INTOTHEVALLEY OF DEFRA AS BADGERSFACE EXTERMINATION
Flying in the face of all the scientific evidence, the government’s chief scientific advisor David King is urging for war to be declared on Britain’s badger population.
Speaking to a select committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. He contradicted the findings of the ten year and £34 million Independent Scientific Group (ISG) report into the transmission of Bovine TB between badger populations and cattle. The research programme involved extensive extermination of badgers in controlled zones throughout the country and resulted in the trapping and slaughter of 11,000 badgers.
Unsurprisingly it reached the same conclusion that wildlife activists had predicted when they begged the government not to carry out the killing – that transmission of TB in cattle is largely down to cattle. That this no-brainer even warranted such a scheme to prove it is evidence of the intensive farming lobby’s grip on DEFRA (Dept. for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs).
Unfortunately the announcement probably signals another onslaught against wildlife, as the plans outlined by Mr King involve killing all badgers in areas not less than 100 square km, in an obvious attempt to overcome the evidence that shows that culling increases TB spread in neighbouring areas – the larger the area in question, the lower disease collateral damage in percentage terms. Clever eh?
Badger groups nationwide have vowed to take direct action. A spokesman for the the Coalition of Badger Action Groups (CBAG) told SchNEWS, “We took action against the experimental culling in the South West – we were out nine months of the year, chasing MAFF (Ministries for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries – now DEFRA) from their base in Truro. We obstructed them, dismantled traps and freed trapped animals. We were dodging MAFF, dodging farmers and dodging the filth but we destroyed 70% of the traps. Direct action will continue – but we’re going to need numbers if they roll this programme out across the whole country.”
BROCKAND A HARD PLACE
The ISG findings were summarised by John Bourne – the group’s chair: “While badgers are clearly a source of cattle TB, careful evaluation of our own and others’ data indicates that badger culling can make no meaningful contribution to cattle TB control in Britain. Indeed, some policies under consideration are likely to make matters worse rather than better… Scientific findings indicate that the rising incidence of disease can be reversed, and geographical spread contained, by the rigid application of cattle-based control measures alone.” – Pretty unequivocal you might think but its not good enough for the farmer-friendly DEFRA. Well what’s a few thousand badgers between friends when there’s all those meat-industry profits to be had?
During the past 28 years, DEFRA (and formerly MAFF) have killed more than 40,000 badgers in a failed effort to halt bovine TB outbreaks. In fact, TB in cattle has been increasing since 1986, including in areas where badgers have been eliminated, or where they have been shown to be free of the disease.
Bovine TB was almost eradicated from the national herd in the 1980s but there has since been a dramatic resurgence, actually neatly mirroring the increased implementation of more intensive animal husbandry techniques. Cases are still currently rising 14% year on year. And the disease cost £80m last year in compensation to farmers who had their animals slaughtered.
But over 80% of the budget for research into Bovine TB is spent on researching the badger link – and not looking into how the increase in TB in cattle goes hand in hand with the increase in all forms of communicable diseases amongst cattle.
TB OR NOT TB
The modern farm animal is a hothouse flower, overbred and pumped full o’ drugs for maximum meat and milk production using all the latest ‘advanced’ veterinary techniques. After a lifetime of overstocking, this animal is then trucked around the country for sale and slaughter.
In human beings, TB flourishes amongst physically and psychologically compromised individuals on poor diets and with inadequate housing. This is a fair description of life in cattle sheds and milking parlours. During winter months, cattle are kept in overcrowded, often badly-designed barns, conditions in which infectious disease spreads.
The persistent focus on badgers distracts from the serious health problems faced by intensively managed cattle in Britain. Many other diseases, such as pneumonia, E. coli, coccidiosis (a fatal diarrhoea), salmonella and mastitis, are also increasing in British cattle herds.
Desperate to defend their highly subsidised agri-business practices, farmers turn time and again to blaming the wildlife.
Responsible for the culling are DEFRA’s Wildlife Unit staff, trained on the use of firearms specifically in relation to killing badgers. When they start to trap, they first lay out the badger traps near known setts and badger runs within the killing area. The traps are camouflaged and baited in a process known as ‘pre-baiting’.
DEFRA will then decide when to start trapping; this can be anything up to ten days from the start of pre-baiting. DEFRA operatives then set the traps, so that badgers can be trapped during the night. DEFRA badger killers then come back in the early morning to check traps in their areas – if a badger is found it will be shot.
Badger traps are about three foot long and eighteen inches square, with a trap door at one end. The traps are made from square weld mesh and are painted black, dark green or brown, (the older traps are unpainted and rusty). They are usually baited with peanuts or sometimes corn and the doors are set with twine. Report any sightings of them to CBAG.
The badger slaughter policy has failed miserably. Bovine TB in cattle has spread to South Wales, Cumbria, Scotland and the Midlands (where next?). Often,TB jumps miles to unaffected areas. Badgers do not travel these great distances. But cattle do. The ISG report analysed culling trials begun in 1998, in which badgers were culled proactively, culled after a TB outbreak on a farm, or not culled at all. The trial, delayed by the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak, was eventually stopped early because reactive culling was clearly counter-productive – in response, the badgers moved around more and spread the disease, resulting in more farm outbreaks.
SchNEWS has learned that despite the ISGs findings, farmers in the Ouse and Cuckmere valleys in Sussex are demanding a badger cull. Local badger groups are already preparing for a robust response. A previous attempt to cull badgers in Saltdean in 2003 (just along the coast from SchNEWS towers) was halted after massive public outcry and the odd bit of scuffling in the street. The government isn’t going to protect our wildlife – are you?
