Hobby hunter shoots pets into cat heaven

Bernd Green from near Berlin is a hobby hunter, and he apparently takes great pleasure in shooting cats — or so suggests a provocative Facebook post that has now backfired badly on the serial killer.

In the post, Bernd Green had boasted about having already killed 28 cats this year alone, on the grounds that, in his opinion, these animals simply have no place in the local natural environment.

The passionate hobby hunter had posted this as a comment beneath a post on the page “Bürgerinitiative Pro Fuchs Hessen”. In the middle of the month, the page had been the scene of heated debate on the topic of free-roaming cats.

Now Bernd Green’s employer, the «Tropical Islands», a leisure pool in Brandenburg where he is said to have worked as a gardener, caught wind of the tasteless comment — and reacted promptly: the employee has been suspended until further notice..

Prior to this, Bernd Green had repeatedly attracted negative attention on social media. On a Pro Fuchs page, he publicly insulted animal welfare activists as “Fuchs-Nazis”, among other things. The hobby hunter now appears to have deleted his social media profiles. The tasteless comment can no longer be found on the “Bürgerinitiative Pro Fuchs Hessen” page either.

Bernd Green: Hobby hunters stand by their comrade

Online, the Facebook comment and its consequences have since caused quite a stir — not only among animal welfare advocates, but also within the hunting community.

In the forum of the hunting magazine ‘Wild und Hund’, for example, there is unanimous agreement that the hobby hunter made no mistake and that his actions are moreover expressly protected under hunting law in the state of Brandenburg. For next time, however, the suspended employee is advised to show greater restraint.

Free-roaming cats: Can hunters really shoot them?

Hunting law in Germany is not uniformly regulated and depends on the legislation of the individual federal state in which a hunter practices. In Bavaria, hunters are permitted to shoot cats found in the wild more than 300 metres from the nearest house. In Brandenburg, the distance is only 200 metres. The shooting of free-roaming cats is entirely prohibited in Saarland and North Rhine-Westphalia.