Game Laws in United Kingdom

From the Encyclopedia Britannica (1911):

“Game Laws: This title in English law is applied to the statutes which
regulate the right to pursue and take or kill certain kinds of wild
animals (see above). The existence of these statutes is due to the rules
of the common law as to the nature of property, and the interest of the
Norman sovereigns and of feudal superiors in the pleasures of sport or
the chase. The substantial basis of the law of property is physical
possession of things and the power to deal with them as we see fit. By
the common law wild animals are regarded as _res nullius_, and as not
being the subject of private property until reduced into possession by
being killed or captured. A bird in the hand is owned: a bird in the
bush is not. Even bees do not become property until hived. “Though a
swarm lights in my tree,” says Bracton, “I have no more property therein
than I have in the birds which make their nests thereon.” If reclaimed
or confined they become property. If they escape, the rights of the
owner continue only while he is in pursuit of the fugitive, i.e. no
other person can in the meantime establish a right of property against
him by capturing the animal. A swarm of bees “which fly out of my hive
are mine so long as I can keep them in sight and have power to pursue
them.” But the right of recapture does not entitle the owner to follow
his animals on to the lands of another, and the only case in which any
right to follow wild animals on to the lands of others is now expressly
recognized is when deer or hares are hunted with hounds or greyhounds.
This recognition merely excepts such pursuit from the law as to criminal
game trespass, and fox-hunters and those who course hares or hunt stags
are civilly liable for trespass if they pass over land without the
consent of the occupier (_Paul v. Summerhayes_, 1878, 4 Q.B.D. 9).

It is a maxim of the common law that things in which no one can claim
any property belong to the crown by its prerogative: this rule has been
applied to wild animals, and in particular to deer and what is now
called “game.” The crown rights may pass to a subject by grant or
equivalent prescription. In the course of time the exclusive right to
take game, &c., on lands came to be regarded as incidental to the
ownership or occupation of the lands. This is described as the right to
game _ratione soli_. In certain districts of England which are crown
forests or chases or legal parks, or subject to rights of free warren,
the right to take deer and game is not in the owner or occupier of the
soil, but is in the crown by prerogative, or _ratione privilegii_ in the
grantee of the rights of chase, park or free warren, which are anterior
to and superior to those of the owner or occupier of the lands over
which the privilege has been granted. In all cases where these special
rights do not exist, the right to take or kill wild animals is treated
as a profit incidental to the ownership or occupation of the land on
which they are found, and there is no public right to take them on
private land or even on a highway; nor is there any method known to the
law by which the public at large or an undefined body of persons can
lawfully acquire the right to take wild animals _in alieno solo_.

In the nature of things the right to take wild animals is valuable as to
deer and the animals usually described as game, and not as to those
which are merely noxious as vermin, or simply valueless, as small birds.
Upon the rules of the common law there has been grafted much legislation
which up till the end of the 18th century was framed for the
preservation of deer and game for the recreation and amusement of
persons of fortune, and to prevent persons of inferior rank from
squandering in the pursuit of game time which their station in life
required to be more profitably employed. These enactments included the
rigorous code known as the Laws of the Forest (see FOREST LAWS), as well
as what are usually called the Game Laws.

In England the older statutes relating to game were all repealed early
in the 19th century. From the time of Richard II. (1389) to 1831, no
person might kill game unless qualified by estate or social standing, a
qualification raised from a 40s. freehold in 1389 to an interest of L100
a year in freehold or L150 in long leaseholds (1673). In 1831 this
qualification by estate was abolished as to England. But in Scotland the
right to hunt is theoretically reserved to persons who have in heritage
that unknown quantity a “plough-gate of land” (Scots Act 1621, c. 31);
and in Ireland qualifications by estate are made necessary for killing
game and keeping sporting dogs (Irish Act 1698, 8 Will. III. c. 8). In
England the game laws proper consist of the Night Poaching Acts of 1828
and 1844, the Game Act of 1831, the Poaching Prevention Act 1862, and
the Ground Game Acts of 1880 and 1906. From the fact that the right of
landowners over wild animals on their land does not amount to ownership
it follows that they cannot prosecute any one for stealing live wild
animals: and that apart from the game laws the only remedy against
poachers is by civil action for trespass. As between trespasser and
landowner the law is peculiar (_Blades_ v. _Higgs_, 1865, 11 H.L.C.
621).

