Kirby’s Hunting Lodge Pub (Co.Limerick)

Like many rural pubs listed on bloodbusiness.info there is very little online about Kirby’s Hunting Lodge (it was apparently once – you guessed it – an old hunting lodge). Old habits die hard, though – especially in a country where (shamefully) fox hunting is still legal. A 20 January 2023 hunting report in the Irish Field stated that Kirby’s Hunting Lodge was the starting point for a Limerick Harriers hunt and that it is “run by Donal Kirby and his mother Frances, and more welcoming hosts it would be hard to find” (the fox hunting scene prominently displayed on its facade might just give that away). Noting that the pub has a large car park for unboxing, the Field stated that “whippers-in Myles Harney, Gerry Murphy, Des Lenihan and huntsman Padraic Behan” and the rest of the field spent the day terrorising foxes, then returned to Kirby’s Hunting Lodge where “a warm welcome awaited”.