The government department responsible for animal welfare in hare coursing has monitored just four out of 200 events in the last five years.
Noteworthy can reveal that the Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine (DAFM) has sent veterinary inspectors to just a handful of meetings since 2019. And records secured under our investigation show that in 2021 and 2023, officials failed to attend any coursing events at all.
Of the few coursing meets that were monitored, DAFM inspection reports state that 10 hares were killed, five “hit” by dogs and one injured greyhound euthanised in those four events alone.
DAFM claims that the record of 10 hares being “killed” is a clerical error but the report has not been updated or amended to state so.
The Department has sole responsibility for animal welfare in the bloodsport.
Animal rights activists have described the revelations as “outrageous and completely unacceptable” and have called for an independent investigation into DAFM’s low monitoring of the coursing industry.
DAFM said inspections are carried out “according to risk assessment and policy priorities” with animal welfare breaches “acted upon and investigated”.
Noteworthy, the crowdfunded community-led investigative platform from The Journal, supports independent and impactful public interest journalism.
Inspection reports secured by Noteworthy under Access to Information on the Environment (AIE) legislation state that during the four coursing events that were monitored in 2019, 2020 and 2022, five hares were “hit” by dogs and an injured greyhound had to be euthanised.
The sport, described as “archaic and cruel” by opponents, involves two muzzled greyhounds pursuing a live hare on a track.
The first dog to “turn” the direction of the hare is deemed the winner, with some competitions offering up huge cash prizes to winning trainers.
Issues recorded by DAFM officials attending the events included hares “not trained well”, poor escape routes and track issues which in one case led to the slowing down of hares as they were being pursued by dogs.
One report, which when queried DAFM said was not accurate, stated that 10 hares were killed during the final day of the Irish Coursing Club’s National Meeting in 2020.
Department veterinary inspectors tasked to monitor coursing meetings are required to complete a pre-prepared DAFM form which includes a series of questions surrounding animal welfare at events.
If any hare fatalities occur, inspectors are required to give their analysis on why these occurred.
However, in response to that question, the inspector at the Co Tipperary event wrote ‘no’.
When Noteworthy queried this record with the department, we were told the number of deaths recorded was a “clerical error” and that no hares were killed during the Powerstown Park event.
It is not clear why the error had not been amended on the inspection report.
However, a spokesperson for the Irish Coursing Club (ICC), the governing body of the sport, told Noteworthy that the error was “noted and clarified” at a meeting held on October 20, 2020.
“The accuracy of reports is important to all bodies concerned in the monitoring and supervising of coursing, to reflect factual reporting of coursing events,” an ICC spokesperson said.
Asked about the low number of inspections carried out over the last five years, a DAFM spokesperson said “intensified levels” of inspections are carried out in “varying sectors” from year to year.
“In 2023, calf welfare inspections were prioritised,” the spokesperson said.
“DAFM does not routinely attend coursing meetings to carry out animal welfare inspections, as the activity is licensed by NPWS (National Parks and Wildlife Service) and a private veterinary practitioner must be present.”
The NPWS told Noteworthy it does not licence coursing. The spokesperson said: “NPWS responsibility relates to the conservation status of the hare.”
This includes issuing licences to clubs for the netting, tagging and release of hares as well as checking the number of hares netted and used in the sport.
The NPWS spokesperson added that the “control of live hare coursing”, including the operation of coursing meetings and managing the use of hares at events, “is the responsibility of the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine”.
When asked what its responsibilities were concerning animal welfare in coursing events, they said that “all animal welfare measures rest with DAFM given its remit under the Animal Health and Welfare Act 2013”.
Vets, appointed by each coursing club, are required to submit reports to NPWS to verify hare numbers. These reports state the number of hares pinned, injured or killed during the events.
Under the Wildlife Act 1976, the Irish hare is protected, making it illegal to hunt, kill, trap or sell.
However, the same act allows for hares to be captured and used in legal hare coursing with netting licences administered by the NPWS.
Documents obtained by Noteworthy show that between 2020 and March 2024, the NPWS carried out 17 investigations into alleged licence breaches by coursing clubs in Ireland.
That included the disappearance of 22 hares from a meeting in Co Kerry in November 2019.
