Tuesday was a sad day for our wild animals. The BBC reported that the badger cull will be extended into five new areas, although the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) would not confirm that the selections had been made. News that the already failed cull would be expanded is particularly disappointing to […]
Tag: badger cull
POLL: Should the killing of buzzards to protect pheasants be allowed?
Every year, thousands of pheasants are slaughtered by cars. What would we say if the government’s conservation watchdog issued a licence to allow a gamekeeper to shoot 10 careless motorists? Natural England has instead issued a licence to allow a gamekeeper to kill something like us: a legally protected predator, a clever, adaptable native species […]
POLL: Should the UK halt its failed badger cull policy?
The imminent expansion of England’s controversial badger cull “flies in the face of scientific evidence”, according to the nation’s foremost experts, who have called on new prime minister, Theresa May, to halt the “failed” policy. The scientists say the badger cull, intended to curb tuberculosis in cattle, is a “risky, costly, and inhumane” distraction and […]
POLL: Should the badger cull in the UK be stopped?
Police are investigating after a list apparently showing farmers who have signed up for the next phase of the badger cull was leaked to animal rights groups. One group that advocates direct action, Stop the Cull, has said it intends to publish the list of farmers in south Devon – one of the new areas […]
POLL: Should the National Wildlife Crime Unit be properly funded by the British Government?
There is a crime wave cascading through Britain that the government doesn’t appear much to care about. In Lincolnshire alone, police have arrested or reported for summons 152 people for hare coursing since September 2015, compared with just 65 for the entire “season” last year. Across the country, the Badger Trust logged 441 incidents of badger […]
POLL: Should all badger culls in the UK be stopped?
The government is to relax the restrictions on its controversial badger culls as it rolls them out to new areas in 2016. But a leading scientist has warned that the move makes it even less likely that culling will achieve its aim of reducing tuberculosis in cattle and could even make it worse. The badger […]
Poll: Should badger culls be continued in the UK?
A Conservative-led government will continue the cull of badgers regardless of complaints from protesters, the environment secretary has pledged. Speaking at the annual National Farmers Union (NFU) conference in Birmingham, Liz Truss set up a pre-election badger battle with Labour, which has promised to end what it calls the “ineffective and inhumane” programme intended to […]
Testing cattle better than culling badgers to control bovine TB
Frequent testing of cattle is a far more effective way of controlling bovine tuberculosis (TB) than culling badgers, research suggests. A new computer simulation showed that vigilant cattle testing can eventually eradicate the disease whether or not badgers are culled. Badger culling alone did not lead to TB eradication, according to the model. The research […]