Furbabies, dog mums, pawrents. The way that we think about our dogs is changing.  Across the world, governments (and the pope) are wringing their hands over plummeting procreation, while their citizens merrily bundle puppies into papooses.

You could be forgiven for thinking that it's only millennial urbanites that treat their dogs like children. But not all trail-hunting country folk are immune to this shift in perspective. Even if it's expressed very differently.

For example, when we asked William Bethell – who is a hunt master at the Holderness Hunt in the East Riding of Yorkshire – whether the hounds at his hunt were beaten to make them behave, he said:

"Possibly, sometimes…  

"Would you beat a child to make it behave? Yes."

He could not give details of what form these beatings might take because disciplining hounds is the responsibility of the huntsman and whipper-in. He also clarified that he did not have children. Also –dogs that can’t keep up with the pack and can’t be rehomed are shot in the head.

A representative of Hull Wildlife Protectors, Charlotte Smith, said:

"The wider public, I don’t think they understand that these dogs get shot in the head regardless – the majority of them. They rarely get rehomed and there is obviously a welfare concern given what they are used for – even in trail hunting."

The most common allegation you’ll hear about groups like the Holderness is that they use trail hunting as a smokescreen for fox hunting. It’s the reason the current government has pledged to ban it.

Needless to say, they strongly deny that this is the case.

But the argument over the hounds is more complex. It’s less a dispute over the facts of their treatment, and more a question of what we owe to dogs.

For most pet dog owners, the thought of their pooches’ life ending prematurely – never mind with a gun – is horrendous. Is it right to consider hounds in the same terms?

Oliver Hughes is the managing director of the British Hound Sports Association (BHSA). He said that hounds learn most of their discipline in the nine to ten months they spend living with families on farms after being weaned and before they come to live with the other dogs as part of a hunt. 

From then on, he said that hounds were generally disciplined verbally. "Obviously when you have that many large hounds living together, discipline is required," he said. "But as for physical assault, I very much doubt that’s the case across the country."  

The RSPCA is opposed to "aversive" training techniques, including shouting and hitting, which they say are unnecessary for modifying dog behaviour. A spokesperson said: "Aversive training techniques cause pain, fear, may compromise welfare and can make some behavioural problems worse and the RSPCA believes reward-based methods should be used instead." 

Mr Hughes also said that, because they have been living as part of a pack, hounds are rarely suitable for rehoming. He thinks that it’s a mistake to think of hounds in the same terms as pets, like the lurcher and border terrier that were asleep at his feet. "They’re not domesticated, they’re large animals," he said. "They’re more likely to eat the sofa than lie on the sofa."  

He emphasised that the welfare of hounds was the BHSA’s priority and explained that hounds who are left in kennels while the others go hunting will pine for the other dogs. Mr Hughes then draws on an analogy from ‘Dogs in the Wild’, a TV series presented by Chris Packham, who is an outspoken opponent of trial hunting. An episode on African wild dogs revealed that, if separated from their pack for veterinary treatment, the animals die of grief.

While the BHSA did acknowledge that shooting the dogs is one form of euthanasia that is used, they said that hunts increasingly had vets that would come to the kennels to deliver a lethal injection. Whichever method, he was clear that the unfamiliar environment of a veterinary surgery would be a more distressing experience.

Section four of The Animal Welfare Act 2006 prohibits unnecessary suffering and is clear that the ‘destruction of an animal in an appropriate and humane manner’ does not constitute such. For this reason, Edie Bowles, solicitor and co-founder of the law firm Advocates for Animals, said that legally, there’s no blanket verdict when it comes to physically beating or shooting dogs.

"Gratuitous cruelty is not allowed," she explained. "You could not just argue you are 'training your dogs’ using a cruel method. I cannot see a court being sympathetic with that at all.

"But let's imagine that hounds are running into the middle of the road and there's a risk – then yes, maybe in that situation, rightly or wrongly, a court might be more sympathetic."

Ms Bowles said that the same thing would be true of shooting dogs.

"Let's imagine a dog has been hit by a car and, to put the dog out of their misery, you've shot the dog in the head. You can see how a court might be sympathetic to the idea that that was appropriate and humane in those circumstances.

"However, you can see another scenario where a dog was shot from a distance, without a clean shot, and it wasn't appropriate, it wasn't humane, although even there you will need to evidence the suffering. So, it really will depend on the specifics of the case."

Those specifics include the type of hunting being practised.

"This is also all against the backdrop of some hunting with hounds being illegal – and the hunters putting the animals in harm's way," she added.

 "So a case could also be made that any hitting or shooting a dog that has stemmed from that activity could never be deemed necessary or humane."