According to a NPWS report, a ranger arrived at the grounds of Kilflynn Coursing Club to monitor the event, and was informed that the hares had “escaped” from a paddock overnight.
Members of the club, the report states, claimed a hatch had “been tampered with” and gardaí had been informed.
In internal NPWS correspondence seen by Noteworthy, an individual described as having “close links” to coursing claimed that a dog mauled a hare in front of crowds at the same event.
“The hare could clearly be heard screaming in pain and terror for about half a minute,” they stated.
The email went on to claim that handlers were forced to wash blood from the dog’s mouth following the alleged attack.
It was also claimed that on the final day of the coursing event, a judge was injured after his horse was “snapped” at by a dog.
Addressing the allegations, the ICC told Noteworthy that it had carried out pre-coursing checks prior to, and during, the Kilflynn event.
“On the second day of the Kilflynn meeting of 2019, the judge was unseated during the event due to a muzzled greyhound entering the turning space of the horse, but the judge was uninjured,” the ICC added.
Asked about the reported hare mauling, the ICC confirmed that a “dislodged muzzle” led to greyhound “contact” with a hare. The spokesperson added:
The dislodging of a muzzle is an extremely rare event, as the fitting of all muzzles are inspected prior to each course.
The coursing body confirmed that the hare was then euthanised after being examined by the club’s vet.
Kilflynn Coursing Club was subsequently sanctioned over what officials described as “security issues” related to the missing hares. As a result, the club’s courses were reduced by 20% the following year.
Animal rights advocates say the removal of hares from their natural habitat and confinement in the weeks prior to coursing events places the animals at significant risk of stress and disease.
Figures released last year under parliamentary questions show that between 2013 and 2023, a total of 45,466 live hares were netted and captured for use in coursing.
Of those, 45,236 were released back into the wild meaning 230 hares died or were unaccounted for after being captured for use in coursing.
During the last 2023/24 season, the ICC told Noteworthy that 124 hares were pinned by dogs during events, 17 were injured and 14 were either euthanised or killed. Two hares died of natural causes, the ICC added.
Ireland is one of only three European countries where hare coursing remains legal, despite multiple attempts to outlaw the practice over the last three decades.
The UK banned coursing in 2004.
In 2020, People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy introduced a private members’ bill, the Animal Health and Welfare (Ban on Hare Coursing) Bill, calling for an end to “cruel, barbaric and outdated practice”.
Last year, Social Democrat TD Jennifer Whitmore brought the Protection of Hares Bill before the Dáil.
Whitmore’s proposed legislation would remove the ability of the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage to sign off on NPWS licences to coursing clubs for the capture of hares.
Both Bills are due to be debated through the Dáil ‘lottery system’, where legislation is selected for debate at random.
Supporters of the sport, including the ICC, say a ban would be “short-sighted”, “irresponsible” and would threaten hares by driving the activity underground and into the hands of illegal hunters.
The governing body said regulated coursing “makes a significant contribution to the economic, environmental, and the social fabric of rural Ireland”.
ICC secretary DJ Histon told Noteworthy that those calling for a ban have not considered the “lasting and far-reaching repercussions” on the conservation of the Irish hare.
“Besides being unable to provide an alternative and viable conservation strategy, these groups are also completely unconcerned with the pervasive issue of illegal hunting of the hare, as they seldom raise it in the media or Dáil Éireann,” he said.
Histon added: “We would be wise to learn from the mistakes made in the UK, where the hare went from being the protected species to the forgotten one.”
According to the UK-based Hare Preservation Trust, the hare is currently under “serious threat” in Britain.
The group says numbers are thought to have declined by 80% since the late 19th century, with “intensification of agriculture” described as a major contributing factor to falling numbers.
In February of this year, Noteworthy attended the ICC’s National Coursing Meeting in Clonmel, Co Tipperary.
The annual three-day event is considered the jewel in the coursing season calendar, attracting up to 30,000 punters from across the country.
On top of the high stake races, there are bookie stalls, food vans, music and entertainment with those attending ranging ages.
While there, Noteworthy observed a number of races including one where a hare was pinned by a greyhound before the intervention of trackside handlers.
