I know I m going to get my head bitten off but here goes anyway

I can't count how many pheasants, partridges, pigeons, hares (when they were plentiful) and rabbits we've eaten over the last forty years.

Also, pike, trout, venison, wild duck and even a roadkill muntjac!

Country living.

I'm sure if I had money at my fingertips, I could find a different way to have fun than shooting animals.
I don't have to be a vegetarian to say that.

Estate management does have something to do with it, MissA

Keeping down the fox population has something to do with hunting, apparently.
I dislike that, too.

We kept chickens until I was 16. No purpose other than for eggs and the occasional Sunday lunch. I watched my Dad wring a chickens neck and then helped my Mum pluck it. It was a normal part of living on a farm. It didn’t horrify me, I wasn’t traumatised. My Dad knew my Mum couldn’t kill a chicken and neither could I. We did understand the chickens weren’t pets, they were there for food. I’ve never shot (other than at rats raiding the chicken run with an air pistol) my Dad did, usually rabbits and pigeons, all for food. It may be unacceptable to some but I view the rearing of grouse in the same way as I did the chickens. A friend runs a shoot, he cares about the birds, monitors their well-being in the same way my Dad did our chickens.

Foxhunting is illegal. It was banned in 2004.

Sometimes it is necessary for birds or animals to be killed for good reason, but to kill them for fun and call that a sport is obscene.

Shooting is big business. It costs a fortune to buy a place at some of the best estates. Little George is going to be part of that just as his dad and GD are and his GGD come to that, not sure about his mum but I suspect GD's wife and GGM are as well. What on earth did you expect? That he might have some respect for animals? It's plants his GD talks to, animals are for shooting.

Merlot - shooting to eat as in country living is a totally different story. We are not all townies, you know.

As for foxhunting being illegal- it may well be, but I am sure you know that it goes on all the time- including the most disgusting aspect of all, the lovely sounding 'cubbing' at the moment.

If a Conucil Social Services Department were tipped off that an unemployed couple living on a run down estate were deliberately killing birds and animals in front of their young children, I suspect that a case conference would be called to consider where the children ought to be removed to Council care for their own protection.

I think that William and Kate are being let down by their advisors. This is the 21st century.

A sport, to my thinking, is between evenly matched competitors.
Give one of them a gun and it ceases to be a sport.

Isn’t this what the aristocracy have always done? I don’t think it’s surprising. They’ve got to pass their time somehow......

I think Diana had the right idea with a visit to Thorpe Park.
Much more appropriate.

Oopsminty Meghan has a lot to do with it because if she was pictured with Harry shooting animals or birds with Archie watching she would be hung drawn and quartered, but not a peep on here about this horrible behaviour by William and Kate who I believe talk passionately about conservation, double standards or what ?

There is a vast different between killing an animal for food to killing it for pleasure Cornergran
Children growing up on farms or countryside seeing animals killed is very different to a so called sport or in other words killing for fun

There are some things about animal husbandry and cruel killing methods that leaves a lot to be desired in this country but that’s a whole different thread

Disgusting I thought the young Royals had become more civilised ...... I was wrong

varian

If a Conucil Social Services Department were tipped off that an unemployed couple living on a run down estate were deliberately killing birds and animals in front of their young children, I suspect that a case conference would be called to consider where the children ought to be removed to Council care for their own protection.

I think that William and Kate are being let down by their advisors. This is the 21st century.

If the gun is kept illegally without the correct licence and compliance with safety regulations that's more than likely what would happen.

I find the killing of any living thing for sport abhorrent Bluebell. It's something the royals amongst others do and William and Harry will have been brought up with it.

Not something I would ever do or want my children to have witnessed even if I was married to the future king.

Isn’t this what the aristocracy have always done?

But not just the aristocracy
Other activities, such as hare coursing, were enjoyed by the plebs until they were banned. Rabbit are still shot, ferrets are still used to flush them out (rabbits are pests)

The Royals are not aristrocracy.

varian Good point!

I think Diana had the right idea with a visit to Thorpe Park.

An artificial theme park? Not real life, not real countryside.

One day we may all be foraging for food if the doom and gloom peddlers are right ?

I have my eye on some fat pigeons in the garden come Doomsday

Shooting birds for the table, fine. Shooting birds for shits and giggles, not fine.

Meghan has a lot to do with it because if she was pictured with Harry shooting animals or birds with Archie watching she would be hung drawn and quartered.

Kate hasn't been pictured with William shooting birds with George watching. There is no proof George was even there.

I think they will be for the table.
Tastier than tough old pigeons, even though they have fed well on my lettuces and cabbages.

Too many people read the Daily Express!

Don't believe everything in that rag.

I think several things are being mixed up in this debate.
Hunting as a pleasure (the fact that the birds are called game)

The dislike of the landed gentry whatever they do.(including the ownership of huge areas of land)
Children watching their parents kill an animal.
There are probably other things to throw into the mix.

I don't eat meat but if people knew how animals are kept prior to killing and if abattoirs had glass walls, many more people wouldn't want to make animals suffer.

Running wild on the hills until the day when it's: Bang, what's that! is less horrible and more natural in my opinion.

As for keeping vast tracts of land for rich people to use as a playground is not so defendable.

Children watching? well if you aren't ashamed of what you do, why hide it from your kids?