Outrage after trophy hunters pay big bucks to shoot wild reindeer: 'It’s hardly in the spirit of Christmas'
A Scottish sporting company has come under criticism online after it emerged that they were offering wealthy hunters' packages where they could track and kill reindeer in Norway.
Hendry, Ramsay & Waters is based in Fife and describes itself as 'Scotland's Premier Sporting Agency'. It offers reindeer bull and cow hunting trips in Norwegian national parks between August and September and promises that it's a "breathtaking experience", according to the Daily Star.
On their website, they say they "offer Moose and trophy Reindeer hunting in the North-Eastern part of Norway" and that "hunting traditions are strong and have been for many generations".
"Today we hunt moose and reindeer here, but it is also possible to hunt capercaillie, red and roe deer, bear, wolf, wolverine, and lynx during some parts of the season," a description read.
They also boasted that they had "full exclusivity in both the Breheimen and Jotunheimen national parks, which hold Europe’s last-surviving population of wild reindeer."
Photos posted online by hunters who took up packages from the company show them posing in the snow in front of the reindeer's bloodied corpse while often holding aloft its giant antlers. Nick Weston of the League Against Cruel Sports criticized the package and said it was against the spirit of Christmas to hunt down and kill reindeer for sport.
"It’s hardly in the spirit of Christmas to shoot Rudolph, is it?" he said. "There is no justification for shooting animals for fun at any time of the year, but to celebrate Christmas by killing Santa’s reindeer doesn’t really keep with the season of goodwill."
"When will we learn that animals are not commodities and give them the gift of life instead of needlessly killing them?"
The company offers packages in Scotland as well, stating, "Scotland is rightly famous throughout the world for deer stalking too and we can offer the discerning sportsman prime hunting for Red Deer Stags and Hinds, Roe Deer Bucks and Does, as well as Fallow and Sika Deer."
Other countries that Hendry, Ramsay & Waters operate in include England, France, Spain, Argentina, and even Africa, where trophy hunters can track and kill species such as zebra, kudu, antelope, and bushbuck.