Neh, I put nuts out to provide food for the sparrow hawk!
The reality is that blue tits and great tits are, most likely, in unnaturally high numbers. If they weren't there would be fewer sparrow hawks.
Two thirds of confirmed birds of prey illegal killings last year linked to shooting estates...
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Neh, I put nuts out to provide food for the sparrow hawk!
The reality is that blue tits and great tits are, most likely, in unnaturally high numbers. If they weren't there would be fewer sparrow hawks.
I can't say I totally agree with you there. Farmers, like gamekeepers, 'protect the land' for their profit; not for conservation, biodiversity, reduction in species loss ....
We have to find a better balance. We only produce about 50% of the country's needs for food, and farming takes up 70% of the land. We cannot intensify the production any further without destroying other aspects of the ecology.
There are good farmers I know, but most of my neighbours don't know the difference between a crow and a rook or a raven - it's black, they shoot it. As for the care of the animals, you should see the state of some of them! Don't assume I'm a towny complaining; I started my working life as a farm labourer.
The only two academic (i.e. planned and peer reviewed studies) that have been published (one in Scotland and one in North Wales) concluded IIRC that 90% of lost lambs was down to husbandry not predation! The guy that farms the fields next to me lost 2 lambs and 2 ewes in the space of a week (all within sight of my window) and we hadn't seen him for a month before that - but He'll happily spend his time shooting foxes.
What effect might annual releases of non-native gamebirds be having on native biodiversity?
Henrietta Pringle reveals the work behind a recent paper on gamebirds and predation
Oddly enough, saw this recently.
And a red kite. (Getting quite common here).
I'm the opposite, and wouldn't consider it for a moment; they are all native species, its what they've evolved to and it's part of reaching a natural balance.
But... if there were unnaturally high numbers of sparrowhawks because of human intervention of some sort, I'd then say that a cull may be necessary - or, better, stop the idiotic intervention and let a natural balance occur.
What you write is utterly wrong in many cases, in fact of the vast majority of farmers I know. For the record I have never claimed subsidy, on principle. I certainly do have to make a profit, I find paying for things easier that way...
I 'protect the land' and water to my cost because I believe it is right, and also because it gives me great pleasure to do so. I do so quite deliberately for conservation, for biodiversity and for reduction in species loss, and I know others who do the same. I am proud to say I am doing more than most, but many, many others do far more than you seem to want to give credit for.
By value 60% of UK food is produced here, though by consumption 46% is imported. I think that if the average person were to see the books for the average farm they'd be astonished that anyone would put in the hours necessary for the remuneration received. We, the UK, could get far cheaper food if it was all imported, but you lose enormously important things in doing that, not least forex and food security and many familiar and much-loved landscapes - and you'll be peeing in the wind if you think that you'll get food to the same standard, particularly regarding animal husbandry, from the great majority of other countries.
Virtually everyone I know around here who farms could, if asked, name all six of our most often seen corvids, in English and Welsh... and the common songbirds and waterbirds and pigeons and prey birds; and native mammals, reptiles, fishes and amphibians and a lot of invertebrates, And the grasses and sedges, and trees and a hell of a lot of herbs too.
Please provide links to the two papers you mention, I will be very interested to read them because that 90% figure really does sound like the sort of stuff I clear out of the cowyard. Only a fool would deny that there aren't some - a very few - appalling farmers, and I won't do that. But there are some quite appalling nurse, Barristers, mechanics, journalists and even ecologists...
No farmer is going to lose X number of lambs, with 90% of that being his fault, and not correct the stupid fault! You could put that purely down to enlightened self-interest if you like, but it's as much down to decent animal husbandry, a pride in one's work and simply being humane in not wanting young animals to die.
Just saying...
Sorry GNJC, I should have been more clear in my support of good farmers and I know there are many; it wasn't meant to sound like a dig at farmers in general but, reading it through again I can see why I upset you. The truth is I worked on a good farm in my youth and saw and practiced good husbandry - I have every respect for the farming community and appreciate the incredible hours and hard work put in.
However, My land is bordered by three farms and none of them will lift a finger for conservation. I can walk the land and find a dead ewe most weeks. I have rescued dozens from the poorly maintained fences that would have died if I hadn't. Nobody in this area walks the land or even drives it on a quad. The losses are balanced against the time and the vets fees if they found a sickly one. They actually hate it when I call them to say there's a beat that needs checking - and that includes the cattle. None of the four sheep that I mentioned earlier died by predators, but of poor husbandry. He still buries them in a pit not more than 100m from my house.
It's like the shooting fraternity; good farmers must call out the bad ones and make them accountable, and good gamekeepers must call out the ones that break the law. To deny their existence does no good IMO and loses public support.
However, My land is bordered by three farms and none of them will lift a finger for conservation. I can walk the land and find a dead ewe most weeks. I have rescued dozens from the poorly maintained fences that would have died if I hadn't. Nobody in this area walks the land or even drives it on a quad. The losses are balanced against the time and the vets fees if they found a sickly one. They actually hate it when I call them to say there's a beat that needs checking - and that includes the cattle. None of the four sheep that I mentioned earlier died by predators, but of poor husbandry. He still buries them in a pit not more than 100m from my house.
It's like the shooting fraternity; good farmers must call out the bad ones and make them accountable, and good gamekeepers must call out the ones that break the law. To deny their existence does no good IMO and loses public support.
Fair enough, sometimes it's hard to convey things in writing that would be very simple with an expression or tone of voice. I wasn't 'upset', just a wee bit irritated...
Those fellows you mention sound like utter s***s to me, I am pleased to write that around here, quite apart form personal feelings, people would be so embarrassed at being found to treat stock like that, that they'd never let a neighbour see such a thing!
Disposal of stock is a matter of law, end of story; however... there is discretion allowed, e.g. if a badger takes a lamb and a fellow finds just a single foot by a sett, he's really not going to bother with going through the hoops over it. At the the other end of the scale, I know of a fellow near Whitland who was pushing fallen cattle into a pit, he got shopped and serve him right.
The questions come in the middle ground, what if 75% has been eaten; and then there are ways around it, many claim a fallen animal was slaughtered for their own or their dogs' consumption.
But, of course they do die sometimes, and one can't be everywhere; but my stock will all be checked at least twice daily when in the fields, and at lambing / calving it will be far, far more often. Nevertheless, I've had a ram die right next to a gate by a lane, and been told about it by a walker; and that when I had checked there less than an hour earlier...
