For those unaware in this 'nation of animal lovers' (hopefully the sarcasm can be detected there) good old Brits enjoyed several past times and also earned money for having 'fun'.
Felidide -the killinbg of any and every wild cat that could be found whether adult or kitten. By the 1860s that had wiped out the Old (true) wild cat across the UK.
Lucipide -same thing but here wiping out every and any wolf whether adult or cub. By the 17th/18th century wolves were wiped out.
Vulpicide -a term also used by widely: the killing of every and any fox whether adult or cub and as with lucipide and felicide this included pregnant females. The hunts knew and the famous hunters of the time wrote that the Old British foxes were headed for were headed for extinction and took action -by hunting them into extinction by the 1850s/1860s.
Red Squirrels were hunted to extinction by the 1860s but more were imported and released to continue the fun. Since that time they have faced several near extinction threats and the grey squirrel has become the scape goat for that.
Then we have (leaving aside all of the other species this 'nation of animal lovers' wiped out) there was melecide: any and every badger from male, female and cubs were killed and in a lot of the North of England badgers were wiped out and everyone commended the "good work" done. Why badgers -which 'sportsmen' hunters all declared to be harmless- survived is something I have researched and found the reason for and it is almost unbelievable. It is why, today, no one is calling for badgers to be "re-introduced".
Wildlife is still being wiped out in various ways in the UK -England is the only country practicing badger culling in the UK- from the greatest killer cars (well, humans are driving those so let's not blame the car ).
Snaring which is still going on and despite the Welsh Government banning it no one appears to be going out looking for snares and finding the culprits because no snarer making a lot of money is going to say "Oh well, it was fun while it lasted" and destroy his/her snares. Snares are inhumane and indiscriminate and kill foxes, badgers, hedgehogs, domestic pets as well as cause serious injuries to larger animals that can break free (lost feet, legs etc).
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Above: A Bristol fox that probably lost its lower leg to a snare (it did survive)
Below;despite media alerts that a pet silver fox was in Barry, Wales (the snaring capitol of the UK) and that rescuers were attempting to trap it -someone laid out snares and this puet lost its leg.
Shooting. Despite there being supposed strict gun control in the UK every night there are many 'sportsmen' who simply go out to enjoy killing things because they like to. Foxes and even domestic pets such as cats have been shot (by 'mistake' of course) -"I got a big fox last night disguised as a pet cat!" (lots of chuckles from his mates).
Even sheep and other animals are shot and injured or killed but in the countryside you can hide a lot of things. Badgers are being "illegally" killed and shooters/'sport' sites online show this clearly. Incidentally, foxes can only be "taken care of" if they are a threat to livestock and as they are not in the habit of taking down cows or calves or horses there is no threat so hundreds (by shooters own statistics) are killed across the UK every week.
Below:in a war zone people fire back so dress for the part and go out to shoot a domestic cat sized fox.
And as for badgers -I make no apologies if this upsets anyone because people who do not sign petitions, complain to their MPs or harass DEFRA over things like badgers culls are actually allowing this to continue.
There is no doubt that badgers are killed by shooters as I have spoken to farmers (poultry not dairy so where is the BTB angle) over the years who know "a chap locally will take care of foxes and badgers" and, yes, I did report these conversations to Police Wildlife Crime Officers and nothing happened. I also know that private estates "get rid of nuisances" like badgers, foxes and red squirrels. Nothing happens.
https://theecologist.org/2016/oct/11/fate-badger-great-badger-scapegoating-conspiracy
Leaving aside the (natural) emotive language:
This is why people at Wildlife trusts will tell you to keep badger locations "to yourself":
quote
ALMOST 7,500 BADGERS MURDERED IN AVON OVER FOUR YEARS
Despite substantial efforts by activists trying to prevent the cull, Avon’s badger population has suffered terribly since the cull began in the region in 2019. The number of badgers culled in Avon so far are:
2022: 1,521
2021: 2,095
2020: 2,751
2019: 1,084
AVON TOTAL: 7,451
This figure will, no doubt, increase substantially, as Avon’s first zone will enter its supplementary licence phase, and its second zone will enter its fourth year of intensive culling in September 2023.