If A starts and kills a hare on B’s land the dead hare belongs to
B (_ratione soli_) and not to A, though he has taken the hare by his own
efforts (_per industriam_). But if A hunts the hare from B’s land on to
C’s land and there kills it, the dead hare belongs to A and not to B or
C. It is not B’s because it was not taken on his land, and it is not C’s
because it was not started on his land. In other words the right of each
owner is limited to animals both started and killed on his own land, and
in the case of conflicting claims to the animal taken (made _ratione
soli_) the captor can make title (_per industriam_) against both
landowners. If he is a trespasser he is liable to civil or criminal
proceedings by both landowners, but the game is his unless forfeited
under a statute. Another peculiar result of the law is that where
trespassers (e.g. poachers) kill and carry off game or rabbits as part
of one continuous transaction they are not guilty of theft, but only of
game trespass (_R_. v. _Townley_, 1871, L.R. 1 C.C.R. 315), but it is
theft for a trespasser to pick up and carry off a pheasant killed by the
owner of the land on his own land or even a pheasant killed by an
independent gang of poachers. The young of wild animals belong (_propter
impotentiam_) to the owner of the land until they are able to fly or run
away. This right does not extend to the eggs of wild birds. But the
owner can reduce the eggs into possession by taking them up and setting
them under hens or in enclosures. And if this is done persons who take
them are thieves and not merely poachers. A game farm, like a decoy for
wild water-fowl, is treated as a trade or business; but a game preserve
in which full-grown animals fly or run wild is subject to the ordinary
incidents of the law as to animals _ferae naturae_.

The classification of wild animals for purposes of sport in England is
as follows:–

1. Beasts of forest are hart and hind (red deer), boar, wolf and all
beasts of venery.

2. Beasts of chase and park are buck and doe (fallow deer), fox,
marten and roe, or all beasts of venery and hunting.

3. Beasts of (free) warren are roe, hare, rabbit, partridge, pheasant,
woodcock, quail, rail and heron.

4. Game, as defined by the Night Poaching Act of 1828 and the Game Act
of 1831, is pheasant, partridge, black game, red grouse, bustard and
hare. In France game (_gibier_) includes everything eatable that runs
or flies.

5. Wild fowl not in any of the previous lists which are nevertheless
prized for sport, e.g. duck, snipe, plovers, &c.

6. Wild birds not falling within class 4 are more or less protected
against destruction by the Wild Birds Protection Acts, which were,
however, passed with quite other objects than the game laws.

As regards class 1 no subject without special authority of the crown
may kill within a forest or its purlieus or on adjacent highways,
rivers or enclosures. The right to the animals in a forest does not
depend on ownership of the land but on the royal prerogative as to the
animals, i.e. it exists not _ratione soli_ but _ratione privilegii_:
and this right is not in any way altered by the Game Act 1831. A chase
is a forest in the hands of a subject and a legal park (which is an
enclosed chase) is created by crown grant or by prescription founded
on a lost grant. The rights of the grantee are in substance the same
as those of the crown in a forest, and do not depend on ownership of
the soil. In the case of a free warren the grantee usually but not
necessarily owns some or all of the soil over which the right of
warren runs.

The right of free warren depends on crown grant or
prescription founded on lost grant, and involves a right of property
over beasts and fowl of warren on all lands within the franchise. As
will appear from the list above, some game birds are not fowl of
warren, e.g. black game and red grouse (_Duke of Devonshire_ v.
_Lodge_, 1827, 7 B. & C. 39). Free warren is quite different from
ordinary warrens, in which hares or rabbits are bred by the owner of
the soil for sport or profit. Ground game in such warrens is protected
under the Larceny Act 1861, s. 17, as well as by the game laws. In
manors, of which none have been created since 1290, the lord by his
franchise had the sporting rights over the manor, but at the present
time this right is restricted to the commons and wastes of the manor,
the freehold whereof is in him, and does not extend to enclosed
freeholds nor as a general rule to enclosed copyholds, unless at the
time of enclosure the sporting rights were reserved to him by the
Enclosure Act or award (_Sowerby_ v. _Smith_, 1873, L.R. 8 C.P. 514).
In other words his rights exist ratione _soli_ and not _ratione
privilegii_.