We spoke to some of the trainers who had travelled from some of the 90 coursing clubs across Ireland.
Lester Power grew up coursing dogs in his native Co Waterford, introduced to the sport by his parents.
He supported the introduction of muzzling dogs, brought in to Ireland in 1993 with his own dogs previously winning derbies at the National Meeting.
“What we always say is, when you go racing to the track, you lock your car, but when you go to the coursing all the vans are open. It’s a different culture altogether,” he said.
He does not believe coursing is cruel, to either the hare or dog, and believes those calling for a ban are misinformed.
“If they came today and had a look at what really happens, they’d say there is nothing wrong with that,” Power told Noteworthy.
“Okay, they knocked two hares and they got away, but that usually wouldn’t happen.
It was probably a bad batch of hares, and there is some amount of care [that] goes into minding those hares.
Newry-based trainer Damian Matthews is one of a number of coursing club members from Northern Ireland, where hare coursing is illegal.
The well-known trainer, who is currently treasurer of the ICC, said the sport is considered a “family tradition”.
“You’ve got people heavily invested in hurling, you have people heavily invested in soccer, rugby, and then there’s people heavily invested in greyhounds,” he said.
“And with the National Meeting, it’s a bit like the All-Ireland Final for all the provincial meetings that have taken place for the last 13 weeks.”
Matthews disputes those involved in the sport support or take part in cruelty.
“The people here are great ambassadors for the hare because they know if there’s no hare, there’d be no sport,” he said.
“And I think that’s something that has been lost with the city folk, who don’t understand that the rural countryside do their best to protect the habitat of the hare because if there are no hares, there would be no coursing.”
John Egan, a 78-year-old farmer from Co Tipperary, is the current president of the ICC.
He claims that the biggest threat to coursing is from illegal hunting.
Egan said such hunters kill hares and ”that’s our biggest threat”.
He says claims that the hare is dropping in numbers in the wild is incorrect though did say birds of prey such as buzzards do target the young of hares.
“I do not want to see a hare killed and the biggest cheer you will get here is when a hare beats the dogs home,” he said.
Speaking to Noteworthy, Laura Broxson of the National Animal Rights Association (NARA) said there is no justification for the use of hares in the bloodsport.
The majority of people in Ireland see hare coursing for what it is: a cruel and barbaric bloodsport that needs to be banned immediately.
“The only block to a ban is the archaic Irish government, and clearly the veterinary inspectors too.”
Describing the low number of welfare inspections carried out by DAFM veterinary inspectors as “outrageous and completely unacceptable”, the activist added:
“How can Minister McConalogue continue to stand over hare coursing and claim that it is regulated and above board, when his department officials don’t even bother to go and see what’s happening to these animals?”
NARA has now called for an independent investigation into DAFM’s low attendance at coursing events in Ireland.
In a statement to Noteworthy, DAFM said hare coursing is kept under “constant review” by the monitoring committee, of which the department is a member.
A spokesperson added that annual meetings ensure coursing is run in “a controlled manner” and to review the previous coursing season.
The Irish Council Against Blood Sport, which has campaigned for a coursing ban for decades, described the handful of welfare inspections in coursing as “disgraceful”.
Aideen Yourell said DAFM, which is a member of the Coursing Monitoring Committee alongside NPWS and ICC, had previously agreed to request permission for the capture hares on Coillte land in Newtownmountkennedy.
“Thankfully Coillte refused to allow the hare coursers to net hares on their lands,” the animal rights activist told Noteworthy.
A spokesperson for DAFM confirmed that department officials had contacted Coillte “on behalf of the Coursing Monitoring Committee” to enquire if a mechanism existed which would allow the ICC to request permission to net hares.
“In response, Coillte expressed the view that it would not be possible to grant the request without impacting on general access for recreation,” the spokesperson said.
“This was this Department’s only communication with Coillte on the matter.”
Read more articles in this series >>
Is animal welfare protected in the coursing industry?
By Patricia Devlin of Noteworthy
Noteworthy is the crowdfunded investigative journalism platform from The Journal. This project was proposed and funded by our readers.
Project design photos: James Horan/RollingNews.ie and Alamy Stock Photo.
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