SLOVAKIA: PHEASANT SHOOTING AT PALÁRIKOVO CASTLE

Source: YouTube.

By Wolfgang von Eschenbach
November 4, 2015

Once they get started, the hunters shoot one shot after another, and soon, before you realise, a Noah´s rain of dead or wounded birds falling down from the sky breaks loose. 

The rain of massacred birds keeps busy the retrieving dogs. The happy masters smile.

This goes on for a long time. 

The gathered hunters, some of whom are probably feeling like a King Louis XIV during a chase, call this "ethical hunting". 

What are they shooting at?

Tame pheasants!

But the business-oriented wardens will tell you that the poor victims come from a "carefully managed" pheasantry (Fig. 1) established in 1752, following the "best game management techniques" available in the field, so that they can thrilled their dispatchers  one day, some of whom have come from many corners of the world, even as far as the United States, just to hunt on the groomed grounds of Palárikovo castle (Károlyi castle, formerly owned by count Ludovit Károlyi) in Slovakia.

Figure 1. "Game managed" (tame) pheasants running around before they are slaughtered in the hunting grounds of Palárikovo Castle in Slovakia. Source: YouTube.

According to Wikipedia (2015), Palárikovo castle is where many of the discussions to create the International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation (CIC) (French: Conseil International de la Chasse et de la Conservation du Gibier, German: Internationaler Rat zur Erhaltung des Wildes und der Jagd) took place, which was established in 1928. This castle has become the CIC museum (Fig. 2)

Figure 2. Plaque conmemorating the foundation of the International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation (CIC) at Palárikovo castle in Slovakia. Source: YouTube.

Since the beginning, the CIC has promoted ideals for sustainable and ethical hunting, stressing that hunting and the conservation of wildlife go hand in hand, and gaining global recognition as an independent advisor in the field of wildlife conservation (Wikipedia, 2015).

But what took place at Palárikovo castle on December 2014 cannot be called "sustainable" nor "ethical" hunting.

Besides, there is not such a thing as ethical hunting. Getting your brains blown out with a bullet is not ethical at all. 

Notwithstanding, you might argue that "putting to asleep" an old, crippled or suffering animal, for example, is "ethical".

Also, there is the population ecology aspect which we shall leave outside this arena.

Since this can lead us to an endless discussion over ethical which will take us to a cul-de-sac where the animal´s point of view, with his own opinion on the issue, will always be lacking, let us leave it at that and move on.

The result of the shooting frenzy that took place in 2014 in the fields of Palárikovo castle is shown below: 1519 dead pheasants in a single day (Fig. 3)!:

Figure 3. The death circle of the 1519 pheasants slaughtered in the hunting grounds of Palárikovo Castle in Slovakia in 2014. Source: YouTube.

After the hunters got their fill with pheasants, they took it on wild boar. 

The panicked poor creatures did not know what was happening, for they are so used to seen people in the hunting grounds that they are almost domestic. They are tame boars, i.e. tolerant to human presence.

Here is a short film (Video 1) showing what happened to the unlucky birds and wild boars that day at Palárikovo castle in Slovakia:

Video 1. SCI Bavaria European Chapters Hunting and meeting at Palárikovo Castle in Slovakia. Uploaded by PD Safaris.

Thus, let us ask you the following question:

Can this be really called ethical hunting?

Some people would say yes. Others, no.

It all depends on people´s economics, business intentions, psychological shuffling, fight against hidden fears, palliation of unexpressed and fearful sexual inclinations through killing, search for peer acceptance or social climbing, misdirected fulfilment of unmet emotional needs or extent of personal spiritual growth. They may all come together at hunting.

We call it a pheasant holocaust. Followed by a wild boar slaughtering.

To each his own.

What do you think?


References

Wikipedia (2015). International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation (CIC). A Wikimedia Project. The Free Encyclopedia. 10 p.