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Le Chasse


Cazs
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Does anyone know of any rules/law surrounding the rights of the chasse on your land?

I ask as only the other week, on a lovely Sunday afternoon, I caught a hunter cocking his rifle 2m away from my two horses and daughter who had wondered over to check on them. When I confronted him - he was apologetic, however the fumes of alcohol on his breath almost knocked me out ! I know this is a french past time, but we'd like to be informed when the chasse decides to hunt, then at least we can protect ourselves......

(We have a number of acres of woodland and a rural chemin running along the edge of it, so I doubt we'd ever be able to stop them completely.)

 

 

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This subject keeps cropping up in one form or another.  

Over the next couple of weeks I intend to write an article / fact sheet on all the various issues/ laws / regulations re "hunting in France".

To answer your question in brief, if you live in a part of France with an ACCA covered by the Law Verdaille you can not stop hunters coming on your land without you going through a legal procedure the end result being that your land becomes "Chasse Interdite". This procedure can only be finalised at 5 yearly periods from the date of creation of your ACCA.   An application has to be made at the latest 6 months before the next 5 yearly "birthday" of your ACCA. Therefore this procedure could take as long as 5 years 5 months and 30 or 31 days.

There are French Associations that will assist with this; Ligue ROC,   ASPAS    or the LPO

Chris

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Thanks for the information Chris.

One thought I did have, if we were to purchase some deer with the intention of breeding them and fence off the area either side of the rural chemin I wouldnt have thought they can stop you using your own land for grazing deer and if you've fenced them in, then surely by default they wouldnt be able to hunt where you have breading livestock? an idea possibly - your thoughts would be appreciated ?

Caroline

 

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An interesting thought Caroline although I am not sure how this would work. I imagine that your horses are fenced in but this did not prevent this person from entering?  Next, how much land do you have and what use is it registered for?

I can say with certainty that I have often seen hunters with their dogs in fields with sheep and witnessed on one occasion the dogs kill two sheep.

If you would be breeding the deer for commercial purposes you would have to register the fact and it is at this point that I am out if my depth! Hopefully someone else is going to have some answers to this.

The great difficulty is that to simply not want people in your "garden" with guns, even though there is masses of countryside, is often taken as an affront by the local hunting community which can make life difficult whether you are French or non French.

Chris

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We have over 43 acres - of which half is woodland - the rest is largely agricultural arable and livestock farming land. For the deer we would need to errect 6ft high fencing. When I asked the mayor what we could do with it, he said anything we wanted - it was our land.

After reading your first response I reviewed our original contract and deeds and there was no right of ways or right of use, which presumably would have mentioned any rights the hunt may or maynot have on our land? so Im not sure that there is an official right to hunt here.

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The right to hunt is already there in law it does not need to be on your documents, this is the so called Law Verdaille from 1966 after Senateur Verdaille who created this law. The situation and how it came about, as with so many things, is complicated and as with many things in France the story begins with the revolution. Once again I would repeat what I have said before elsewhere " don't take to much notice of your Mayor"  Mayors are only ordinary people elected at the local level and have limited knowledge.

Could you say what region you are in?

Chris

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Chris, this thread worries me since we are moving to (82) france in 6 months, We have a valley surrounded by woods with boar and deer definately in residence and the property a french holiday retreat for some years.  I would be suprised if it is not currently hunted.  In April we will bring one dog, and six horses and I would not want hunters on the land close to the animals (there is 5 ha grass and 5ha trees respectively).  Should we act now given your above timescales, to minimise the trouble when we get there?  Broadly I would be happy for the hunters to hunt the woods so long as we could agree when, and not on the grassy areas for the horses sake.

 

Andy advice welcome.

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Right now this seems to be coming from all directions, I have started to loose track of how many different forums this is running on. The problem I have is that I can only inform people of the situation and the potential difficulties that could arise. It would be wrong for me to suggest a course of action that may create a different set of difficulties with some of your locals. If you did choose to go down the route of taking your land "out of the chasse", using one of the associations, they do provide back up and legal assistance in the event of any future infractions. It is quite interesting that the French as far as can be ascertained are themselves 70% to 80% fed up with the irresponsible behaviour of some "hunters" and that coming to a reasonable arrangement with some will not prevent everyone who owns a gun where you live from abiding by it. Some people in the hunting fraternity are OK others not. Hope to get the factsheet finished this week!

Best wishes, Chris

 

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Panic should not set in where everyone has to make their property a non-chasse area.  It is a possibility when you have a lot of land.  We have always had horses and they have always been in "unprotected" fields, sometimes at quite a distance from our house.  We have never had a problem with chasseurs.  They are not all maniacs, even if we don't particularly appreciate them banging around, especially on Sundays.