INTO THE VALLEY OF DEFRA AS BADGERS FACE EXTERMINATION
Flying in the face of all the scientific evidence, the government’s chief scientific advisor David King is urging for war to be declared on Britain’s badger population.
Speaking to a select committee on Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. He contradicted the findings of the ten year and £34 million Independent Scientific Group (ISG) report into the transmission of Bovine TB between badger populations and cattle. The research programme involved extensive extermination of badgers in controlled zones throughout the country and resulted in the trapping and slaughter of 11,000 badgers.
Unsurprisingly it reached the same conclusion that wildlife activists had predicted when they begged the government not to carry out the killing – that transmission of TB in cattle is largely down to cattle. That this no-brainer even warranted such a scheme to prove it is evidence of the intensive farming lobby’s grip on DEFRA (Dept. for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs).
Unfortunately the announcement probably signals another onslaught against wildlife, as the plans outlined by Mr King involve killing all badgers in areas not less than 100 square km, in an obvious attempt to overcome the evidence that shows that culling increases TB spread in neighbouring areas – the larger the area in question, the lower disease collateral damage in percentage terms. Clever eh?
Badger groups nationwide have vowed to take direct action. A spokesman for the the Coalition of Badger Action Groups (CBAG) told SchNEWS, “We took action against the experimental culling in the South West – we were out nine months of the year, chasing MAFF (Ministries for Agriculture, Food and Fisheries – now DEFRA) from their base in Truro. We obstructed them, dismantled traps and freed trapped animals. We were dodging MAFF, dodging farmers and dodging the filth but we destroyed 70% of the traps. Direct action will continue – but we’re going to need numbers if they roll this programme out across the whole country.”
BROCK AND A HARD PLACE
The ISG findings were summarised by John Bourne – the group’s chair: “While badgers are clearly a source of cattle TB, careful evaluation of our own and others’ data indicates that badger culling can make no meaningful contribution to cattle TB control in Britain. Indeed, some policies under consideration are likely to make matters worse rather than better… Scientific findings indicate that the rising incidence of disease can be reversed, and geographical spread contained, by the rigid application of cattle-based control measures alone.” – Pretty unequivocal you might think but its not good enough for the farmer-friendly DEFRA. Well what’s a few thousand badgers between friends when there’s all those meat-industry profits to be had?
During the past 28 years, DEFRA (and formerly MAFF) have killed more than 40,000 badgers in a failed effort to halt bovine TB outbreaks. In fact, TB in cattle has been increasing since 1986, including in areas where badgers have been eliminated, or where they have been shown to be free of the disease.
Bovine TB was almost eradicated from the national herd in the 1980s but there has since been a dramatic resurgence, actually neatly mirroring the increased implementation of more intensive animal husbandry techniques. Cases are still currently rising 14% year on year. And the disease cost £80m last year in compensation to farmers who had their animals slaughtered.
But over 80% of the budget for research into Bovine TB is spent on researching the badger link – and not looking into how the increase in TB in cattle goes hand in hand with the increase in all forms of communicable diseases amongst cattle.
TB OR NOT TB
The modern farm animal is a hothouse flower, overbred and pumped full o’ drugs for maximum meat and milk production using all the latest ‘advanced’ veterinary techniques. After a lifetime of overstocking, this animal is then trucked around the country for sale and slaughter.
In human beings, TB flourishes amongst physically and psychologically compromised individuals on poor diets and with inadequate housing. This is a fair description of life in cattle sheds and milking parlours. During winter months, cattle are kept in overcrowded, often badly-designed barns, conditions in which infectious disease spreads.
The persistent focus on badgers distracts from the serious health problems faced by intensively managed cattle in Britain. Many other diseases, such as pneumonia, E. coli, coccidiosis (a fatal diarrhoea), salmonella and mastitis, are also increasing in British cattle herds.
Desperate to defend their highly subsidised agri-business practices, farmers turn time and again to blaming the wildlife.
Responsible for the culling are DEFRA’s Wildlife Unit staff, trained on the use of firearms specifically in relation to killing badgers. When they start to trap, they first lay out the badger traps near known setts and badger runs within the killing area. The traps are camouflaged and baited in a process known as ‘pre-baiting’.
DEFRA will then decide when to start trapping; this can be anything up to ten days from the start of pre-baiting. DEFRA operatives then set the traps, so that badgers can be trapped during the night. DEFRA badger killers then come back in the early morning to check traps in their areas – if a badger is found it will be shot.
Badger traps are about three foot long and eighteen inches square, with a trap door at one end. The traps are made from square weld mesh and are painted black, dark green or brown, (the older traps are unpainted and rusty). They are usually baited with peanuts or sometimes corn and the doors are set with twine. Report any sightings of them to CBAG.
The badger slaughter policy has failed miserably. Bovine TB in cattle has spread to South Wales, Cumbria, Scotland and the Midlands (where next?). Often,TB jumps miles to unaffected areas. Badgers do not travel these great distances. But cattle do. The ISG report analysed culling trials begun in 1998, in which badgers were culled proactively, culled after a TB outbreak on a farm, or not culled at all. The trial, delayed by the 2001 foot and mouth outbreak, was eventually stopped early because reactive culling was clearly counter-productive – in response, the badgers moved around more and spread the disease, resulting in more farm outbreaks.
SchNEWS has learned that despite the ISGs findings, farmers in the Ouse and Cuckmere valleys in Sussex are demanding a badger cull. Local badger groups are already preparing for a robust response. A previous attempt to cull badgers in Saltdean in 2003 (just along the coast from SchNEWS towers) was halted after massive public outcry and the odd bit of scuffling in the street. The government isn’t going to protect our wildlife – are you?
- CBAG website: www.badger-killers.co.uk or call the Badger Hotline: 07896 360927 and for more info on badgers see www.badgertrust.org.uk