Act of Union
November 27, 2010
It may have seen an adverse Dáil vote earlier this year but the Ward Union Hunt remains an indelible aspect of life in Co Meath. Royal County caught up with Ward Union Chairman and Walterstown's Christy Reynolds.
To animal rights activists and environmental campaigners alike, the decision of Dáil Eireann to ban stag hunting last summer appeared to have placed an insurmountable obstacle before the Ward Union Hunt, Ireland's last stag hunting club. However, it was never the intention of the Ward Union to retreat into its shell and allow more than a century and a half of history to count for nothing.
Indeed, the commitment to the traditions of rural Irish pursuits remains as strong as ever, embodied both by the ability of the Ward Union to reconfigure its practices in late 2010 and the strength of the RISE! (Rural Ireland Says Enough!) movement, which continues to lobby powerfully for the collective interests of its many and varied stake-holders across the country.
Christy Reynolds, now in his third year as Chairman of the Ward Union Hunt, returned to equine pursuits having put the football boots on the nail for the final time after a career which spanned almost two decades and gave him five Meath senior football championship and two Leinster club winners' medals with Walterstown.
For Reynolds, the reasons for his decision to take up the reins again lay in the need for a buzz after his time in the famous black of Walterstown. Speaking to Royal County recently, he said, "I've seen a lot of lads who've played football at any type of level, and when they were finished and looking for something else to do, plenty of them have started into the hunting. Some lads play golf but that's not for everybody. It didn't do it for me, anyway. We were into ponying as kids, Gerry, Paul, Julie and myself, but I was probably 24 or 25 years out of it, and that was mostly down to the time playing competitive football. Getting up on a horse again, and the buzz you get out of it, is a great feeling."
As Chairman of the Ward Union, Reynolds has presided over a challenging time for the organisation. Since that vote in Leinster House in June, the hunting of a live stag is now no longer permissible in Ireland. And yet, the Ward Union has adapted and moulded itself to the new landscape, and the new hunting season began in November. Changed, but not quelled.
"The state of play 12 months ago was that we could hunt a stag with conditions, of which there were 32 or 33. At the present time, following the ban, we don't need a license so all those conditions are gone. We're sort of governed by nobody now - so long as we don't hunt a live stag, we can basically do as we wish.
"We didn't know how it would work but we had a few EGMs and all the members decided that they didn't want to change to a fox-hunt or hare-hunt, they wanted to keep a stag involved if there was some way we could satisfy the Minister [for the Environment John Gormley]. We had meetings with them and we put a draft proposal to them, and the Minister didn't object to the way we were planning on doing it.
"He has always maintained that he banned stag-hunting, he didn't ban the Ward Union hunt. So he was happy to see that the hunt went on, because he didn't want to have the problem of burdening the taxpayer with looking after the herd of red deer that we look after."
So how has the Ward Union's 200-strong membership taken to the new realities of the 2010/11 hunting season?
"We've had a number of hunts over the past month or so and everyone is very happy," says Christy. "It's not the same, there's no doubt about it. The hunt members don't see the stag being released and don't see the stag being retaken. We don't hunt the stag now, we hunt the scent.. There's a bit of a void but the rest of it is the same - the stag is out there, he's still running the same country, he's still jumping the same rivers and crossroads. In addition to the Government's understandable wish to avoid the burden of caring for red deer in the control of the Ward Union, there was also the realisation that threatening hunting pursuits could have far-reaching implications for Ireland as a whole, with its corollary industries forming a significant portion of the rural Irish economy.
"An independent study was carried out by a man called Gerald Scallan from NUI Galway," says Christy, "and he came up with a figure that hunting pursuits are worth in the region of €111m to the Irish economy. From the farrier to McAuley's grassmeal to the fella doing the haylage, to bedding, to the tack lads, there's a huge industry there, a massive industry, all over the country."
If the Ward Union is one indelible aspect of rural Ireland, the GAA is certainly another and there is a healthy relationship between the organisations in the county. The Union, which hunts twice weekly (usually Tuesdays and Fridays), often nominates as its meeting-point the grounds of local GAA clubs, including Skryne, Kiltale, Walterstown, Kilmessan and Dunsany, with the clubs benefiting from a decent post-hunt bar trade as well as regular support from Ward Union members for local GAA lotto fundraisers.
Nor is Christy Reynolds the only noted GAA man to occupy a prominent position in the Ward Union hierarchy. Pat Coyle - who Christy describes as "Mr Ward Union" - is the Curraha coach, former manager of the Meath minors and, at the time of writing, was still in the running for the vacant Meath U21 manager's job. Given his exceptional track record at underage level with both club and county, it would be no surprise if Coyle, who was also shortlisted for the Meath senior job before Seamus McEnaney's appointment, is back in the intercounty arena in 2011.
Other Gaels in the Ward Union include Summerhill pair Martin and Mannix Coyne, while All-Ireland winning Meath captains of the past Tommy Dowd and Graham Geraghty have also taken part in hunts in the recent past. The hunt's PR adviser, Liam Cahill, played Colleges hurling in his native Waterford with the famous Mount Sion CBS and is a former Committee member of Dunsany GFC and Kilmessan hurling club.
As one of the top midfielders in the county during Meath's glory years in the 1980s, when he was a teammate of ousted former Meath manager Eamonn O'Brien, and the father of current Walterstown stalwarts Alan, David and Mark Christy is well placed to comment on the current situation in the county.
"Eamonn came in in his first year and got to an All-Ireland semi-final, and last year he won a Leinster final," he says. "However that came about it's still in the record books that Meath won a Leinster title. Okay, he made a few mistakes along the way but we all make mistakes and I think getting rid of him was a serious injustice to the man. I spoke to him at length earlier this year, he had huge plans for the future and I was disappointed for him.
"Once he was gone I didn't in my wildest dreams think that the job would go outside the county. I was very surprised at the margin of the vote too but now that it's been done, I think everyone should row in behind Seamus McEnaney. He's a good operator and everyone should give him full backing."
Christy also feels that there is room for optimism that Meath can become genuine All-Ireland contenders once more, provided the new management team unearths some of the talented players who have previously been overlooked. "Looking at Meath closely for the last couple of years," he says, "I felt we had a lot of grand footballers on the panel but we lacked honesty from some of our players. It's not always the nice flair footballer who will win an All-Ireland for you. You need a few hard chaws on the team as well. They are in the county but I think they've been overlooked. We went for too much polish and not enough hard nuts, who wouldn't do you any harm at all."
Back at club level, Christy is also upbeat about the Blacks' prospects in 2011 and beyond. "I'll make a prediction," he announces boldly. "I think Walterstown will win a county title within the next three years. There are good lads coming through but more than that there is a lot of honesty in them. They're good, honest, straight footballers. No flash Harrys. Every one of them wants to play football."
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