They are often farmers who have cattle and other livestock themselves and respect the grazing animals of others.  The main danger is perhaps when the few irresponsible ones come too near houses where there are pets who could be mistaken for something else.  This is where the friction can start.

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A couple of years ago we were walking through a picturesque village in the Tarn-et-Garonne (can't remember the name of it) on a Sunday morning when we were startled to discover hunters actually shooting in the streets amongst the houses. There were no signs warning of this "event" and what were they hoping to kill? Pigeons? We could hardly believe it, certainly no 150 m rule here, but it was for real and we bid a hasty retreat.
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An interesting thread. I've got 6 hectares in a fairly active hunting part of the country and personally don't approve of the machismo 'shoot anything' type of hunting that goes on hereabouts. At first we had a few hunters walking across our land. After whizzing down on my rather raucous 2 stroke enduro bike and giving them the 'privé, privé, allez, allez' routine I've never had any trespassing since. And I don't know whether my land is Verdailles or whatever.

For those without a motorbike, quad or whatever and have problems, get your strimmers out at the weekend and get the bonfire going. The sort of anally-retentive 'laws' that seem to apply or not, for this that and the other, really should be ignored. No-one is ever going to stump up the cash to try and enforce the 'right' of the 'hunt' to continually trespass of private property.

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  • 3 weeks later...

And when the hunter is within 50 meters of your backyard, where young children and family pets are playing, shooting OUR direction, buckshot flying overhead, that'll get you moving !  I went flying out of the house to grab my kids and pets, screaming for him to move on there are children here (my neighbors were yelling at him too).  He didn't, wine jug and shotgun in hand - he continued shooting.  I called the Gendarmes, they laughed at me and asked me what I wanted THEM to do about it.

At some point, logic and responsibility has to come in here.  I suppose the Gendarmes might show up if he had actually shot my child - maybe...

Will never forget this moment and am obviously still quite angry about it. 

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Also be very careful on the roads during the chasse season, espcially when driving through forests with the deer signs (you've only got to see the tyre marks on the roads where people have had to suddenly brake).  There are a lot of accidents with deer and wild boar.

At the opening of the chasse two years ago we had an accident just after Tours on our way back up to Normandie when in the dark a stag leapt out, jumped the security barrier, just like a horse, and ended up on top of our car.  We and the five dogs with us were more or less unhurt, but the car and the poor stag were dead.

My husband also ended up one night upside down in the ditch when crossing through a forest as a wild boar suddenly came out and hit his car.  I now drive very slowly through any such areas. 

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In my locality (72), the local hunt organisation came and asked me permission to hunt on my land (4ha). I gave them permission to access part of it (that I do not use and it totally wild) but said no to the open fields which my dogs use – and they seemed very happy. They asked for (and got) one of these French type “self renewing contracts” on a 3 year basis.

In the last two seasons I have only had a couple of hunters walking on the part that they are not meant to. It is interesting that a couple of neighbouring fields have horses in. With regard to one the local organisation said they did not use it due to the horses but I see loads of people with guns (and using them) in that field. Also, other field with horses in is also used. If too many started using the “Interdit” areas then I would start making comments to the local hunt.

I notice that in a lot of the forests on Sunday morning there are “Chasse” warning signs out on the roads through the forests.

I believe there are actually quite a lot of accidents. Local radio was going on about more the other day.

I don’t agree with hunting but do not object strongly enough with the practice as in France to be a real nuisance to them. My couple of fields is not a big deal to the hunt so I felt it better to keep on the better side of locals that just say no. Also, the hunt have proved very helpful to me with reducing an “excess Rangondin” problem (all at no cost).

Ian
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"how I could I have coped with a very angry wild boar"

TU that reminds me of the story, not to do with the chasse, of a French woman in the Perche who was going along in her little 2CV and saw a baby wild boar who looked lost on the road.  She stopped and picked it up and put it in her car.  It must have squealed so much that the mother, who probably wasn't far away, suddendly arrived and started charging the 2CV to get her baby back.  The poor woman, frightened to death, had to take refuge inside her car until someone came along to save her.  Apparently there wasn't much left of her old dodoche !

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First the people who police hunters are Office de la Chasse et de la Faune Sauvage, I have spoken to our departmental office previously and they are categoric, if you have a problem - call them! Ours is en permanence 24/24  7/7  They also take a dim view of law breakers and they are mainly made up from hunters!

Link    http://www.oncfs.gouv.fr/

Deimos(controlling ragondin) The local hunters were also called in to kill florida turtles in Dordogne in september which were completely destroying the habitat etc for the indigenous species, - a very useful function (the turtles having been introduced some years back to ornament someones lake).

