Eggesford Hunt, Lower Gorhuish, 28.02.26

This was a rare Saturday meet for Eggesford Hunt. They stopped hunting Saturdays a few seasons ago in the hope it would stop them being sabbed. It hasn’t quite worked out that way. This was the third in a row of four of their meets which was sabbed!

The meet was at Lower Gorhuish, east of Northlew. The hunt had brought along a little catering trailer this time – fancy!

They set off south to Hookmoor Brook and then through South Moor Plantation, failing to pick up on anything other than the scent of a few deer in the valley. Huntsman Jason Marles brought hounds out to the road north of Cruft and put them back into the valley by Ashbury Plantations, drawing north past Horrathorn. A fox was spotted by sabs and hounds eventually got onto the line, taking it out of the valley towards Ten Acre Plantation. Jason hunted-on but a combination of our drone tracking the movement of the fox, one sab discreetly covering the fox’s line at various pinch points and other sabs stopping the hounds enabled the fox to get away safely.

Hounds were taken further north in direction of Ashbury. Aside from the fact they were trespassing on the neighbouring hunt’s ‘country’ at this point, hounds were also terrorising ewes with newborn lambs in the field, and we received messages from distressed locals reporting on this. Another fox was chased across the road, right past our team of sabs. This was in full view of all the hunt support. They knew we knew, and we knew they knew where the fox had gone. Predictably, Jason brought hounds to that exact spot and put them on the line of the fox. Hounds ran off in cry but the warming weather, the stench of the slurry that was being spread on the fields at the time, and determined intervention from sabs eventually caused the pack to lose the scent in the valley.

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Eggesford Hunt, Higher Biddacott, 26.02.26

Eggesford Hunt met at Higher Biddacott on the edge of Chittlehampton. They seemed a little surprised to find a small team of sabs already waiting for them in the fields north of the meet. The hunt set off north towards Stowford, first drawing a blank in a large gorse patch and then carrying on east towards Breakneck Cross, with huntsman Jason Marles on foot a lot of the time.

They continued north through Bottomley Wood towards Stowford Wood, hounds failing to pick up on any scent. After drawing another blank in a scrubby area around Breakneck Cross, Jason took hounds via Sandy Lane back towards the area north of the meet and into Woodland Wood and Higher Ford Wood.

It wasn’t until they got to the Frogmore Copse valley north of Stowford that hounds picked up on the line of a fox, following the scent in full cry all the way east to Island Copse. Hounds marked a badger sett, indicating that a fox had gone to ground. The presence of sabs averted a digout, protecting the hunted fox as well as the resident badgers at the sett.

With not much to see all day, hunt supporters David Evans and Helen Dunn turned to their usual belligerent antics, both of them seemingly desperate to get their fingers caught up in the propellers of our drone at takeoff and landing.

They boxed up before 4pm at Woodland Farm, where the hound van and several horse trailers were parked for the day.

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Stevenstone Hunt, Sheepwash, 21.02.2026

We headed over to Sheepwash to see the Stevenstone Hunt celebrate the birthday of a hunt member in a damp shed. Stephen James left the meet into an adjacent field and took the hounds straight to a nearby woodland at Upcott Barton and dismounted.

It wasn’t long before hounds had picked up on a line but were just as quickly rated off by nearby sabs, though terrierman Ben Vincent encouraged them back onto it and the hounds headed north into Upcott Wood.

Some time passed before we found huntsman and hounds heading towards Sheepwash. With James perched on the back of a quadbike and no field to be seen, the convoy headed into Sheepwash where we found the field at the pub with James’ horse in tow.

Seemingly frustrated by this, James’ continued without his horse, putting the hounds into some woodland near a sewage works, where they picked up on a line and shot off in full cry north, eventually ending up into Upcott Wood again.

Hounds tore through the large plantation, passed a nearby dog agility training session, and down to Higher Gortleigh where they lost the scent.

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Two Bridges Hunt Club, 18.02.26

On Wednesday, 21 years after the Hunting Act came into effect, the 4 hunts of Dartmoor (Dartmoor, South Devon, Mid Devon, and Spooners) once again met at the East Dart Inn, for the annual Two Bridges Hunt Club meet. Mother Nature had other ideas, battering the area with constant rain, strong winds, and thick fog.

