This thread refers to the news article elsewhere on BCUK
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/index.php/Latest-News/Losing-our-open-access-to-land.html
...so you must read this before reading the thread below.
I did try to add my comment to the news article but it was too long. The reason I've posted it is that I feel not enough people see the issue from the other side of the fence, so to speak (sorry but it was begging for it). I see the issue from both sides so I hope that what I've said below rebalances many of the views that have already been expressed. I've taken a philosophical view and have used reason as my guide. I hope any responses will at least have the latter attribute.
Here goes (by the way it's long and my apologies for any grammar errors):
"Not wishing to go against the grain on this but if one wants to keep the habitat in the same way it's been for hundreds maybe thousands of years then conservation measures of this type are required.
We are a very small country with a very large human population. Most of our natural habitats have long, long disappeared. Many of the plants and animals that lived in these habitats have also gone, indeed many we never knew of. What we have is a semi-natural habitat. Yes, left unattended it will re-wood but it would take several hundred years to do so and above all it would not have many of the plants and especially animals that shape these habitats. It would not be the same habitat as that found say 6,000 years ago and would therefore still be classed as a semi-natural habitat. Remember that the last ice age ended 9,000 years ago with Man, a then very natural part of the landscape coming fairly quickly onto the secene albeit in very small numbers typical of a predator/omnivore. He was still a natural part of the landscape up until the Iron Age (and technically he still is although the perception is distorted by his very negative impacts).
We have to put up with fences because there are people using the land for various purposes, invariably farming, and occasionally military (both for obvious reasons) and this includes land that is percieved as wild. In our case, preserving semi-natural habitats is the best we can do and it is not on a par with say protecting vast areas of the Amazon or Taiga, but we still need to protect what little we have. Penwith Moor exists because it was grazed (at least in part) in the past. To conserve or rather protect the species that have been able to adapt to the new habitat and indeed colonise the habitat (ie., birds and some flying insects) over the last few hundred or thousand years we have to take measures. Unfortunately many are unpopular. Fencing breaks up the natural landscape. It takes away that feeling of wilderness and of freedom. I hate it but I also realise we screwed it up in this country long ago and we are now dealing with the legacy, assuming we care about the landscape and the life that it is home to.
Comments from the media like "tamper, tidy, cultivate or refine..." are very unhelpful and should be reserved for town councils sprucing up their local park. Indeed it is the opposite that is trying to be acheived; and what is being acheived is ecological stability, the inherent state of the true wilderness, and one that is acheivable with semi-natural habitats such as at Penwith.
I know of areas locally that have been in farming, of sorts, or otherwise kept open for the last 1000 years (at least as far as records go back) but have completely scrubbed over with gorse in the last 10-20 years because of the decline in the farming economy or the reduction in grazing, i.e, grazing was no longer profitable. We have consequently lost our butterflies, beetles, Meadow Pipits, Sky Larks, and others which relied on these open habitats. Indeed, many areas are impassable because of the now wall-to-wall gorse. This is what could happen on many parts of Penwith over the next few decades if nothing was done.
We have to accept that our truly wild areas are gone and those that are left are so small or are so species impoverished that they have to be managed in some way, not to improve or cleanse as the media puts it but to stabilise and protect. Just to put this in perspective, England, the worst-off country in the UK, has a population of 55 million. British Columbia (BC) in Canada has just over 4 million. BC is 7 (seven) times bigger than England. BC has most of its habitat changed by Man, e.g., most of its forests are secondary (or worse) having been harvested at least once in the last couple of centuries. If BC can lose so much wild habitat then imagine what would happen if there were 335 million people living there (the same population density as in England)!
It is unfortunate that we are forced to put up fences in our 'wild' areas but it reveals how small they are, and the fact that so many people are upset about the fencing shows how many hundreds visit these areas each day (excluding a damp winter's day of course). In BC there are areas of similar size to Penwith that are visted by one person once a year if that.
Perhaps less importantly from a spititual point of view, the British government has a legal responsibility to protect SSSI's, SPA's, and RAMSAR sites, etc. under European Law (much of which has become British Law).
Fences are ugly but they do weather in over time - that's all I can say about them. They are a part of countryside now whether we like it or not. I personally don't like them but to me, this 'cluttering' up of the landscape is the prison sentence we have to pay for destroying our true landscape. Hopefully we will learn responsibility and consideration and the onus is on us to pass this knowledge on to other countries.
I sleep easier in my bed knowing that at least some of the wildlife that LIVES in these habitats is still there courtesy of conservation measures, and if that includes fencing for grazing then so be it. I love the feeling of freedom and I truly believe it is an inherent part of human nature to feel that way. But if that feeling came at the cost of species extinction (albeit on a local basis at worst) then that feeling will fade to regret. Humility is needed and a recognition that we have no rights at all over the landscape and the life that exists within in it. Indeed, we should have mutual respect, something which should have stayed with those hunter-gatherers that turned into farmers those thousands of years ago!
I've waffled on again too long but I hope those that reached this far don't take this as a snub to those who oppose fences and other 'necessary' clutter but a reasoned comment on the facts."