DebraA64 As far as I know Dordogne is under Law Verdaille.  Very simply I would keep my children & myself out of the woods during the hunting season, I think the ONCFS site gives the numbers of killed and injured for each year, people that is, not creatures.

Chris.

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Where we live it is the garde champetre who makes sure the hunters obey the rules and also looks after the animals.   He is a hunter but is keen on making sure that everything is done correctly.   For example, when our cat was lost and found caught in a trap, be brought her straight back to us with many apologies.
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Here's another group "Rassemblement Anti Chasse" (did you know them Chris?) which shows there are a lot of French against it and they have a petition for no chasse on Wednesdays and Sundays.  Have a look at their "les Lois" page, an example :

Chat tué ou blessé

Il est interdit aux chasseurs de tirer sur un chat : les chats sauvages sont protégés, la notion de chat « haret » n'existe pas dans la loi et il est interdit de tuer un chat domestique. Donc il est interdit de tirer sur tous les chats.
Seul le maire d'une commune peut autoriser la destruction de chats en cas de surpopulation flagrante de chats sans propriétaires.
Si votre chat a été blessé ou tué, et si vous désirez déposer plainte, faites faire un rapport à un vétérinaire sur la nature de la blessure et déposez plainte directement auprès du Procureur (il arrive souvent que les gendarmes refusent d'enregistrer une plainte quand des chasseurs sont mis en cause.

http://www.antichasse.com/index.htm

 

La France bat le triste record d'Europe:  1 400 000 chasseurs



     
 

     
Selon les enquêtes d'opinion, 40% des citoyens demandent l'arrêt de toute chasse

 

Il faudra un jour que les chasseurs comprennent que la faune sauvage n'est pas leur propriété. La faune sauvage, chassable ou non, est une richesse naturelle, un patrimoine commun national et international.
Une chose est certaine, lorsqu'on va aux champignons, on n'a pas peur des sangliers, mais bien des chasseurs.
Chaque année, la chasse provoque plusieurs centaines d'accidents corporels, dont une quarantaine de morts et plus de 200 blessés graves. Nous ne parlons pas des animaux domestiques pris pour cibles.

ERREURS DE TIRS !!!
25% des oiseaux recueillis et soignés par les associations de protection des oiseaux, souffrent de blessures attribuées directement à la chasse

L'élevage des animaux pour la chasse

14 millions de faisans, 5 millions de perdrix grises et rouges, 1 million de canards colverts sont élevés et lâchés pour servir de cibles à des hommes avides de jouer à tuer et qui osent prétendre qu'il gèrent la faune!
Les cochongliers, vous connaissez ?
Comme des élevages de perdreaux, il existe des élevages de « cochongliers », c'est à dire un croisement de porcs et de sangliers qui donne des animaux qui ont un aspect semblable à des sangliers. Ces hybrides sont lâchés dans la nature.
L'interêt: une laie fait en moyenne 3 à 5 petits; une cochonglière en fait de 8 à 10. De ce fait les "sangliers" prolifèrent et les chasseurs ont beau jeu de nous faire croire qu'ils nous protègent  et qu'ils gèrent!

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I have had many arguments with hunters.  We usually start the generator, the wood planer (this is the best!), and make as much noise as possible calling our dogs and cats if the hunters are close to us. My dog and 2 goats wear bells.

At the moment my llamas are in a field a bit further from our house, so I have warned the hunt, put up notices on the other side of the stream and am just sewing two velcroed flourescent neck bandsfor them as they could look like deer through the trees.

There should be no problem at all fencing your own property, we made a simple Declaration de Travaux to the mairie and we can completely fence off our land. We have a lane running through our land which is only used by the vignerons during the vendage, usually the hunters think they have right of way here, but we do not let any single hunters through.  Last week I confronted two young lads, dressed for combat in Bosnia, with two Rotweiller dogs about to cross our bridge.  I did not know them and certainly they are the only people I have ever seen with Rotweillers to hunt with, so I turned them away, they can in any case access the woods above by other routes.  They argued but I stood my ground.  I will let the organised hunt through as I do not want to stop the vingneron from protecting his vines and it is my best interests not to have boar diggin up my potager.

I have now noted the numbers given for the anti chasse and the ONCFS given above and will not hesitate to contact them in case of any infringements.  There have been three mortal accidents local to me in the last 8 weeks, which I will not go into detail about them, except one which occured on a Thursday (non hunting day here). Some hunters had wounded a boar on the Wednesday and had gone back to 'finish it off' the next day, they heard a rustle in the undergrowth and shot and killed a young man collecting mushrooms, one of the hunters was a policeman.....it will be interesting to see how they are dealt with.

Wear bright clothes on hunting days, do all your noisy DIYjobs, put a hunting bell on your dogs (and your children?), and let your children make as much noise as they can, buy them drums for Christmas....well maybe not......

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