It is a change of size which is announced for the Sologne and all the large areas of hunting closed by high metal hedges. The National Assembly adopted, Thursday, October 6 in the evening, a bill from Richard Ramos, the MoDem deputy from Loiret, “aimed at limiting the entanglement of natural areas and protecting private property”. A vote which received the unanimity of the 90 voters.
In Sologne, fences, sometimes enhanced with barbed wire to better contain deer, have multiplied in recent years. Between 3,000 and 5,000 kilometers of fences scar this wooded area and imprison its fauna to allow large landowners to organize fenced and sometimes priced hunts, within areas of 200 to 4,000 hectares.
This generalization of fences has moved the inhabitants of Sologne, whether they are hunters or simple amateurs of Sunday walks. “These owners have transformed their plots into game traps and damaged the vegetation, because of a skilfully maintained animal overdensity. It was high time to put a stop to it,” considers Raymond Louis, the president of the association Les amis des chemins de Sologne, who came to Paris for the occasion.
“A text of balance”
The text voted on Thursday requires that the fences be “posed 30 centimeters above the surface of the ground”. Their height should be “limited to 1.20 meters and they cannot be offensive or constitute traps for wildlife”. Enclosure hunting is therefore not over, but there will no longer be any question of planting deep fences to prevent the smallest wild boar from digging its way out, nor of prohibiting a deer from jumping to escape. “A boar, since he can pass his muzzle from below, will have no problem passing his whole body”, notes Mr. Louis.
“I wanted to take a bit of these spoiled children who love clay pigeon shooting,” says MP Richard Ramos
Several deputies had tabled bills, more or less ambitious, to limit this scourge. It was ultimately that of Mr. Ramos that was put to the vote. “I wanted to take a bit of these spoiled children fans of live clay pigeon shooting… From now on, wild animals will be able to move freely from one private property to another, pass under the fences without getting their paws caught, disembowel themselves, it’s a relief “, confides the chosen one, son of a worker from Blois, a non-hunter but a lover of picking chanterelles.
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