Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

anthony chadwick — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 19:25:47 GMT

oops I meant this year!

just already thinking about 2013

writing Christmas cards this evening and yes I do believe in God!

or am I confusing my threads here

Anthony

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

anthony chadwick — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 19:18:29 GMT

Carl Padgett did an interesting webinar for us on the topic of bovine TB to explain the science behind the BVA's decision. It was part of our contentious issues series that we do with them. Well worth a view along with the other topics such as religious slaughter which we covered last year

www.thewebinarvet.com/bva-webinars

Hope this helps

Anthony

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Hannah Wynne Richards — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 14:47:17 GMT

Neil Add humans to your list of vectors

Wynne

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Paul Dowie — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 23:38:46 GMT

I believe a cull is necessary as part of the strategy to control TB.

This is my opinion despite having been a member of a county Badger Group

to preserve the badger. Logic indicates this course of action.

Political concerns have contributed to a massive waste of public money to

enable any decision to be postponed until a better time...ie someone else will

have to take the tough decision .

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Neil Wheadon — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 14:02:49 GMT

[quote user="Marius Erasmus"]What other vectors are there for TB. Mice? Rats? Hedgehogs?[/quote]

TB has been detected in all mammalian species but to varying degrees. I don't have the stats to hand but small mammels is about 0.5-1%. Deer are interesting and can't be ruled out in the spread of TB. In some areas the percentages are about 8% - data from gamekeepers. However unlike badgers they have a very small range of about 5km, have little contact with cattle (both direct and indirect) and I believe die quickly from TB, unlike badgers that can be chronic excretors.

Neil

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Michael Woodhouse — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 13:46:25 GMT

[quote user="Marius Erasmus"]

The mention of hedgehogs begs the question. What other vectors are there for TB. Mice? Rats? Hedgehogs? Deer? Has there been any research into other vectors, or are Badgers assumed to be the only culprits?

[/quote]

I can see rats and mice could get and spread TB, but on the whole they don't move around much. If they find a farm with a food source, they are not going to wander long distances.

Deer are known to get TB, but they are solitary, skittish creatures and don't get close to cattle. In some areas TB is rife in deer populations.

Badgers are quite big (cf rat/mouse/hedgehog) and therefore can multiply more bacteria. In badgers the infection also spreads to the kidney so wherever the badger urinates it passes the bacterium (whereas in most species it remains in the lungs and is spread via sputum). Badgers come out of their sets and urinate on cattle pasture. The bacterium is tough and can survive better than most in the environment. They will also get quite close to cattle - hence badgers are a significant problem.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Marius Erasmus — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 12:51:12 GMT

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

James Laidlaw — Sat, 17 Nov 2012 14:28:37 GMT

Cheers Michael, I'll have a look at these when I get over my Saturday and have had some me time!

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Michael Woodhouse — Sat, 17 Nov 2012 14:19:26 GMT

[quote user="James Laidlaw"]Do you know what happened exactly? Or is this assumption as well?[/quote]

Interference with the traps. From an NFU document:

Furthermore while the Krebs trials were taking place animal rights activists deliberately
wrecked so many of the traps that during one of the 6 week Krebs trial culling periods in
2004 activists destroyed £300,000 worth of traps in just one 5 kilometre killing zone.

http://www.conservativeruralaffairs.org.uk/toDefra/kenshammemo-1.pdf

I have no great reason to doubt the validity of the statement.

The trial only trapped for short periods and had limited access to land so big blocks couldn't be used. It was flawed from the start.

The Irish Trial

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Evelyn Barbour-Hill — Sat, 17 Nov 2012 12:51:33 GMT

Would anyone like to explain:

a) why we should not shoot some badgers, as we do rats, rabbits, foxes and deer, whether it does anything for cattle tb or not;

b) the point of saving the lives of tubercular badgers.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

James Laidlaw — Sat, 17 Nov 2012 09:31:19 GMT

[quote user="Michael Woodhouse"]The 'problem' with the evidence is the badger-huggers who kept interfering with trials wrecking the data and spreading the problem.[/quote]

Do you know what happened exactly? Or is this assumption as well?

I understand these are just trials, but they have done trials before and not seen much of a change, and there are studies from other countries that have been mentioned too showing control without reducing wildlife. I think there's far more of an issue with poor control over transport/purchase of livestock and unreliable testing methods to diagnose and base culling of cattle on than that which comes from the wildlife issue, but I only really understand from reading the data from the trials that have been done. Does anyone have links to the irish studies?

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Michael Woodhouse — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 21:41:21 GMT

[quote user="plantagenet"]

What then do you propose - we can reduce badger numbers and do a lot to help the other, equally iconic, wildlife species that I have mentioned. We do it in many other situations where wildlife population management is required and often very beneficial to the species controlled.

We can also seek both personally and politically to reduce the damage to the planet that we humans do.

The two actions are really, unrelated, both, neither or only one can be done and certainly I do not want to return the human race to a stone age (but probably quite green) existence. WE have to face up to the fact that some species, from whom we have removed the natural predators, need population control or eventually disease, starvation and parasitism will do the job for us.

