HORSE show week beckons again, and we'll be treated to performances by some of the most talented riders and the finest horses in Ireland.

The show attracts a lot of media attention, most of it lavishing praise on the event, which has become one of the great showcasing opportunities for Irish bloodstock and the time-honoured equestrian skills of our nation.

But there is a darker side to this colourful and extravagant display. This is the occasion every year where fox hunts from all over Ireland exploit the feelgood atmosphere to promote a deceitful impression of what their 'sport' is all about.

The hunts arrive at the show in style to replicate, or so they claim, what happens in foxhunting. Dressed up in traditional hunt costume, with horns to blow and packs of hounds all happily wagging their tails, these upholders of a proud old English pastime (that the English have since banned) offer a breathtaking spectacle.

But there is always something missing from their act: the fox. Without him, their re-enactment is utterly misleading, for he is the one all those riders, horses, hounds and hunt followers chase.

Then again, I suppose it mightn't go down too well if these delightful people were to do at the show what they do across the length and breadth of rural Ireland.

The sight of a terrified, exhausted fox being cornered by the hounds, and then having the skin ripped from its bones, might present a negative image of what these ladies and gentlemen get up to.

And images of sportspeople digging out fox cubs to blood young hounds might really spoil the party. One does that business away from prying eyes.

I'll say one thing for the foxhunters. They mightn't be great animal lovers, but they've got a marvellous flair for PR.

John Fitzgerald,

Lower Coyne Street,

Callan,

Co Kilkenny