Protect The Wild spoke to Avon Against The Badger Cull (AABC), a group which works year-round to try to prevent the murder of badgers in its area. It surveys setts to locate where badgers have survived, and then puts huge effort into trying to protect them during the cull itself. The group said:
“Well over half of England’s badgers have been killed now, although the number of badgers in England is a guesstimate, so the figure might even be much greater. The government says that the object of the cull is to reduce the spread of bovine TB. But after ten years of killing badgers, there has been very little impact on the number of cows having to be killed each year, which is still in the region of 9,500. Killing badgers is a depressing waste of money and anybody can see that it’s a failure.”
EXPANDING ONE OF AVON’S ZONES BY 136KM²
AABC’s hard work has been severely hampered by Natural England, which works on behalf of Defra to issue cull licences and decide upon the parameters of each cull zone. Natural England recently admitted in FOI responses that it had expanded one Avon zone by a massive 136km² in 2021. The decision was made covertly, with no public consultation. Environmental journalist Tracy Keeling argued that expanded cull zones this huge “are clearly large enough to qualify as cull zones in their own right.”
Keeling went on to say:
“This indicates that larger extension areas are operating in some respects as if they are separate badger culls. This includes apparently aiming to kill badgers more intensely than the cull areas they are attached to, due to the reduced number of years of operation.”
Natural England, on behalf of the government, has made a concerted effort – seemingly more so than in other areas of the country – to wipe out Avon’s badgers. 7,500 means that the old Avon (it has been the City and County of Bristol for a long time now) badger population is seriously at risk of getting to the point of being unable to sustain a population.
Many badgers die yearly on roads in and around Bristol (I only accept reports where someone has stopped and can clearly state the animal seen was a badger) and to date 2023 has seen 43 killed. We have no idea how many are killed by shooters at night or via snares and there is a brisk trade with taxidermists who take the word of the supplier that "the badger was killed by a car".
I was actually kicked off of one Face Book taxidermy group after asking too many questions. One member stated that he took photos of all his badgers on the roadside (to 'prove' that they were killed by a car) and there were up to 4-6 on a small stretch of country road every week and he could sell them on if anyone was interested. I asked what stretch of road as that was a high weekly number and I could contact the Badger Watch people and alert them so they could look into it to stop badgers being killed. That got me kicked off.
According to Badger watch over 210,000 -half of Britain's badger population (in fact estimates go as high as 230,000) has been wiped out and it has not made the slightest difference when it comes to bovine TB. In fact:
To Stamp Out “So Terrible a Malady”: Bovine Tuberculosis and Tuberculin Testing in Britain, 1890–1939
KEIR WADDINGTON, PhD*
"Local and national attempts to limit infection from bovine tuberculosis were fuelled by fears about the prevalence of the disease in cattle. A transition in the nature of agriculture, with a shift from arable to livestock and dairy farming, combined with farmers' apparent unwillingness to stamp out bovine tuberculosis, ensured that levels of infection remained high until the 1950s."
Bad animal husbandry is nothing new in the UK. I knew two German farmers who came to the UK to see how British farmers worked and were shocked "Do they know nothing about taking care of livestock?" one asked me. While foxes were blamed for lamb and sheep deaths work carried out by hunts (of all people) found that bad animal husbandry was to blame and the fox was the scapegoat. No one seems to see just how weird that sounds.
People are actively going out and searching for badger traps and smashing them. I cannot really condemn them for this because they are carrying on a fight to try to save a species from extinction. A species that was simply chosen as a scapegoat and based on non-science. In twenty years time it is possible that urban badgers are all we will have left if we are lucky. Centuries of melecide was endured and badgers survived. Now, Natural England is "legally" succeeding in what past generations failed to do.
If you really care about badgers or wildlife then get off your asses and start complaining to your MP, to DEFRA and the Natural England and if needed spam them with as many emails and phone calls as you can.
EXTINCTION IS FOREVER
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