Hunting lobbyists always like to use the lack of natural enemies as an argument when it comes to hunting encroachment on wildlife populations. At least in the case of foxes and other predators in our latitudes, this is a false conclusion.

Fox hunting has been banned in Luxembourg since 2015.
The horror scenarios projected by the local hunting association FSHCL, but also by the German colleagues at the time, did not come to pass: Environment Minister Carole Dieschbourg confirmed only last year in response to a parliamentary request from the opposition that after years there were no indications of an increase of the fox population in Luxembourg.

Controls and counts with wildlife cameras would rather indicate a stable, constant stock.

Even the infestation of foxes with the fox tapeworm has decreased since the hunting ban.
While the fox tapeworm was still diagnosed in 40 percent of foxes in 2014, it was recently less than 20 percent.

Nor can one blame the foxes for the decline in ground breeding or even biodiversity.
In Luxembourg, for example, the partridge was almost extinct at the beginning of the 1980s, despite the fact that fox hunting was still intensive at the time.

According to the Minister for the Environment, the loss of biodiversity, particularly among ground breeders, is due to the destruction of the habitat and the associated loss of insects as a source of food.

Luxembourg could be a model for Europe when it comes to fox hunting.

However, there is probably a lack of political will in this country to make hunting at least animal welfare-friendly.
For most animal species there is not even a reasonable reason for hunting within the meaning of the Animal Welfare Act.

Together with many other animal protection societies and the Fox Action Alliance, Wild Animal Protection Germany demands the abolition of fox hunting and the review of all animal species subject to hunting law with regard to a reasonable reason.

https://www.wildtierschutz-deutschland.de/single-post/fuchs-luxemburg

And I mean…While the German lust killers, also known as “hunters”, pursue the foxes with all sorts of violent means at this time of the year, the neighboring European countries present themselves in some cases much more rationally when it comes to hunting.
And they are proud that the abolition of fox hunting, which has been going on for over six years, is so effective.

German hunters kill and dispose of over 400,000 foxes every year
In most federal states, the red fox is hunted without a regular closed season.
During the mating season, during the gestation period, while rearing the young, while wandering in search of a territory.

They are hunted with traps, dogs are sent into their burrow, the retreat for the birth of the puppies, they are kept in barren kennels to train so-called burrow or ground dogs on them, they are victims of battue hunts and fox weeks.

Every year well over 400,000 red foxes die in Germany from hunting!
Foxes cannot be used as food, and fox fur has long ceased to be popular.
About 97 out of 100 foxes killed are thrown into bushes or, at best, buried.

The hunters in Germany basically justify the fox hunt with three “reasonable” arguments:

– The fox also transmits diseases that are dangerous to humans, such as rabies and fox tapeworm,
– It is by no means endangered because of its high population and thirdly
– The fox has to be hunted because there is a risk of wiping out ground-breeding birds that have become rare.

There is also not just one single scientifically reliable research paper that could be used to justify the three steep theses mentioned.
This is especially true for the blind claim that more intensive fox hunting would have a stabilizing effect on the populations of endangered species.
That is just as much nonsense as the statement that hunting can significantly reduce the fox population.

The opposite is true, as scientists and wildlife biologists can attest. The more vehemently these animals are pursued, the higher their reproduction rate.
In this way, losses can be compensated for quickly.
Nature arranged it that way.

So…the only honest reason for fox hunting and any other hunt is, that the perpetrators enjoy it.
And a murderer won’t let that can be spoiled.

My best regards to all, Venus