Towards the end of last year a video surfaced on social media which showed an incident in which a stag was wounded and then left to struggle in a loch for a while until it finally sank. The soundtrack of the video included laughter as the stag struggled and congratulations for shooting it. It can be viewed on The Ferret YouTube channel here.
Complaints were made to the police and to the British Deer Society (BDS) which oversees humane deer control. The BDS issued a statement part of which we reproduce below:
“We were disappointed that someone who is as well-regarded in the deer world as Niall Rowantree did not stop the incident from being filmed. We all have a duty to ensure we do not bring our community into disrepute and the footage, with its accompanying commentary, was distressing and distasteful and clearly upset many people who viewed it.”
The statement was apparently made in response to a query from the Field Sports Channel whose website contains the following comment:
“The film shocked some deerstalkers but, maybe more shocking, is that some of them complained to the police about the video, which shows a stag shot in water on the West Coast of Scotland. For the stalker Fraser Macdonald and guide Niall Rowantree, it has been four difficult months, not knowing whether a campaign started by fellow deerstalkers and whipped up by antis would result in police action.”
It is interesting that the concern of the BDS seems to be not that someone allowed the incident to happen but that they allowed it to be filmed. The Field Sports channel seems to acknowledge that some deer stalkers were shocked but seems to be more concerned that they complained to the police about it.
So where is the respect for the quarry that we hear so much about? There doesn’t seem to be any just a view that you can be as brutal as you like but don’t film it and don’t break ranks and complain to the police when you have concerns about the behaviour of others in the industry.
Wild Mammal Persecution UK 
These perverse killers are so wrapped up in their sick activity that it didn’t even cross their mind that it is the activity that is unacceptable, cruel and callous not the film of said activity.
I was furious at the time and I’m even more angry now that they are complaining about being filmed.
Is there no end to the persecution of our wildlife? It isn’t clever, it isn’t sport and the people (mostly men) who participate in killing will be insensitive and possibly violent in other aspects of their lives
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It annoys me the way the word anti gets used. Anti what? Maybe anti cruelty and empathy.
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I agree. The hunters and killers are under the impression that persecuting, mutilating and killing wildlife is the right of ‘man’ and anyone opposed to that is abnormal and therefore an ‘anti’. The reality is that the majority abhor the suffering meted out by the, in my opinion, psychopaths. However, generally the killers are the landed and powerful or the depraved thugs and the police and judiciary are often complicit. We all need to do what we can to bring an end to the cruelty and killing delivered to our depleted wildlife.
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This bull***t about “respect” was one of the things that drove me out of gamekeeping. I spent some time in the job when I came out of the army and at first I enjoyed it. But after a while you get sick of the mindless killing that you do all time to make sure that there is plenty of “quarry” for overweight city folk to come and kill on their days off. I also got tired of the military style bull***t that many of the keepers came out with. Pretending that their role equated to some sort of heroic army campaign with themselves in the staring role. Brainlessly killing huge numbers of stoats, weasels, foxes, rabbits, hares foxes, badgers, pine marten etc etc is not actually the same as taking on the Iraqis or the Taliban. There is no “respect” for the quarry whatsoever. You have only to have spent time watching some brainless Rupert make a complete hash of killing something and then laughing about it with his cronies for hours afterwards to know that.
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How do you like being a traitor Gavin. Ratting out on your mates. Bet you were a gutless squadie too.
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We are afraid that your other nine comments found their way to the spam folder Billy. That tends to happen when you post using obscene language or send multiple posts one after the other. However we have allowed this post through as we don’t like censorship and it seems to convey in a few lines the thrust of your very cogent argument.
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I completely agree Gavin. I used to be a keeper myself many years ago and left the profession for exactly the same reasons.
I wouldn’t take to heart the (bully boy) comment bellow. Real guts is standing for decency, empathy and compassion in the face of abuse from people who IMO have a narrow moral compass.
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