Report #88: Essex and Suffolk Hunt @ Dairy Farm, Semer, 29/11/25

Close call in Buckleshire

The Essex and Suffolk Hunt gathered at Dairy Farm, home of former hunt masterJames Buckle. The mini fiefdom of “Buckleshire” has been intensively hunted by this crime gang for years, and yet mysteriously, there always seems to be a ready supply of foxes for them to torment.

It wasn’t long before huntsman Jack Henty was putting hounds into Semer Wood with riders on point (riders positioned around the wood to drive back escaping foxes). No pretence of trail laying with Jack ‘burring’ (a tongue rolling sound designed to unseat foxes). With South Suffolk Hunt Sabs and Suffolk Action for Wildlife monitors close by, foot sabs from SoNo headed to the southern end of the wood. We had the usual busybodies telling us we were on private land. For the record, the laws on trespass aren’t so straightforward when challenging a blatantly criminal activity like fox hunting.

Within two minutes of entering the wood, we were confronted with the sickening sound of hounds in full cry with a terrified fox hurtling past with the pack closing in. We did our best with voice calls to get the hounds off the fox. Incredibly, the fox managed to dive into a badger sett leaving the hounds frustrated. Maybe on hearing our shouting, the huntsman decided to gather the hounds and move on. We were concerned to see paramedics present to help an injured rider. We hope they make a swift recovery.

It’s a large hunting area so we were relieved to have Norwich Hunt Saboteurs join us, while South Suffolk Sabs covered woodland to the north. The hunt spent some time scouring the water meadows around the sewage works (hunting isn’t all chocolate box beauty) before heading north east to Nedging Hall and woodland leading up to Nedging Tye. By this time, the rain had set in and we were pleased to hear Hertfordshire Hunt Sabs had also arrived. We can’t be sure there were no kills today. There was no pretence of trail laying and hounds were constantly being put into woodland with huntsman burring and encouraging them to pick up a scent.

Riders were on point and ghoulish support were ever present, including the unpleasant Sir Gerald Howarth (former Conservative MP) making his pro-hunt crime views known to us. Great to be out with our sab and monitor friends from South Suffolk Sabs, Norwich Sabs, Suffolk Action for Wildlife and Herts Sabs. Great team work.

We would also like to make a special thank you to Protect the Wild for the body cams they gave us. They perfectly caught the action in Semer Wood, undermining the Pinocchios who still claim these animal abusers are legally trail hunting.

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