
Foxhunting songs with a purely American accent! Would you like to hear a sample? Download lyrics and the MP3 audio file and listen to Coyote Line by Edwin Hall—authentic Americana. If you have the lyrics in your hand and the music playing, you won’t be able to resist joining in on the chorus! Coyote Line is just one of ten songs in Ed Hall’s CD, Meeting in the Morning, available now in our Bookstore.
Also available as promised is a new CD production of Alexander Mackay-Smith’s The Songs of Foxhunting—a collection of twenty traditional songs, including John Peel; Here’s a Health to Every Sportsman; Drink Puppy, Drink; The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night; and many more favorites. There’s too much joy in singing to let those old songs fade away. Not only have they been sung for hundreds of years, but most of them are based on lyrics from the hunting field put to even older English and Irish music. In short, they’re ancient. But let’s go back to Ed Hall and his country music.
Questions from an Honorary Whipper-In
It’s no secret that standards of correct attire and appointments have been allowed to slip in many hunting fields in recent years. To some, it’s of no consequence. To others, standards are something they value. Why? Perhaps they simply wish to demonstrate their respect for history and tradition, or for being guests on the landowners’ property. Perhaps they want to maintain respect for the memory of those sportsmen/mentors of yesterday who taught them about foxhunting and have left us this special way of life. For whatever reason, it’s fun to listen to those who care about correct attire and appointments, wish to maintain the standards, have questions, and want to understand the finer points.
Aeron Mack is one who cares. She is starting to help her local hunt as an honorary whipper-in, and she has several questions that we have put to our Panel of Experts both here and abroad. Mack asks:
More Subscriber Benefits in 2011
Foxhunting Life loves its subscribers! To show our appreciation and to give you more value for your annual subscription, all FHL subscribers now receive an automatic ten percent discount off the list price on all items in the Bookstore: books, calendars, videos, and CDs. This new policy goes into effect immediately. (And don’t forget, subscribers can post […]
Some Good News from England and Northern Ireland
Ginni Beard photo
As 2010 closes, two pieces of good news should bring cheer to all supporters of hunting. A Hunting Bill in Northern Ireland has been rejected, and a case against the Sinnington Foxhounds in Yorkshire has failed.
Northern Ireland
Yesterday evening the Northern Ireland Assembly rejected a Hunting Bill that was introduced into the Assembly by Green Party Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) Brian Wilson. This Private Member’s Bill was virtually identical to the Hunting Act of 2004 in England and Wales, so its rejection by the Assembly sends a strong and clear message to Westminster: the Hunting Act is a bad law, and we in Northern Ireland do not wish to repeat the mistake.
The Fox’s Morning & Other Stories
W.H. DeCourcy Wright suffered a fatal fall from his horse while foxhunting on February 3, 1951. The horse stepped in a groundhog hole, throwing his rider heavily and breaking his neck. For years after that, Wassie Ball, another larger-than-life personage from the distant mists of Elkridge Harford Hunt Club history, albeit from a slightly more recent era than Mr. Wright, would thrill local youngsters by showing them that exact groundhog hole and then poking around in the loose dirt and stones surrounding the hole to find tiny shards of glass, ostensibly from the deceased foxhunter’s spectacles.
For my part, other than having a vague knowledge that DeCourcy Wright was one of the defining personages from the glory days of our hunt club before and after The War, and having an exact knowledge of which groundhog hole brought about his demise, I knew little about him.
Little, that is, until his grand-daughter Ann McIntosh left in my mailbox the collection of his writings that comprise this book. It turns out that this is one of the freshest, brightest, most brilliant and original collection of “sporting” pieces I have ever read. By the way, “sporting” is intended to be descriptive, not limiting. This is wonderful writing, period.
Where Do the Articles Go?
Readers will notice, we hope, that FHL’s Home Page is continually being updated with new articles. As new articles are posted, the older material is pushed lower on the Home Page until it disappears. Or does it? No, it doesn’t! Not completely, anyway. Note that each article on the Home Page has a category heading […]
A Boxing Day Meet in South Carolina
We had the South Carolina version of a blizzard on Boxing Day, but we and some of our hardiest of members decided to brave the elements and go hunting anyway. It had rained all night then turned to sleet and snow, which carried on all day and into the evening. Cancelling was an option but not one we wanted to use. We have always hunted on Boxing Day since the hunt was started, so we hated the thought of missing it this year, especially since the scenting would hopefully be better and we were meeting at our favorite fixture.
To Evoke an Emotion
I was born in France, raised in Holland, and came to the United States in 1988. While visiting friends over Christmas, I met my future husband and decided to study Fine Arts. I graduated summa cum laude from Northern Virginia Community College, and summa cum laude from the University Of Maryland in Studio Fine Arts. In 1993 I moved from Washington, DC to our farm in Loudoun County, Virginia, and established my studio.
I had been painting large abstract paintings in art school, so I began painting impressionistic landscapes. One day a neighbor asked if I could copy a George Stubbs painting of Mares and Foals from a table coaster. Since horses are my second love, I gladly accepted my first commission. A second Stubbs commission followed, and I started to develop an interest in sporting art.