Badger culls- for or against?

[Harbornite]

Badger culls have been in the news again.

New badger culling trials given go ahead across England

Badger culls are to be carried out in five new areas of England in a bid to control bovine TB, the BBC has learnt.
Shooting of badgers will begin in early September in South Devon, North Devon, North Cornwall, West Dorset, and South Herefordshire, the BBC understands.
Culling is part of the government's 25-year-strategy to eradicate the disease, but opponents say there is no evidence culling is effective.
Dorset, Gloucestershire and Somerset are already practising culling.
More on the extension of the badger cull trials
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) would not confirm the selections had been made but said it was "currently considering applications for further badger control licences as part of the usual licensing process".
However, the BBC understands that culling companies have already been selected, and marksmen trained for the new locations.
Tony Francis, a farmer who had TB in his herd near Okehampton in Devon, said he had signed up to one of the new cull zones to try to prevent the disease from returning.
'Take control'
"It's an issue which has been going on for decades," he said.
"No-one has really got on top of it. I think the agricultural industry feel we've got to try and take control of it."

Badger cull in numbers

Culls took place in 2013, 2014 and 2015

3,943 Badgers culled in Somerset, Gloucestershire and Dorset

50,000 Badgers estimated to be killed by vehicles on UK roads every year

1,627 culled in Gloucestershire

1,560 culled in Somerset

756 culled in Dorset

£7,262.21 per badger cost to police and government of 2014 cull
Sources: House of Commons Library and The Wildlife Trusts
Thinkstock

According to Defra, England has the highest rate of bovine TB in Europe, which results in thousands of cattle being slaughtered every year.
But anti-culling campaigners say there is no evidence that killing badgers is reducing the level of TB in cattle.

Jenny Pike, of campaign group Devon and Cornwall Against the Badger Cull, said only 6% of TB cases in cattle came through badgers and the government should focus on curbing cattle-to-cattle transmissions.
"It really is not a good use of taxpayer money, and it's going to cost thousands of badgers their lives for no benefit at all to farmers," she said.
Paul Wilkinson, head of living landscapes at The Wildlife Trusts, said: "The evidence shows that badgers are not the primary culprits in the spread of TB in cattle - the primary route of infection is via cow-to-cow contact. A vaccine for cattle should be a priority.
"Culling has been shown to be more expensive, less effective than other bovine TB control mechanisms and the free-shooting of badgers has been shown to be an inhumane method of killing."
In March hundreds of protestors campaigned against the plans to introduce culling in Devon and a significant policing operation has been planned in case of disorder when culling begins in the new locations in September.
Culling in Gloucestershire is expected to be extended, while those in west Somerset and north Dorset are due to continue, the BBC has also learnt.


Badger culling - the story so far


2013: Trial culls of badgers begin to opposition in west Gloucestershire and west Somerset

April 2014: The government u-turns on plans to expand trials to other locations after an independent assessment shows they were not effective or humane in 2013

August 2014: A new assessment by Defra finds targets for killing badgers have been met in Somerset, but not in Gloucestershire
September 2015: Culling is extended to north Dorset

February 2016: The government reveals that six new areas had applied for badger cull licences but did not specify the exact locations

August 2016: More than 3,900 badgers have been killed since the cull started in Somerset, Gloucestershire and Dorset

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-devon-37158418


I was wondering what you all think of these? Good for the countryside or bad?

 

[Howardh]

Emotive issue - but no idea who to believe. But generally feel there's more that could be done to the affected cattle?

 

[Busaholic]

Why won't the UK introduce vaccination against TB for cattle like so many other countries have? Because some elements of the Countryside lobby have always hated badgers and are implacably opposed to their protection, which, incidentally, only came about through the campaigning efforts of a Conservative Peer of the Realm by the name of 'Buffy' Arran and his columns over many years in the long-dead London Evening News. I pass badger setts daily in Cornwall on my walks with my dog, but rarely see their corpses on the roads like I used to, so can only conclude that their numbers have declined in, literally, this neck of the woods.

 

[Trog]

A quick Google suggests that vaccination is illegal under EU law, apparently there is no way to tell the difference between a vaccinated and an infected cow.

 

[Phil.]

Simple equation.
Areas that have a high Badger population have a high incidence of Bovine T.B.
Areas that have a low Badger population have a low incidence of Bovine T.B.
Badgers are attractive looking disease spreaders.
Rats are unattractive disease spreaders.
No-one complains about rats being shot.

Go figure.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

A quick Google suggests that vaccination is illegal under EU law, apparently there is no way to tell the difference between a vaccinated and an infected cow.

That won't be a problem in a couple of years!

Though even then, with the Tories in charge culls will still happen, as long as the shooters are able to dress in red and ride on horseback. :roll:
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Simple equation.
Areas that have a high Badger population have a high incidence of Bovine T.B.
Areas that have a low Badger population have a low incidence of Bovine T.B.
Badgers are attractive looking disease spreaders.
Rats are unattractive disease spreaders.
No-one complains about rats being shot.

Go figure.

A fair point, though rats (which I think are quite attractive animals, but that's by-the-by) only spread disease because they live in the filth that humans leave behind. Also, shooting is probably not the most efficient method of eradicating rattus rattus.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Though even then, with the Tories in charge culls will still happen, as long as the shooters are able to dress in red and ride on horseback. :roll:

How many cases have been reported of armed badger hunters being dressed in red and riding on horseback?

 

[Trog]

That won't be a problem in a couple of years!

Though even then, with the Tories in charge culls will still happen, as long as the shooters are able to dress in red and ride on horseback. :roll:.

