IG Wild beim Wild criticises hunters' market in Weinfelden
How such events combine tradition, commerce and animal suffering.
Criticism of fur, pelt and trophy events in Switzerland, exemplified by the traditional fur and pelt market in Weinfelden (TG) on 21 February 2026.
Wild animals are not commodities for entertainment, prestige and commerce.
The IG Wild beim Wild sharply criticises fur, pelt and trophy events in Switzerland in the strongest terms. Year after year, such events present killed wild animals as trophies, decorative objects and trade goods. This normalises a way of dealing with wild animals that is no longer in keeping with the times and that clearly contradicts society's expectations of animal ethics and respect for fellow creatures.
The organisers sell these events as upholding tradition and as a contribution to so-called wildlife management. In reality, the focus is on killed wild animals, whose body parts are measured, graded, awarded prizes or traded as merchandise. This practice promotes an outdated trophy culture in which what counts is not the animal as a sentient individual, but the hunting performance and the size of antlers, horns or other «signs of success».
Particularly offensive is the fact that such events additionally serve as a marketplace for the trade in pelts. Fox pelts and other hides are bought up, assessed, in some cases awarded prizes or raffled off. This trade obscures the suffering behind every single pelt and contributes to viewing wild animals as a raw material. While politics and society are taking steps towards restricting the fur trade, Switzerland continues to celebrate a commercialised form of hobby hunting that is ethically barely justifiable.
Such markets are not folklore, but part of a system that places a value on animal bodies. When pelts are traded at unit prices, animal suffering becomes a matter of calculation. It is precisely this logic that is incompatible with a modern understanding of wildlife protection .
IG Wild beim Wild also points out that the hunting practice portrayed often conveys an embellished picture. In reality, missed shots, injured animals and long ordeals of suffering are part of the everyday reality of hobby hunting. These aspects are neither addressed at such events nor openly communicated by those responsible. The claim that trophy shows serve to analyse the state of wildlife populations is barely tenable. Scientifically based monitoring instruments do not require displayed skulls and antlers, which primarily serve self-promotion. Trophies are a material expression of killed wild animals, whose kill quality, follow-up search and suffering hardly feature in the official picture.
From an animal welfare perspective, it is also concerning that children and young people are introduced to such events without being taught a respectful and contemporary approach to wild animals. Instead of imparting knowledge, the focus is on a spectacle that trivialises violence and propagates a romanticised hunting world.
Arms dealers, optics manufacturers, hunting accessories, hunting trips, raffles of hunting kills abroad: a hunting-industrial system of violence is emerging, in which kills and animal carcasses form part of a marketing system.
Whoever kills senselessly protects nothing, and it serves no purpose for a civilised society. Hobby hunters thus do not ensure healthy or natural wildlife populations, least of all with their abhorrent fox hunting. Such events regularly raise questions about ethical aspects, permit practices and public perception, and they finally deserve to be fundamentally reviewed politically and socially.
IG Wild beim Wild calls on those responsible in municipalities, towns and cantons to fundamentally rethink such events. A civilised society needs no contests in which dead wild animals are presented as achievements, and it needs no market on which pelts are traded like any commercial goods. What is needed instead is a respectful understanding of wild animals, a scientifically sound wildlife ecology and a move away from hobby hunting.