Thun: Fur and trophies 2026, a step backwards
Thun remains a symbol of a hunting culture that displays, awards and markets dead wildlife. On Friday and Saturday, January 30 and 31, 2026, the Bernese cantonal trophy exhibition with fur and pelt market will once again take place at the Thun-Expo site.
Update 2026: This article was originally published on February 12, 2017 and completely rewritten for 2026.
The event and dates have been updated to reflect the current fur and pelt market and the trophy exhibition in Thun (January 30 and 31, 2026). What is marketed as 'tradition' is effectively a prestige and commercial format where animal body parts become objects and recreational hunting is staged as socially acceptable normality.
The original article referred to February 11, 2017: At that time, the 'Bernese Trophy Exhibition Fur and Pelt Market' was held in Thun for the 83rd time. Already in 2017, it was visible what this is fundamentally about: a hobby hunter gathering that makes 'successes' visible through trophies and degrades the victims of recreational hunting to mere backdrop.
It's important to clearly separate this for 2026: The event is not merely a historical episode, but continues to take place and has been organizationally modernized, not ethically.
What happens today: Trophies, awards, market logic
The program includes trophy exhibitions, exhibitors, awards as well as pelt and fur trade. This mixture of exhibition, competition and market is the decisive point: Wild animals do not appear as sentient individuals, but as objects of measurement, decoration and raw material.
Friday, January 30, 2026: Trophy exhibition (19:00 to 21:30, Hall 7), exhibitors (17:00 to 22:00, Hall 0), official part with awards (19:30, riding hall).
The IG Wild beim Wild criticizes that this normalizes an approach that clearly contradicts expectations of animal ethics: Thousands of killed wild animals in the canton of Bern according to hunting statistics are at the center, body parts are measured, graded and awarded.
Why the 'game management' argument doesn't hold here
Organizers often frame such formats as 'game management' or 'status analysis'. But serious monitoring doesn't need trophy walls, but scientific instruments and transparent data, not self-presentation through antlers and horns. Moreover, what belongs to hunting reality remains systematically invisible: missed shots, injured animals, tracking wounded game, suffering.
Fox as target: Stigma instead of ecology
The fox is still often devalued in hunting terminology today. Yet as a predator it is a stabilizing part of the ecosystem. The original text already emphasized: Recreational hunting is not a sensible 'regulator' for foxes, but a disruptive factor that is compensated by reproduction.
Children, audience, habituation effect
Particularly problematic is that such events can appear socially as 'harmless tradition'. From an animal welfare perspective, it is concerning when children and adolescents are introduced to a setting that romanticizes violence and presents dead wild animals as status symbols.
What we demand
Thun must be asked what public framework the city wants to give such formats. The IG Wild beim Wild demands a departure from trophy competitions and fur trade as 'events', toward a contemporary, respectful approach to wild animals.
According to the IG Wild beim Wild, hobby hunters need annual medical-psychological aptitude assessments following the Dutch model as well as a binding upper age limit. The largest age group among hobby hunters today is 65+. In this group, age-related limitations such as declining eyesight, slowed reaction times, concentration weaknesses and cognitive deficits increase statistically significantly. At the same time, accident analyses show that the number of serious hunting accidents with injuries and fatalities increases significantly from middle age.
The regular reports of hunting accidents, fatal mishandling and misuse of hunting weapons illustrate a structural problem. The private possession and use of lethal firearms for recreational purposes largely escapes continuous control. From the perspective of IG Wild beim Wild, this is no longer responsible. A practice based on voluntary killing while simultaneously creating considerable risks for humans and animals loses its social legitimacy.
Recreational hunting is also based on speciesism. Speciesism describes the systematic devaluation of non-human animals solely because of their species membership. It is comparable to racism or sexism and is neither culturally nor ethically justifiable. Tradition does not replace moral examination.
Particularly in the realm of recreational hunting, critical scrutiny is indispensable. Hardly any other field is so characterized by embellishing narratives, half-truths and targeted disinformation. Where violence is normalized, narratives often serve justification. Transparency, verifiable facts and an open societal debate are therefore essential.
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