Genesee Valley Hunt
3899 Huston Rd.,
Geneseo, New York 14454.
Established 1876.
Recognized 1893.

The rules change in December in the Genesee Valley. Our dress code relaxes completely so as to make hunting possible in our usually horrible early winter weather. And the footing is deep and sometimes partially frozen.

Our season is often over by now, as hunting must stop when the Genesee River freezes, so each day that it’s possible to go out in December is considered a gift. Although the fields are very small, the foxes really do start to run!

On Dec. 13, our raggedy little field assembled at the kennels on a surprisingly nice day. Of the four riders who showed up, three were staff. These die-hard hunters included our Jt.-MFH Martha Wadsworth, our professional whip and kennelman Travis Thorne, huntsman Marion Thorne and hunt secretary Janice Barrett.

Our road whips, who also numbered four, were ready in their parkas and trucks. Ed Lavery drove the hound truck. Amateur whips Annie Morss and John Chanler, both sidelined by injuries, were driving their own vehicles, and photographer Bill Gamble was in his own car.

Hunting conditions seemed perfect–a 35-degree day with a light west wind. We set off for the north, drawing through the east edge of the Simpson Woods but hoping not to find until we crossed Huston Rd. and got on the Smith farm.

Our pilot was waiting there. Hounds went screaming into the covert, losing almost right away near the earth. We shook our heads sadly, thinking it was not a great start, perhaps because it was the last day of shotgun deer season. Seconds later, however, the pack were on again, speeding south of the woods in the low thorn-bush field.

Now they were really moving. We started galloping east through Annie’s Woods and across the open field to Galway Farm. We reached the northwest corner just in time to see them streaking across the Soteks’ wheat field north of Galway Farm, surprising a deer hunter heading out on his four-wheeler.
When we reached the Henty Covert, hounds had already turned west in Billy’s swale and headed for the Farm Woods. Some hounds checked here, but in the distance, at the Smith Woods again, the rest of the pack was raging on. We raced off, encouraging our group to catch up.

At this point we realized that they were split, with the front group shooting south to Kat Mandrell’s and the other group filling the Smith Woods with their music. As the latter group pushed their pilot on, the car followers on South Avon Rd. were treated to a view of a fine, healthy fox crossing the road, northbound.

Meanwhile, half of the pack was having a terrible time in Annie’s horse pasture with hound-proof (not fox-proof) fence slowing down the hounds. Eventually they went on, tracing a figure-eight south across Huston Rd., then west and north again, ending up at the Farm Woods, where they lost or put to ground. We did not wait to find out, as the other pack was still in earshot.

We gathered up our little bunch and galloped off to the east, hooting like cowboys, just in time to see the others flowing across the green hay field north to the Triangle Lot on the railroad bed. This is always a tricky area, but today our quarry could not lose his eager pursuers.

They worked north to Billy’s swale, east to the hedgerow, and then started north with determination through the Haverford Farm, with tenant Pinky Edmunds excitedly waving us on.

The pack ran on north through the horse pasture and then into the woods west. The fox followed the swale running north and west toward Jimmy Hanna’s barns on Hogmire Rd. Reynard crossed the Kuchars’ pasture west of their house and headed for the Black Creek Woods over a newly cut cornfield that seemed to stretch a mile ahead and was the deepest footing yet.

When we arrived there panting, our hounds were already on the north side near the swamp. As we bushwhacked our way to
the trail, Gamble, situated on Fowlerville Rd., saw hounds exit the east side of the swamp and run east toward the railroad bed near busy Rt. 39. Our road whips were right on top of things, reporting that the fox had turned south, paralleling the road along a recently plowed field.

We chose the railroad bed, to finally get some firm footing, and galloped along with the hounds in view on our left, while the road whips kept pace along the shoulder of Rt. 39. At Hogmire Rd., Pinky waved us on south. He had seen a brace–two foxes–running together in front of hounds!
At Haverford Farm, the pair of pilots cut west again briefly, but then took off south back to Billy’s swale. No rest here as they speedily retraced their steps from Annie’s Woods to the Smith Farm swale, then south to Kat’s Woods.

We were really worried about our horses now, as we had been running an hour and a half already, with no checks. We nursed them over the next four or five jumps as hounds flew west toward the Simpson Woods. This line was nearly straight, as the foxes headed for the Granger Woods to the Big Woods to the river, and along that to the Big Meadow.

Exhausted, we watched from the hill as hounds shot across the soybean field and into the tiny covert on the north side of the Big Meadow. Here their music finally stopped, and the silence seemed so strange to us. Hounds had been speaking without pause for two hours and 10 minutes! We dragged ourselves down to the flats, to find the hounds wandering around and showing very little interest in a few holes on the bank.

We were delighted to let our foxes get away after riding some 20 miles, with a five-mile point. Gamble logged about 40 miles of driving as he sought vantage points to photograph the hunt and aid the road whips.

As we limped across the Big Meadow to the waiting hound truck, the celebrations began. The four staff who’d started were all still there, and it was the hunt of a lifetime–just reward for a year of hard work!