The Game Act 1831 gives lords of manors and privileged
persons certain rights as to appointing gamekeepers with special
powers to protect game within the district over which their rights
extend (ss. 13, 14, 15, 16). The game laws in no way cut down the
special privileges as to forest, park, chase or free warren (1831, s.
9), and confirm the sporting right of lords of manors on the wastes of
the manor (1831, s. 10). As to all lands not affected by these rights,
the right to kill or take game on the land is presumably in the
occupier. On letting land the owner may, subject to the qualifications
hereinafter stated, reserve to himself the right to kill or take
“game” or rabbits or other wild animals concurrently with or in
exclusion of the tenant. Where the exclusive right is in the landlord
the tenant is not only liable to forfeiture or damages for breaches of
covenants in the lease, but is also liable to penalties on summary
conviction if without the lessor’s authority he pursues, kills or
takes any “game” upon the land or gives permission to others to do so
(1831, s. 12). In effect he is made criminally liable for game
trespass on lands in his own occupation, so far as relates to game,
but is not so liable if he takes rabbits, snipe, woodcock, quails or
rails.

The net effect of the common law and the game laws is to give the
occupier of lands and the owner of sporting rights over them the
following remedies against persons who infringe their right to kill or
take wild animals on the land. A stranger who enters on the land of
another to take any wild animals is liable to the occupier for
trespass on the land and for the animals started and killed on the
land by the trespasser. He is also criminally liable for game trespass
if he has entered on the land to search for or in pursuit of “game” or
woodcock, snipe, quail, landrails or rabbits. If the trespass is in
the daytime (whether on lands of the subject or in royal forests,
&c.), the penalty on conviction may not exceed 40s., unless five or
more persons go together, in which case the maximum penalty is L5. If
a single offender refuses his name or address or gives a false address
to the occupier or to the owner of the sporting rights or his
representatives, or refuses to leave the land, he may be arrested by
them, and is liable to a penalty not exceeding L5, and if five or more
concerned together in game trespass have a gun with them and use
violence, intimidation or menace, to prevent the approach of persons
entitled to take their names or order them off the land, they incur a
further penalty up to L5.

If the trespass is in search or pursuit of game _or rabbits_ in the
nighttime, the maximum penalty on a first conviction is imprisonment
with hard labour for not over three months; on a second, imprisonment,
&c., for not over six months, and the offender may be put under
sureties not to offend again for a year after a first conviction or
for two years after a second conviction. For a first or second offence
the conviction is summary, subject to appeal to quarter sessions, but
for a third offence the offender is tried on indictment and is liable
to penal servitude (3-7 years) or imprisonment with hard labour (2
years). The offenders may be arrested by the owner or occupier of the
land or their servants, and if the offenders assault or offer violence
by firearms or offensive weapons they are liable to be indicted and on
conviction punished to the same extent as in the last offence. In 1844
the above penalties were extended to persons found by night on
highways in search or pursuit of game. If three or more trespass
together on land by night to take or destroy game or rabbits, and any
of them is armed with firearms, bludgeon or other offensive weapon,
they are liable to be indicted and on conviction sentenced to penal
servitude (3-14 years) or imprisonment with hard labour (2 years). By
“day” time is meant from the beginning of the first hour before
sunrise to the end of the first hour after sunset, and by “night” from
the end of the first hour after sunset to the beginning of the first
hour before sunrise (act of 1828, s. 12; act of 1831, s. 34). The time
is reckoned by local and not by Greenwich time.

