Things that are going on.

Representatives of the HTA had a productive meeting with the Caldbeck Commoners and the Lake District national park officers on Thursday regarding the future of trailing on Caldbeck Common.

Also in the news , although nothing to do with hound trailing , just food for thought – the Australian state of New South Wales is about to ban Greyhound racing on the grounds of cruelty.

The festival of hound trailing on Saturday and , unless sponsors are forthcoming, this could be the last one.

On the subject of sponsors the Committee is in possession of two coins donated by Hamish Rose valued at around £1000 . This very welcome donation is to be used to sponsor a trail meeting in which any profit will be equally divided by the HTA and a charity of our choice.

Grasmere sports and show will soon be here and the Chairman has negotiated an increase in prize money for the three short trails, which will be £150 and £320 for the seniors, this means that the trails will be all to pay and that is £7 prepaid.So it doesn’t matter how many hounds or passengers or whether you are married  or not .

On Sunday the Committee will meet to pick a venue for the Premier trails , Shap and Buttermere are the venues put forward.

Finally Horse and Hound channel television was at Helton on Monday night included in the interview was an ex- bookmaker, a part time librarian an offcomer from Oldham whoes claim to fame is he was  the first person to run in the Everest marathon with a pacemaker. Unfortunately that isn’t so because the first person to achieve that was Sir Edmund Hillary with his pacemaker Tensing Norgay.