The hunt headed up onto the moors into Spooners country, led by Spooners’ new work experience huntsman Sam Kelly and half a pack of hounds, where they proceeded to hunt the area with little success for the next couple of hours. Kelly called it quits at around 2:30pm due to continued poor weather.

Delighted to have been joined by Plymouth & West Devon Hunt Sabs, Wiltshire Hunt Saboteurs, Hunt audits southwest and Cirencester Illegal Hunt Watch.

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Silverton Hunt, Creedy Barton, 14.2.26

Silverton’s Valentine’s Day meet at Angie Prouse’s Creedy Barton wasn’t quite the day they were expecting. The lovely sunshine had brought out a decent-sized field and more quadbike followers than we’ve seen in a while, several of them equipped with terriers for digging-out. Not long after spotting sabs though, several of those disappeared.

Huntsman Chris Matterface evidently didn’t want to do too much in the presence of sabs and with the drone following his every move. He took hounds north from Shobrooke Mill towards Furze and then on towards Coombe Barton and Stockleigh Wood. Hounds picked up some scent and marked to ground at a badger sett we know well.

They then moved east towards the car park at Raddon Hill, via the track owned by South West Water – who apparently don’t give the hunt permission to use it for hunting. From Raddon Hill car park the support watched the hunt as they drew the various hedges and copses between Lynch Plantation and Kitlake.

At around 2pm the hunt began retracing their steps and headed back to the meet. A nice short day for us.

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Eggesford Hunt, Bondleigh, 09.02.26

Another wet day for Eggesford Hunt. They met at Farley’s Grave, east of Bondleigh. Terriermen Jake Crabb and Tom Bounsall were sent packing as soon as sabs arrived.

They started in the wooded valley north-west of Ankridge and then crossed the road east towards the woods at Little Cutland. A lorry driver got very frustrated with the hunt blocking the traffic at Thorn Corner – the hunt own the countryside, don’t you know!

Hounds were speaking on and off in the woods but as soon as sabs went in to rate them, Jason called them out and moved them on to the north-east into the boggy area between West and East Leigh. The horses grew quite fed up of being made to cross deep ditches between fields, and Lloyd Heard was promptly thrown off.

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Eggesford & Spooners Joint Meet, Smeardon Down, 24.01.26

On Saturday we joined forces with Plymouth & West Devon Hunt Sabs to sab the joint meet of Eggesford and Spooners & West Dartmoor Hunts. A natural pairing, as terriermen from both hunts have racked up criminal convictions based on evidence gathered by us. Sabs comfortably outnumbered riders, a sure sign of dwindling support for both of these hunts. Several of the field riders were young children on ponies.

Hounds were unboxed at Smeardon Down and taken to the meet at Lower Churchtown in Peter Tavy. Here we were greeted by an elderly male hunt follower with the words “piss off you old slag”, which is rich coming from a man whose idea of youth is remembering when that insult was still fashionable.

From the meet, the hunt headed north and via Cudliptown onto the moor. Our Land Rover followed and was blocked by masked terrierman Tom Bounsall, who nearly lost his quad in a ditch as he swerved wildly to overtake, a bold manoeuvre given he had a young child perched on the back of his one-seater quadbike. The vehicle, unsurprisingly, had no numberplate and is almost certainly uninsured to be driving on the road. Tom then crawled along at about 2mph in front of our Land Rover in a misguided attempt to delay us, achieving only the remarkable feat of annoying everyone else on the road. This included a woman in genuine distress who was prevented from reaching her sick horse. His performance achieved absolutely nothing of value, as two foot teams were already positioned on the moor well ahead of the hunt’s arrival.

Tom, who clearly peaked in pre-school, repeatedly seems determined to demonstrate that confidence and competence are not the same thing. This terrierman now divides his time between these two hunts. He’s currently under police investigation for a catalogue of incidents, including digging out foxes, blocking badger setts, assault and using his quad as a weapon against sabs and members of the public. How he fits all this in alongside caring for a toddler and (allegedly) holding down a job is anyone’s guess. Our best theory is that he doesn’t spend much time and effort on those other things, which is probably for the best considering his volatile temperament.