The penalties for night poaching are severe, but encounters between
the owners of sporting rights and armed gangs of poachers have often
been attended by homicide. It is to be observed that it is illegal and
severely punishable to set traps or loaded spring guns for poachers
(Offences against the Person Act 1861, s. 31), whereby any grievous
bodily harm is intended or may be caused even to a trespasser, so that
the incursions of poachers can be prevented only by personal
attendance on the scene of their activities; and it is to be observed
also that the provisions of the Game Laws above stated are, so far as
concerns private land, left to be enforced by private enterprise
without the interference of the police, with the result that in some
districts there are scenes of private nocturnal war. Even in the Night
Poaching Act 1844, which applies to highways, the arrest of offenders
is made by owners, occupiers or their gamekeepers. The police were not
given any direct authority as to poachers until the Poaching
Prevention Act 1862, under which a constable is empowered “on any
highway, street or public place, to search any person whom he may have
good cause to suspect of coming from any land where he shall have been
unlawfully in search or pursuit of ‘game,’ or any persons aiding or
abetting such person, and having in his possession any game unlawfully
obtained, or any gun, part of gun, or nets or engines used for the
killing or taking game; and also to stop and search any cart or other
conveyance in or upon which such constable or peace officer shall have
good cause to suspect that any such game, or any such article or
thing, is being carried by such person.” If any such thing be found
the constable is to detain it, and apply for a summons against the
offender, summoning him to appear before a petty sessional court, on
conviction before which he may be fined not more than L5, and forfeits
the game, guns, &c., found in his possession. In this act “game”
includes woodcock, snipe and rabbits, and the eggs of game birds other
than bustards; and the act applies to poaching either by night or by
day. In all cases of summary conviction for poaching an appeal lies to
quarter sessions. In all cases of poaching the game, &c., taken may be
forfeited by the court which tries the poacher.

_Close Time._–On certain days, and within periods known as “close
time,” it is illegal to kill deer or game.

In England and Ireland the winged game above named and hares may not
be killed on Sundays or Christmas Day. It is illegal to sell or expose
for sale hares or leverets in March, April, May, June and July. It is
illegal throughout the United Kingdom to buy or sell winged game birds
after ten days from the beginning of the close season as fixed by the
English law (1831, s. 4; 1860, s. 13). This prohibition applies to the
sale of live game, British or foreign, and to the sale of British dead
game. It is illegal to lay poison for game or rabbits except in rabbit
holes, and it is illegal to kill game by firearms at night. Wild birds
not within the list above given but of interest for sport are
protected by close times fixed under the Wild Birds Protection Acts,
which may vary in each county of each kingdom.

_Licences_.–Besides the restrictions on the right to take or kill
game which arise out of the law as to ownership or occupation of the
lands on which it is found, there are further restrictions imposed by
the laws of excise. From the time of Richard II. (1389) until 1831 the
right of persons other than gamekeepers properly deputed by the lord
of a manor to take game was made to depend on the social rank of the
person, or on the amount of his interest in land, which ranged from a
40s. freehold (in 1389) to L100 a year (1671). These restrictions were
abolished in 1831, and the right to kill game was made conditional on
the possession of a game certificate, now called a game licence in
Great Britain (act of 1831, ss. 6, 23). By s. 4 of the Game Licences
Act 1860 “any person, before he shall in Great Britain take, kill or
pursue, or aid or assist in any manner in the taking, killing or
pursuing, by any means whatever, or use any dog, gun, net or other
engine for the purpose of taking, killing or pursuing any game, or any
woodcock, snipe, quail, landrail, or any coney, or any deer, shall
take out a proper licence to kill game under this act”–subject to a
penalty of L20. There are certain exceptions and exemptions as to
royal personages, royal gamekeepers, and with reference to taking
woodcock or snipe by nets or springes, by coursing or hunting hares or
deer, or killing deer, rabbits or hares (Hares Acts 1848, Game
Licences Act 1860) in certain enclosed lands by the owners or
occupiers. A licence is not required for beaters and assistants who go
out with holders of a game licence. The licence is granted by the
Inland Revenue Department. The issue is regulated by the Game Licences
Act 1860 as amended by the Customs and Inland Revenue Act 1883. The
licences now in use are of four kinds:–

Those taken out after 31st July–

To expire on the next 31st July L3 0 0
To expire on the next 31st October 2 0 0

Those taken out after 1st November–

To expire on the next 31st July 2 0 0

Those taken out for any continuous period of
fourteen days specified in the licence 1 0 0

In the case of gamekeepers in Great Britain for whom the employer pays
the duty on male servants, the annual licence fee is L2, but the
licence extends only to lands on which the employer has a right to
kill game. A licence granted to a person in his own right and not as
gamekeeper or servant is effective throughout the United Kingdom. The
game licence does not authorize trespass on the lands of others in
search of game nor the shooting of game, &c., at night, and is
forfeited on a conviction of game trespass (1831, s. 30; 1860, s. 11).
Persons who have game licences need not have a gun licence, but the
possession of a gun licence does not qualify the holder to kill game
or even rabbits.