I think you will find that was foxes, the dog like red brown creature with a bushy tail and a dead chicken in its mouth. As opposed to badgers which are low slung grey creatures with a black and white face, often seen in the company of cows with a sixty a day habit cough. :roll::roll::roll:

 

[61653 HTAFC]

How many cases have been reported of armed badger hunters being dressed in red and riding on horseback?

I think you will find that was foxes, the dog like red brown creature with a bushy tail and a dead chicken in its mouth. As opposed to badgers which are low slung grey creatures with a black and white face, often seen in the company of cows with a sixty a day habit cough. :roll::roll::roll:

Oh dear, it seems there's been an outbreak of Sarcasm Blindness Syndrome...

 

[Tetchytyke]

Farmers always like to blame other people for their failings.

Foxes spread disease, best shoot them. Badgers spread disease, best shoot them.

All these issues, as well as foot-and-mouth and BSE, come back to shockingly poor husbandry in the big factory farms. The diseases started with poor husbandry, were spread by poor husbandry, and prolonged by poor husbandry.

You'd probably eradicate bovine TB quicker by putting the farmers down, truth be told.

 

[meridian2]

For.

The problem is the government's reliance on importing cattle with bovine TB. Bovine TB is not native to this country, but was introduced and soon, badgers could be found to carry it.

It may be the case that it tackles the symptom and not the cause, but until the government stop relying on cheap imports of cattle, extreme measures have to be taken.

 

[backontrack]

Killing these badgers won't make a difference. I think that going ahead with these culls is careless and, as Arctic Troll said, just trying to find a scapegoat. We are morally obliged to find a different course of action.

 

[SS4]

As Brian May put it: Keep the Badgers Alive!

 

[Phil.]

As Brian May put it: Keep the Badgers Alive!

Brian May. The rock guitarist who bought a Devon estate and then had the red deer on the estate culled.
Keep playing your guitar Mr. Hypocrite and leave running of the countryside to the experts.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

For.

The problem is the government's reliance on importing cattle with bovine TB. Bovine TB is not native to this country, but was introduced and soon, badgers could be found to carry it.

It may be the case that it tackles the symptom and not the cause, but until the government stop relying on cheap imports of cattle, extreme measures have to be taken.

No cattle with bovine T.B. are imported. Every single head of cattle coming in to the country is tested and, if found with bovine T.B. slaughtered. Bovine T.B. has been in the country for many many years. Long before any animal rights or PETA types were born.

http://www.tbfreeengland.co.uk/faqs/

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Brian May. The rock guitarist who bought a Devon estate and then had the red deer on the estate culled.
Keep playing your guitar Mr. Hypocrite and leave running of the countryside to the experts.

Doesn't seem so hypocritical when you read his explanation of the situation (assuming what he wrote is correct) (Telegraph link):

Mr May, who runs Save Me, an animal rights charity which opposes hunting, wrote on his Facebook page: "I inherited culling of deer on the land I bought in Dorset a few years ago, and was initially advised that I ought to keep it up because having a gamekeeper discouraged poachers. I had my doubts, but I was new to forest management, and realised I had much to learn.

"I decided to let it continue for a short period, observe for a while, and then take what action I felt was right. A couple of years ago, having studied the effects, I decided to stop the culling."

 

[Phil.]

Doesn't seem so hypocritical when you read his explanation of the situation (assuming what he wrote is correct) (Telegraph link):

What's the difference between culling and hunting? The result is the same - dead animals. The man is a hypocrite.

 

[Rich McLean]

In an ideal world, there would be a natural predator to keep the population manageable, however, this is not the case in the UK.

Culling may be a necessary evil to prevent the spread of disease

 

[61653 HTAFC]

In an ideal world, there would be a natural predator to keep the population manageable, however, this is not the case in the UK.

Culling may be a necessary evil to prevent the spread of disease

Now there's a thought... let's reintroduce wolves!

 

[Harbornite]

Now there's a thought... let's reintroduce wolves!

That might not be as unrealistic as you think and has been discussed!

A pair of highland ponies nibble grass as two kestrels swoop across the path. Up a rock face across this windswept valley deep in the Scottish highlands, a golden eagle is hunting for prey, its movements tracked by a GPS tag. Nearby are Scottish wildcats among the bracken – Europe’s rarest cat, with fewer than 400 left – plus red squirrels, black grouse, the occasional pine marten, shaggy highland cattle adapted to the harsh environment here, and, like much of the highlands, plenty of deer. Wild boar and moose roamed this corner of Sutherland until recently.

But if Paul Lister, the estate’s multimillionaire owner and the heir to the MFI fortune gets his way, two species not seen on this land for centuries could soon be added to the list: wolves and bears. Alladale estate, which Lister prefers to call a “wilderness reserve”, is one of the most ambitious examples of so-called “rewilding”, the banner under which a growing number of people are calling for the reintroduction of locally extinct species to landscapes. Bringing back species such as wolves, beavers and lynx, rewilding advocates say, can increase the diversity of other flora and fauna, enable woodlands to expand and help reconnect people with nature.

The unofficial figurehead for this movement, the outlines of which will become clearer with the formation of a new charity early next year called Rewilding Britain, is Guardian columnist and author George Monbiot. His book Feral, published in 2013, has been reprinted over 30 times in hardback and has led to a national debate over the merits of restoring the country to a wilder state.

“For me, it’s part of a wider effort to develop a positive environmentalism, which we desperately need,” says Monbiot. “[It’s about] creating a vision for a better world that is much more appealing than just laying out what is wrong with the current one, of having a rather more inspiring one than saying, ‘Do as we say and world will be a bit less crap than it could be’.”

More here...

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/19/-sp-rewilding-large-species-britain-wolves-bears

http://www.wolvesandhumans.org/wolves/wolf_reintroduction_to_scotland.htm