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Eggesford Hunt, Inwardleigh, 19.01.26

Another day spent chasing Eggesford Hunt from one piece of land they’re not allowed on to another, with multiple foxes helped to safety by sabs.

They set off from the meet at Inwardleigh to the south-west, initially following a scent that ended in a large pile of tyres at Glebe Farm, before looping via fields east of The Old Rectory back into the original valley south-west of Inwardleigh. Hounds ended up scattered all over the place between Inwardleigh and Curworthy Farm.

Despite knowing that hounds were not allowed on a lot of this land, Jason allowed them to carry on terrorising wildlife while him and his fanboy Lloyd sat idle in the field, refusing to intervene. Our drone filmed hounds running riot all over Curworthy farm and several went off on the line of various deer in the surrounding valleys. The old “I’m having trouble controlling the hounds” excuse was rolled out when Jason was confronted by a frustrated landowner. However, his choir-boy voicecalls did eventually bring the hounds back to him and the hunt headed off to the north, along the road through Inwardleigh and then into the fields around Norleigh Mill Farm and Waterhouse, where they spent a few minutes hunting before sabs caught up with them.

The second half of the day was in the long wooded valley between Lower Westacott and Forestry England-owned Ashbury Plantations. Hounds marked a fox to ground at a badger sett within minutes. Terrierboys Jake Crabb and Tom Bounsall, who are never more than a stone’s throw from one another, jumped off their quad, masked up and then stood on the sett watching the hounds as they marked several sett entrances. The presence of foot sabs on the ground and the drone overhead averted a digout and the two remained idle for the rest of the day.

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Stevenstone Hunt, Hoarestone Cross, 17.01.26

Increasingly unpopular huntsman Stephen James brought his hounds to a meet by a shed at Hoarestone Cross near Buckland Brewer. We followed them on foot and by drone as they started drawing the long valley through Cleave Wood, Thorne Wood and Holwell Wood, first going south and then eventually back north except for a quick detour to Vielstone Wood.

Blocked in by hunt support, one of our drivers was given a lecture about how we’d be better off going after “all those people who send their cats and dogs abroad to be skinned and killed”. Sadly no details were provided about this international pet-skinning ring and its logistics.

The hunt headed north and into the area around Hembury Castle, where hounds chased a fox back south across the road towards Knaworthy. Hounds continued in cry towards Smythacott (a local game dealer), causing utter chaos in the fields where several sheep appeared to be quite unwell. While everyone from the hunt stood watching, foot sabs ran in to try and help a sheep who was stuck on their back. Another sheep was chased around and baited by hounds. The landowner meanwhile was more interested in two sabs being on the land trying to stop the hounds. Apparently these weren’t her sheep anyway, just her tenant’s!

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Stevenstone Hunt & Torrington Farmers Hunt, 10.01.26

After a week of no hunting, Stevenstone were back out on Saturday, meeting at Five Lanes Cross near Abbots Bickington. So desperate are this hunt for followers that they even invited local violent thug Anthony Hemmings back out to join them.

They did a counter-clockwise loop around Abbots Bickington, starting in the valley south of Court Barton, then via Broomball Wood towards Gardenclose Wood and finishing in the large patch of public access scrubland at Barton Cottage.

A fox was seen early on, running from hounds. Sabs were well-positioned to cover the fox’s line before hounds arrived. Deer were seen bolting in all directions as well, and shortly before the hunt finished, hounds bolted and chased a roe deer for an extended period near the meet. The terrified deer managed to escape, but not before crashing repeatedly into a barbed wire fence in panic. The whole ordeal was captured on film by our drone, while foot sabs ran in to stop the hounds. Huntsman Stephen James meanwhile was stuck on foot in the boggy scrubland and didn’t intervene. As you’ll see from our footage (to follow), this is clearly the kind of place where foxes, deer and other wildlife would lie up and not somewhere anyone could ever lay a trail, so what were the hunt doing in there in the first place? Rhetorical question.

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