The sale of game when killed is also subject to statutory regulation.
Gamekeepers may not sell game except under the authority of their
employer (1831, ss. 17, 25). Persons who hold a full game licence may
sell game, but only to persons who hold a licence to deal in game.
These licences are annual (expiring on the 1st of July), and are
granted in London by justices of the peace, and in the rest of England
by the council of the borough or urban or rural district in which the
dealer seeks to carry on business (1831, s. 18; 1893, c. 73, s. 27),
and a notice of the existence of the licence must be posted on the
licensed premises. A licence must be taken out for each shop. The
following persons are disqualified for holding the licence:
innkeepers, persons holding licences to sell intoxicants, owners,
guards or drivers of mail-carts, stagecoaches or public conveyances,
carriers and higglers (1831, s. 18). This enactment interferes with
the grant of game licences to large stores which also have licences to
sell beer. The licensed dealer may buy British game only from persons
who are lawfully entitled to sell game. Conviction of an offence under
the Game Act 1831 avoids the licence (s. 22). The local licence must
also be supplemented by an excise licence for which a fee of L2 is
charged. Licensed dealers in game are prohibited from selling game
killed in the United Kingdom from the tenth day after the beginning of
close time to the end of that period. The provisions above stated
under the act of 1831 applied only to England, but were in 1860
extended to the rest of the United Kingdom, and were in 1893 applied
to dealers in game imported from abroad. The main effect of the system
of licences is to prevent the disposal of game by poachers rather than
to benefit the revenue.

_Deer_.–Deer are not included within the definition of game in any of
the English game laws. Deer-stealing was very seriously punished by
the old law, and under an act of 9 George I. c. 22, known as the
Waltham Black Act, passed because of the depredations of disguised
deer-stealers in Epping Forest, it was under certain circumstances
made a capital offence. At present offences with reference to deer are
included in the Larceny Act 1861. It is a felony to hunt or kill deer
in enclosures in forests, chases or purlieus, or in enclosed land
where deer is usually kept, or after a previous conviction to hunt or
kill deer in the open parts of a forest, &c., and certain minor
provisions are made as to arrest by foresters, forfeiture of venison
unlawfully possessed and for unlawfully setting traps for deer. These
enactments do not prevent a man from killing on his own land deer
which have strayed there (_Threlkeld_ v. _Smith_, 1901, 2 K.B. 531).
In Scotland the unlawful killing of deer is punished as theft.

_Eggs_.–The owner or occupier of land has no property in the eggs of
wild birds found on his lands unless he takes them up. But under s. 24
of the Game Act 1831 a penalty of 5s. per egg is incurred by persons
who unlawfully (i.e. without being, or having licence from, the person
entitled to kill the game) and wilfully take from the nest or destroy
in the nest the eggs of any game bird, or of a swan, wild duck, teal
or widgeon. Similar provisions exist in Ireland under an act of 1698,
and by the Poaching Prevention Act 1862 (United Kingdom) power is
given to constables to search persons suspected of poaching and to
take from them the eggs of pheasants, partridges, grouse or black
game. And the Wild Birds Protection Acts deal with the eggs of all
wild birds except game and swans.

