The Research Continues

 

There is very little doubt that The Red Paper 2022 I: Canids and The Red Paper 2022 II: Felids are going to shake up wildlife research and study in the UK.

When I published the first Red Paper in 2010 it was called "explosive" by more than one well known naturalist. In fact the book sold very badly and that may be because people are only interested in books with pretty fox pictures or by authors who have been on TV. Sadly, those people are pretty badly educated when it comes to the history of the fox in the UK/Ireland as well as wild cat history.

Basically, people go to university/college and study wildlife but they are taught from books that are full of dogma and taught by persons who follow that dogma and will defend it in the extreme. You see, I have spent 50 years scouring newspaper archives, old hunting and 'sport' books and naturalist/zoological publications from 18th century on. Therefore I KNOW based on contemporary accounts and papers exactly what the original three British fox types were like until hunted into extinction by the 1840s (thousands of foxes were imported into England for hunting from, at least, the 17th century on). Most modern writers will tell you that 'tales' of the three Old foxes were "the equivalent of the giant fish that got away"

That is ignorance and stupidity and shows no true knowledge. Of course naturalists in the 1970s could say they had heard tall tales of Hill foxes but had never seen one in the real world: the three fox types were extinct by the 1840s (maybe the odd pair in very isolated mountainous areas).

My colleague has actually built up a collection of rare Old fox taxidermy and that includes at least two full body Mountain foxes which p[rove they existed and were in fact larger than a coyote.

The updated Red Paper contains photographs (in colour) to prove the point.

The same thing applies to Wild cats which, as hybrids, survived in England and Wales into the early 20th century -we have the photographs and accounts. The true Old wild cat was large and dogs used to hunt them were fitted with studded collars to prevent them being killed -though dogs were and men were also seriously injured. The Old wild cat in size would probably have been near to lynx size -it was not known as "The British Tiger"/"Highland Tiger" for nothing.

In the 1690s it was noted that, had it not been for mating with feral domestic cats, the wild cat would have been extinct long ago. It was this interbreeding that kept the cats going but by 1897 the Scottish naturalists declared "the true" wild cat extinct by the 1860s. In fact, the wild cats at that time were not true wild cats but at least generation III of wild cats (feral hybrids) and, yes, my colleague has specimens from the 1830s. And I have proven what the last vestiges of wild cats looked like just before extinction.

By consulting the works of the field naturalists who (shame on them) were also the 'sportsmen' who helped make wild cats extinct- and some very highly regarded ones at that including Frankl Buckland- I can show how what is currently called the 'true Scottish wild cat' is in fact a feral tabby cat. In fact, it is possible that some were imported from Europe for 'sport' and that others escaped travelling menageries and private collections. The reason why the feral tabby DNA matches that of the European wild cat is simple:

1) they are hybrids or descendants of imported European wild cats

2) European wild cats have survived by also interbreeding with feral domestics.

When it comes to foxes and wild cats the London Natural History Museum has been downright obstructive when it comes to collaboration (the first time I have encountered this since first communicating with them in the 1970s). In fact, it is interesting that (and I have the email) despite all the obstructiveness the last email I had from the NHM was to ask what was in my paper and what had I found , etc., etc. In fact, the NHM even stated that they had no idea where (if they had the specimen) the Kellas cat handed to them in the 1980s was.

Publishers have also flatly refused to accept fully referenced manuscripts -commercially for them it might be bad as they have been publishing dogma and my works show that. I have even heard and seen people attempting to trash the books and their contents which is interesting since the books have not been published and not distributed to anyone or establishment!

In the meantime I have not stopped fox research. The Fox Deaths Project is making discoveries and to date the British Fox Study has the largest data base of fox photographs from the UK not to mention 'fox' masks (head trophies) that have been clearly identified as jackal, coyote and even wolves and whereas I originally thought these were all escapees it appears that they were in fact deliberately released by hunts for 'sport' -again, fully referenced accounts are in the book.

Our next step is DNA testing of Old fox and Old wild cat. This, however, is far too expensive and as there is some anecdotal evidence that the DNA work by one institution on an Old wild cat specimen might have been deliberately lied about there has to be independent lab analysis that can be trusted and data presented.

The work is truly never finished and I hope that in future someone can continue the research but with no funding for any fox project it is an expensive business.

So, I am still here for...well, however long.