Cubhunting in Maryland: Foxes and Cornfields
Five-Year-Old Anabelle Small holds huntsman Dulany Noble’s horse, Smitten, after the meet. / Elizabeth Martin photoWednesday, October 17 was a perfect day for cub hunting in Central Maryland. The morning was clear, crisp, and chilly, the dew covered the ground, and the fall foliage is coming into full color. This Carrollton Hounds fixture—Ships Quarter Farm—is one of my favorites, not only for the quality of hunting but also for selfish reasons as it is where I board Joe, Jr. It means a more leisurely morning as there is no hitching up the trailer and driving to the meet.
This day would see small fields and me leading the Second Field as our regular Field Master was indisposed with work. After hounds were off loaded, announcements made, and guests welcomed, MFH and huntsman Dulany Noble rode off for the first draw, the bottom of Cranberry Creek below Ships Quarters. This covert is always productive as Sir Charles makes it a home. This summer we had two cubs that would come out to play in the driveway and pastures.
Another Use for the Hunt Whip
While hunting with the Old Dominion Hounds on school break, Denya Dee Leake’s horse came into a fence offstride and took care of the situation by catapulting itself over, launching Denya Dee skyward. “I went so high I could look down towards the ground and think, ‘Oh god, this is going to hurt!’” said Denya […]
Piedmont Horse and Rider Win Field Hunter Championship of America
Judge Barbara Batterton presents the championship trophy to Elizabeth Green, riding Gold for Glory. / Liz Callar photo
Elizabeth Green, representing the Piedmont Fox Hounds (VA), rode Shelby Bonnie’s Gold for Glory to victory in the Theodora Randolph Field Hunter Championships of America. The trials, founded in 1989, are named for the late Master of the Piedmont, so it is particularly fitting when a Piedmont horse and rider win the championship.
The week-long event attracts foxhunters from across North America. Entries ride with up to four different area hunts over a five-day period, and horse and rider pairs are selected to compete in the final tests and mock hunt by a team of mounted judges. The finals were held on October 7, 2012 at the Glenwood Park Race Course in Middleburg as part of the Virginia Fall Races weekend program.
Fox Pen Debate Continues in Virginia
The Virginia General Assembly brought opponents and proponents of fox penning together last February in an attempt to review the practice and work out a mutually acceptable set of rules. David Whitehurst of the Department of Game and Fisheries says that no compromise acceptable to each constituency was reached. The issue is expected to be […]
Never Too Late for New Adventures
At age fifty-five, Rick Burtner discovers new adventures. / cell phone photo by Betsy Burke ParkerIn September, I rode with the Old Dominion Hounds (VA) on my first fox hunt. It was an early start from Julia Theriot’s Poe’s Run and a crisp fall morning at the outset with a few shivers to be had by all, but it soon warmed into a beautiful sun shining day with many riders sporting beads of sweat as we neared the end of the hunt. The transformation of the cold morning into a warm, sunny day was reminiscent of my experience preparing for foxhunting.
Hunt Club, MFH Sued: Hound Attack Alleged
A lawsuit has been filed in Buck’s County against the Huntingdon Valley Hunt and Richard Harris, MFH by a Warwick, Pennsylvania couple. John and Judy Cox claim they were attacked on January 1 while walking their blind dog in Dark Hollow Park. Hounds were hunting in the park at the time and came in contact […]
Gentlemen, Start Your Engines
The era of male economic supremacy is over, says Hanna Rosin, an editor at The Atlantic, in her new book, The End of Men: And the Rise of Women. Although executives running Fortune 500 Companies are still overwhelmingly male, women in their twenties now outearn men in their twenties. Are men becoming irrelevant? Consider this incident I witnessed in our hunting field just last Saturday.
One of our hunt members (call her Christy) loaded her horse onto the trailer at the conclusion of our Saturday meet and proceeded to drive out of the field. Unfortunately, she chose a low, wet spot to traverse, and just before reaching the firm driveway her progress ended. The right rear wheel of her truck buried itself to the axle in mud. The right front wasn’t a whole lot better.
Deep Run Hunt Marks 125th Anniversary
Members of the Deep Run Hunt (est. 1887) near Richmond, Virginia, marked their 125th anniversary on Sunday, September 30, 2012 with a day of celebration, awards, and the introduction of a new book by Aynsley Miller Fisher recounting the hunt’s history. For the Love of the Sport—The Horses, Hounds, Foxes and Friends of the Deep […]
Paint Not the Porch
Karen L. Myers photo
Paint not the porch while “walking” hound puppies.
Worry not how bad the porch looks.
Look to the future, a future without hound puppies, before painting the porch.
Paint not even the porch ceiling when hound puppies are on the premises.
Even if your husband has three new partners and he wants to welcome them
And, besides, his old friend Harry Poling is retiring;
Even if he has scheduled the caterers,
And his office has sent out two hundred and fifty invitations
To a garden party at your house,
Panic not!
Paint not the porch.
The Savvy Whipper-In
A good whipper-in can be the decisive ingredient in turning a mediocre hunting day into a brilliant one. If you need a better authority before agreeing with my premise, how about Peter Beckford? Here’s what he had to say in 1781.
“In a country full of riot, where the covers are large, and where there is a chase full of deer and full of game….I should prefer an excellent whipper-in to an excellent huntsman…. The whipper-in, if he have genius, may show it in various ways: he may clap forward to any great earth that may, by chance, be open; he may sink the wind to halloo, or mob a fox, when the scent fails; he may stop the tail hounds, and get them forward; and has it frequently in his power to assist the hounds, without doing them any hurt, provided he should have sense to distinguish where he may be chiefly wanted.”
I recently witnessed a great example of Beckford’s “without doing them any hurt” admonition. It was just a simple thing, yet after forty-five years of hunting it still made me shake my head in admiration.