Back on the 9th March, 2024 I posted an item titled Naturalists Are A Dying Breed you can find that here
https://foxwildcatwolverineproject.blogspot.com/2024/03/naturalists-are-dying-breed.html
The post including what we call a "hook line"; something that will get a reaction or should get a reaction: " I think I can guess the responses to this and yet I cannot believe that I am the only field naturalist left in Bristol! "
And it took a week or so but I got a rather petulant reaction and I had said to someone that I guaranteed the main reaction would be petulant.. How dare I call myself the only naturalist in Bristol blah blah blah. So I responded saying that now that had been said what did the person have in mind re. getting volunteers and carrying on the fox death ans badger deaths projects? Now, I had stated clearly that I set up the Bristol Badger Group in 1994 and so the suggestion was that I get the Somerset Badger Group to help.
That was it. Big petulant response and "I have absolutely nothing" so why even respond. I would tell you about all the other responses but... there were none. Thousands of members of groups and nothing.
Today there were four dead badgers reported and they were not reported privately but on open public groups. Sarah Mills and a friend checked one...it was gone. Then Sarah went to check on another -gone. Apparently a third vanished. How? Well, the answer is simple since the City Council works Monday to Friday and being a bank holiday -nothing.Earliest collection would be Tuesday. It is a fact, I have even been told by some and had two admit that they grabbed foxes that were reported to me on Face Book groups as possible wildlife crime evidence (poisoning).
Taxidermists. A headless fox found on a city street was not bitten off but neatly cut off. This I was told by a taxidermist was likely by one of his compatriots. I was told if the body of a road kill fox is too messy then the head is still worth working on and selling "Usually we'll pop the body in a bin" he told me. Two foxes suspected of being poisoned were placed on a wall for someone to collect. It was made clear on the group where they were reported that these were suspected poisonings and so possible wildlife crime and to be submitted for post mortem examination. The person who went to collect them found the foxes gone and the woman who reported them noted that a man in a car pulled up and put both in a bag then in his car and drove off "He never even knocked as I was told he would". Nothing to do with me and the man was later identified as a taxidermist.
Snatching dead foxes and badgers for your little business is well and good but these people do not check whether the fox is a vixen or badger a sow and whether they are lactating meaning that orphaned cubs need to be checked for. There is no interest in wildlife on their part and they do not care whether they grab evidence in poisoning cases or not.
Of course, taxidermists are not interested in volunteering in picking up and transporting dead otters or foxes for PM examination.
As it happens it is likely that we will struggle to collect any such dead animals. Today a approx 10 week old fox collapsed and died and his body was green; very jaundiced and Sarah Mills contacted me and we have the fox ready for submission and testing.
I have seen jaundice but the entire eye was green and the cub itself looked in good bodily condition. Other foxes we have lost.
Pretty flowers, butterflies, birds are only part of nature and I still cannot understand why "naturalists" in Bristol are not interested in badgers (alive or dead) and foxes other than rare photo opportunities. The Fox Death Project is discovering things and the only project of its type in the UK but no one wants to be part of that.
I am currently having to re-evaluate what will happen in 2024 but so far it looks bleak. Fighting bureaucracy to get the post mortems carried out and all the side issues and problems and it may all fail through indifference.
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