_Damage to Crops by Game_.–Where an occupier of lands has not the
right to kill game or rabbits he runs the risk of suffering damage by
the depredations of the protected animals, which he may not kill
without incurring a liability to summary conviction or for breach of
the conditions on which he holds the land. At common law the owner of
land who has reserved to himself the sporting rights, and his sporting
tenants, must use the reserved rights reasonably. They are liable for
any damage wilfully or unnecessarily done to the crops, &c., of the
occupier, such as trampling down standing crops or breaking hedges or
fences. They are not directly liable to the occupier for damage done
to the crops by game bred on the land or frequenting it in the
ordinary course of nature; but are not entitled to turn down game or
rabbits on the land. And if game or rabbits are for the purposes of
sport imported or artificially raised on land, the person who breeds
or brings them there is liable for the damage done to the crops of
adjoining owners or occupiers (_Farrer_ v. _Nelson_, 1885, 15 Q.B.D.
258; _Birkbeck_ v. _Paget_, 31 Beav. 403; _Hilton_ v. _Green_, 1862, 2
F. & F. 821).

Recent legislation has greatly increased the rights of the occupiers
of land as against the owners of sporting rights over it. As regards
hares and rabbits the occupier’s rights are regulated by the Ground
Game Act 1880 (which is expressed to be made “in the interests of good
husbandry and for the better security of capital and labour invested
in the cultivation of the soil”). By that act the occupier of land as
incident to and inseparable from his occupation has the right to kill
and take hares and rabbits on the land. The right is indefeasible and
cannot be divested by contract with the owner or landlord or even by
letting the occupier’s sporting rights to another. But where apart
from the act the right to kill game on the land is vested in a person
other than the occupier, such person has a right concurrent with the
statutory right of the occupier to take hares and rabbits on the land.

The act does not extend to common lands nor to lands over which rights
of grazing or pasturage for not more than nine months in the year
exist. Consequently over such lands exclusive rights of killing ground
game still continue, and the law appears not to apply in cases where a
special right of killing or taking ground game vested before the 7th
of September 1880 in any person (other than the landlord) by statute,
charter or franchise (s. 5). The mode of exercise of the occupier’s
right is subject to certain limitations. The ground game is only to be
taken by him or by persons whom he has duly authorized in writing, who
must be members of his family or his servants or bona fide employed by
him for reward to take ground game. The written authority must be
produced on demand to persons having concurrent rights to take and
kill the ground game (s. 1 (1) (c)). Firearms may not be used by
night, nor may poison be used, nor may spring traps be set except in
rabbit holes (s. 6); nor may ground game be killed on days or seasons
or by methods prohibited by statute in 1880 (s. 10).

In the case of moorland and unenclosed lands (which are not arable and
do not consist of small detached portions of less than 25 acres) the
occupier may between the 1st of September and the 31st of March kill
and take ground game; but between the 1st of September and the 10th of
December firearms may not be used (1880, s. 1 (3); 1906, s. 2). In the
case of such lands the occupiers and the owners of the sporting rights
may between the 1st of September and the 10th of December make and
enforce for their joint benefit agreements for taking the ground game.
The Agricultural Holdings Act 1906 (operating from 1909) deals, _inter
alia_, with damage to crops by deer and winged game, but does not
apply to damage by hares or rabbits. The tenant of agricultural land
is entitled to compensation for damage to his crops exceeding 1s. per
acre over the area affected if caused by game, “the right to kill or
take which is vested neither in him nor in any one claiming under him
other than the landlord and which the tenant has not permission in
writing to kill” (s. 2). The right of the tenant is indefeasible and
cannot be contracted away. Disputes as to amount are to be settled by
arbitration; but claims to be effectual must be made as to growing
crops before reaping, raising or feeding off, and as to cut crops
before carrying. In the case of contracts of tenancy created before
the 1st of January 1909, allowances are to be made if by their terms
compensation for damage by game is stipulated for, or an allowance of
an agreed amount for damage by game was expressly made in fixing the
rent. The compensation is payable by the landlord subject to his right
to be indemnified in cases where the sporting rights are not vested in
him.

_Sporting Rights_.–Sporting rights (i.e. rights of fowling or of
shooting, or of taking or killing game or rabbits, or of fishing),
when severed from the occupation of land, are subject to income or
property tax, and to assessment for the purpose of local rates (Rating
Act 1874); and in valuing land whether for rates or taxes the value of
the sporting rights is now an important and often the chief item of
value in beneficial occupation of the land. Where the sporting rights
are the landlord’s, the rate thereon is paid in the first instance by
the tenant and deducted from his rent. Where the sporting right is
reserved and let, the rating authority may rate either the landlord or
the sporting tenant as occupier of the right. The Ground Game Acts
have not affected the liability to assessment of concurrent rights of
killing hares and rabbits reserved by a landlord, or of a concurrent
right granted by the occupier (Ryde (2nd ed.), 385-387). The ownership
of sporting rights severed from the ownership or occupation of the
land over which they are exercisable is not an interest in land giving
the electoral franchise or a claim for compensation if the land is
taken under the Lands Clauses Consolidation Acts.

