February sees the end of the shooting/hunting season proper in France, but there is one activity to keep things going: shooting foxes. You can make up maybe for a few missed chances, and anyway it keeps the boys going for a few more weekends. And the people who keep poultry are not averse to it. "I remember," writes Claude Rossignol in Le Chasseur Francais, "in my very first years of shooting, we would stop off at various houses to show our bag to non-hunting families in the district, who thought it only right to offer us a glass and their wives a dozen of eggs: a tradition, it appears, which went back to the time of the wolves, a thank-offering for helping to protect their animals and poultry." So, no horses and red coats and the rest for this foxhunting: just the lads and their guns and dogs. Thick woodland with briars and small shrubby clumps is often chosen, preferably in an area well known. This operation is to be a beat or battue, with all need for extreme care. You need to take up your position in silence before letting the hounds loose. It is not unusual for a fox to become aware of suspicious sounds and to make off before the line has begun to move - and to be shot.
In spite of his winter fur, the writer says, the fox is a fragile enough creature. Also, when he breaks out of cover he may do so at reduced speed. You can't say it often enough, you need to be doubly careful shooting in such thick cover. A horn is no harm. It will signal that an animal has been spotted or shot. The owners of the hounds need to be warned, and the sound of the horn will carry to those on the farthest reaches of the hunt. Fast hounds are needed and they should be equipped with a bell on the collar or at least a fluorescent collar. Last detail: when a fox goes to ground, this writer states, after a run, he can't stay long in his hole or he'll asphyxiate himself (that's a surprise to a non-hunter).
So, the writer goes on, it's wise to leave a patient man at the hole and withdraw the hounds. According to the extent of the underground burrow the fox has gone into, the wait could be as little as 10 minutes or up to half-an-hour. Experience proves, according to the article, that patience is often rewarded. Anyway you've had a good day out with your pals. A photograph shows a fine, hefty fox strung up by the rear legs against a tree, a rifle beside it.