UP TO 33,500 BADGERS TO BE SHOT IN THE AUTUMN CULL

The government has announced that more licences have been issued for the shooting of up to 33,500 of the nationally protected badger. Contrary to the imformation of the past 5 years culling which is being cherry-picked to make it look as though the cull is working it is a shambles. Badgers have as many as 10 setts so if you kill at one sett they just move off to another and you end up chasing them around the countryside until your licence runs out. The cost of culling 1 badger runs into several thousand pounds, the cost per head for vaccination is just £84. Vaccination is being undertaken by private donations through Wildlife Trusts and similar organisations and it works. While shooting at night could injure or kill innocent animals or even people.
This imformation was obtained from THE GUARDIAN Published 11 September 2017.

Another badger cull this Autumn

Another badger cull is planned for this Autumn. Licences have been issued for the culling of up to 1,000 badgers in Somerset and Gloucestershire. I fail to see the use of this cull when it will leave approx. 800,000 badgers to carry on spreading BTB. sorry that could be the other way round. One may hear of lots of reports of cattle being found with BTB but I am yet to come across a report of a badger with it. This disease is also carried by deer and there are far more deer roaming our countryside than badgers. Bovine TB is carried by many animals including household cats. I can remember back in the 1960's TB was rife in humans and by the late 70's it had almost disappeared through vaccination on a grand scale and it has only returned because of immigration, but it it still under control. So if the government still insists on culling perhaps it should be extended to include the many animals that we keep as pets.
This terrible disease is spread through excretions from the body, have you ever looked at a farmyard that is used by cattle then looked at the area surrounding a badger sett, badgers have latrines, cattle do it anywhere all over their dinner table, need I say more. Flies are seen all over cattle (at both ends), the only time you will see a fly on a badger is when the badger is dead.
It is cheaper to vaccinate than to cull. I am glad to say that some counties will not comply with the cull and many land owners will not allow it on their land. Wales vaccinate as do Ireland.

Murder most foul

 I make it a habit to check any badger carcas that I come across on my travels. This one appeared just 10 minutes after I had driven along this peice of road. It was so fresh that even the flies had yet to find it. Method of killing was most certainly shot gun. It was an obvious illegal killing and so close to home I didn't report it in case of any backlash. This happened more than 2 months ago. Badgers use their own pathways and this was nowhere any known pathway in fact local badgers are nowhere near this spot.
Badgers are a protected animal and one has to have a special licence, only issued in certain area's during the official cull.

The Big Eighty

With the life I've had I didn't think I would get this far, but today I hit the eighty mark and I feel great. So good that I celebrated with a 2 mile walk, with my camera of course. What a dissapointment, this was the only decent picture that I got (spotted flycatcher), although I did spend about 20 minutes watching the earth move, waiting for a mole to appear, but no such luck he was quite happy under the soil. I had the idea that I could have a personal celebration with some good pictures but not this time. So I spent some time in my garden this evening with the fox and hedgehog, the fox only made a fleeting visit to pick up his biscuits while the hedgehog stayed longer, it takes some time to eat all those mealworms.