Cheers,
Scrubbity
http://www.bushcraftuk.com/index.php/Latest-News/Losing-our-open-access-to-land.html
...so you must read this before reading the thread below.
I did try to add my comment to the news article but it was too long. The reason I've posted it is that I feel not enough people see the issue from the other side of the fence, so to speak (sorry but it was begging for it). I see the issue from both sides so I hope that what I've said below rebalances many of the views that have already been expressed. I've taken a philosophical view and have used reason as my guide. I hope any responses will at least have the latter attribute.
Here goes (by the way it's long and my apologies for any grammar errors):
"Not wishing to go against the grain on this but if one wants to keep the habitat in the same way it's been for hundreds maybe thousands of years then conservation measures of this type are required.
We are a very small country with a very large human population. Most of our natural habitats have long, long disappeared. Many of the plants and animals that lived in these habitats have also gone, indeed many we never knew of. What we have is a semi-natural habitat. Yes, left unattended it will re-wood but it would take several hundred years to do so and above all it would not have many of the plants and especially animals that shape these habitats. It would not be the same habitat as that found say 6,000 years ago and would therefore still be classed as a semi-natural habitat. Remember that the last ice age ended 9,000 years ago with Man, a then very natural part of the landscape coming fairly quickly onto the secene albeit in very small numbers typical of a predator/omnivore. He was still a natural part of the landscape up until the Iron Age (and technically he still is although the perception is distorted by his very negative impacts).
We have to put up with fences because there are people using the land for various purposes, invariably farming, and occasionally military (both for obvious reasons) and this includes land that is percieved as wild. In our case, preserving semi-natural habitats is the best we can do and it is not on a par with say protecting vast areas of the Amazon or Taiga, but we still need to protect what little we have. Penwith Moor exists because it was grazed (at least in part) in the past. To conserve or rather protect the species that have been able to adapt to the new habitat and indeed colonise the habitat (ie., birds and some flying insects) over the last few hundred or thousand years we have to take measures. Unfortunately many are unpopular. Fencing breaks up the natural landscape. It takes away that feeling of wilderness and of freedom. I hate it but I also realise we screwed it up in this country long ago and we are now dealing with the legacy, assuming we care about the landscape and the life that it is home to.
Comments from the media like "tamper, tidy, cultivate or refine..." are very unhelpful and should be reserved for town councils sprucing up their local park. Indeed it is the opposite that is trying to be acheived; and what is being acheived is ecological stability, the inherent state of the true wilderness, and one that is acheivable with semi-natural habitats such as at Penwith.
I know of areas locally that have been in farming, of sorts, or otherwise kept open for the last 1000 years (at least as far as records go back) but have completely scrubbed over with gorse in the last 10-20 years because of the decline in the farming economy or the reduction in grazing, i.e, grazing was no longer profitable. We have consequently lost our butterflies, beetles, Meadow Pipits, Sky Larks, and others which relied on these open habitats. Indeed, many areas are impassable because of the now wall-to-wall gorse. This is what could happen on many parts of Penwith over the next few decades if nothing was done.
We have to accept that our truly wild areas are gone and those that are left are so small or are so species impoverished that they have to be managed in some way, not to improve or cleanse as the media puts it but to stabilise and protect. Just to put this in perspective, England, the worst-off country in the UK, has a population of 55 million. British Columbia (BC) in Canada has just over 4 million. BC is 7 (seven) times bigger than England. BC has most of its habitat changed by Man, e.g., most of its forests are secondary (or worse) having been harvested at least once in the last couple of centuries. If BC can lose so much wild habitat then imagine what would happen if there were 335 million people living there (the same population density as in England)!
It is unfortunate that we are forced to put up fences in our 'wild' areas but it reveals how small they are, and the fact that so many people are upset about the fencing shows how many hundreds visit these areas each day (excluding a damp winter's day of course). In BC there are areas of similar size to Penwith that are visted by one person once a year if that.
Perhaps less importantly from a spititual point of view, the British government has a legal responsibility to protect SSSI's, SPA's, and RAMSAR sites, etc. under European Law (much of which has become British Law).
Fences are ugly but they do weather in over time - that's all I can say about them. They are a part of countryside now whether we like it or not. I personally don't like them but to me, this 'cluttering' up of the landscape is the prison sentence we have to pay for destroying our true landscape. Hopefully we will learn responsibility and consideration and the onus is on us to pass this knowledge on to other countries.
I sleep easier in my bed knowing that at least some of the wildlife that LIVES in these habitats is still there courtesy of conservation measures, and if that includes fencing for grazing then so be it. I love the feeling of freedom and I truly believe it is an inherent part of human nature to feel that way. But if that feeling came at the cost of species extinction (albeit on a local basis at worst) then that feeling will fade to regret. Humility is needed and a recognition that we have no rights at all over the landscape and the life that exists within in it. Indeed, we should have mutual respect, something which should have stayed with those hunter-gatherers that turned into farmers those thousands of years ago!
I've waffled on again too long but I hope those that reached this far don't take this as a snub to those who oppose fences and other 'necessary' clutter but a reasoned comment on the facts."
Cheers,
Scrubbity