_Scotland_.–By the law of Scotland all men have right and privilege
of game on their own estates as a real right incident thereto, which
does not pass by an agricultural lease except by express words, or in
the case of ground game by the act of 1880. The landlord is liable to
the tenant for damage done to the surface of the lands in exercise of
his right to the game and also for extraordinary damage by
over-preserving or over-stocking. Under an act of 1877 he was liable
for excessive damage done by rabbits or game reserved to or retained
under a lease granted after the 1st of January 1878, or reserved by
presumption of common law; this act from 1909 onwards is superseded by
the provisions of the Agricultural Holdings Act 1906. Night poaching
is punished by the same act as in England, and day poaching by an act
of 1832 and the act of 1882. Until 1887 poaching by night under arms
was a capital offence. The definition of game in Scotland for purposes
of night poaching is the same as in England. The provisions of the act
of 1832 as to game trespass by day apply also to deer, roe, rabbits,
woodcock, snipe, rails and wild duck; but in other respects closely
resemble those of the English act of 1831.

Offences against the game laws are not triable by justices of the
peace, but only in the sheriff court. The close time for game birds in
Scotland is the same as in England, so far as dealing in them is
concerned, but differs slightly as to killing. Black game may not be
killed between the 10th of December and the 25th of August, nor
ptarmigan between the 10th of December and the 20th of August. There
is no close time for red, fallow or roe deer, or rabbits. By an old
Scots act of 1621 (omitted from the recent wholesale repeal of such
acts) no one may lawfully kill game in Scotland who does not own a
plough-gate of land except on the land of a person so qualified.

_Ireland_.–The common law as to game is the same for Ireland as for
England. The game laws of Ireland are contained partly in acts passed
prior to the union (1698, 1707, 1787 and 1797), partly in acts limited
to Ireland, and as to the rest in acts common to the whole United
Kingdom.

Under the act of 1698 no one may kill game in Ireland who has not a
freehold worth L40 a year or L1000 net personality, and elaborate
provisions are made by that and later acts against the keeping of
sporting dogs by persons not qualified by estate to kill game. British
officers and soldiers in Ireland appear to have been much addicted to
poaching, and their activities were restrained by enactments of 1698
and 1707.

Night poaching in Ireland is dealt with by an act of 1826. Trespass on
lands in pursuit of game to which the landlord or lessor has by
reservation exclusive right is summarily punishable under an act of
1864, which includes in the definition of game, woodcock, snipe,
quails, landrails, wild duck, widgeon and teal. Under the Land Act
1881 the landlord of a statutory holding may at the commencement of
the term subject to the Ground Game Acts retain and exercise the
exclusive right of taking “game” as above defined.

A game licence is not required for taking or killing rabbits. But in
other respects the law as to game licences, dog licences and licences
to deal in game is the same as in Great Britain.

_British Possessions Abroad_.–The English game laws have not been
carried to any colony as part of the personal law of the colonists,
nor have they been extended to them by imperial or colonial
legislation. But the legislatures of many colonies have passed acts to
preserve or protect native or imported wild animals, and in some of
these statutes the protected animals are described as game. These
statutes are free from feudal prepossessions as to sporting rights,
and are framed rather on the lines of the Wild Birds Protection Acts
than on the English game laws, but in some possessions, e.g. Quebec,
sporting leases by the crown are recognized. The acts since 1895 are
indicated in the annual summary of colonial legislation furnished in
the _Journal_ of the Society of Comparative Legislation.”

Resources

Further Reading

Oke’s _Game Laws_, 4th ed., by Willis Bund (1897)
Warry, _Game Laws of England_ (1897)
Marchant and Watkins, _Wild Birds Protection Act_ (1897).