BY bringing in legislation to ban hunting, the Government will be responsible for initiating a potentially disastrous downturn in the welfare of British wildlife.

Hunting is the natural and most humane method of controlling populations of all four quarry species and is a key element in the management of British wildlife in general.

Man has a responsibility to manage the countryside that he has created and the wildlife populations therein, particularly those that are without natural predators.

The most immediate and important consequence of a ban will be that the vital search-and-dispatch function of hunting will no longer be there to detect and humanely kill the weak, the sick and the injured.

Shooting

The longer-term consequences of a ban on hunting must inevitably result in a progressive deterioration in the health and vigour of the four quarry species and a precipitous fall in numbers, since - at least for foxes and hares - they will simply become pests to be suppressed by non-selective shooting or trapping.

At present, the hunts are indisputably the best custodians of British wildlife and the Government should be under no illusion that, if it removes this nationwide network of voluntary wildlife management and conservation, it will be directly responsible for a massive and cruel decline in the welfare of British wildlife.

PROF W R ALLEN, DR LEWIS THOMAS,

Veterinary Association for Wildlife

Management,

Newbury, Berks.