[/quote]

Absolutely. I doubt anyone knows how many foxes are killed each year but they have not exactly become extinct. Badgers have no natural predators, it's just motor vehicles and tuberculosis reducing their numbers a bit.

The badger cull shouldn't need to cost us as taxpayers a single penny. It's all the silly hoops and red tape that cause the problem. There is an army of gamekeepers and recreational shooters out there armed with powerful centre-fire rifles with experience of shooting rabbits/deer & foxes. Let all of them have badgers added to their firearm certificates and make it an obligation of landowners to control badgers in infected areas either them self or using these existing shooters.

The 'problem' with the evidence is the badger-huggers who kept interfering with trials wrecking the data and spreading the problem. The Irish did a lot better than we managed. The people who interfered with the study ought to have being punished.

This cull that has being 'postponed' for the moment is also a TRIAL to see how effective this will be. That is often not made especially clear.

Does anyone NOT believe that TB spreads between cattle and badgers, and that we can successfully control an INFECTIOUS disease without controlling wildlife reservoirs?

Go back to bog standard basic epidemiology. Design your own experiment. A DECENT, not interfered with study removing the reservoir would be the place I'd start. That has not yet been done.

Knocking the evidence when it is poor is not really cricket.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Hannah Wynne Richards — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 18:17:15 GMT

The problem is opinions are so polarised

One lot think that badgers are nothing to do with the problem-or won't face the fact

Another thinks that a badger cull will miraculously solve all TB problems

Wynne

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

James Laidlaw — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 17:27:26 GMT

[quote user="plantagenet"]What then do you propose [/quote]

If I knew that, I'd be rich!!!

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

James Laidlaw — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 17:24:09 GMT

[quote user="plantagenet"]we can reduce badger numbers and do a lot to help the other, equally iconic, wildlife species that I have mentioned[/quote]

But we don't yet know that we can - from what I've seen of the trials and the data, I'm not convinced, and neither were a significant number of scientists. What aspects of the information available lead you to the conclusion that it will help? People talk with such certainty about the benefits of culling, but I haven't seen the info that leads me to conclude this is the case. I'm happy to change my mind if the evidence is there...

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

plantagenet — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 17:11:45 GMT

[quote user="James Laidlaw"]That's not my point, farmers are generally great, welcoming, salt of the earth people (who love to try and get a discount on their vet bill...) - BUT human interference with the environment such as farming is but one example of - is responsible for the changes in wildlife and its decline. Badger overpopulation will have a hell of a long way to go to be "equally significant" as you put it.[/quote]

We can also seek both personally and politically to reduce the damage to the planet that we humans do.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

James Laidlaw — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 17:02:44 GMT

That's not my point, farmers are generally great, welcoming, salt of the earth people (who love to try and get a discount on their vet bill...) - BUT human interference with the environment such as farming is but one example of - is responsible for the changes in wildlife and its decline. Badger overpopulation will have a hell of a long way to go to be "equally significant" as you put it.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

plantagenet — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:56:41 GMT

[quote user="James Laidlaw"]Not trying to be argumentative, but surely the damage to wildlife and the planet in general caused by intensive farming/cropping/fishing etc etc, is far higher and also the original cause of any ecological imbalances in the wildlife populations in the first place? [/quote]

Ok, right, we'll get rid of modern farming and bring back bears and wolves. I for one am happier to modify modern farming and have enough to eat - but each to their own.

It does annoy me when farmers are immediately blamed 100% for the decline in ground nesting birds, bumble bees and hedgehogs when badger overpopulation may well be equally significant. Farmers seem to be such easy targets.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

James Laidlaw — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:37:59 GMT

[quote user="plantagenet"]And again, we have to consider the damage to other wildlife, and in some cases archaeological sites, that uncontrolled badger numbers are causing.[/quote]

Not trying to be argumentative, but surely the damage to wildlife and the planet in general caused by intensive farming/cropping/fishing etc etc, is far higher and also the original cause of any ecological imbalances in the wildlife populations in the first place? We seem to be tripping over our feet as a species to correct our mistakes that are impacting on our environment. I don't know the fix, but culling one species will lead to a hole in the ecosystem that has to be filled somehow and these changes are always infinitely hard to predict with any trials or computer models.

Unfortunately, I don't have the solution to put forward, so I will just look argumentative, but we do seem to favour knee jerk short term solutions such as this planned cull, without fully realising the implications or adequately predicting the outcomes of such plans, but going ahead with them anyway.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

plantagenet — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:37:43 GMT

[quote user="James Laidlaw"] Wasn't restocking after foot and mouth disease a significant contributing factor in the recent rise? What was the problem with the initial cull trial?[/quote]

There was no testing done during F+M so the figures are difficult to interpret, also one needs to distinguish between one animal that has TB and moves and a herd outbreak with numerous resident cows.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Hannah Wynne Richards — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:33:15 GMT

Badger baiting would be a very efficient way of increasing the perturbation effect That and the fact that we got rid of TB in the 50s without a badger cull tells me there's more to it than just badgers-but I still think removing the wildlife reservoir in infected areas will lessen the incidence I voted for a cull but if the profession isn't willing to look at what other factors are also involved-even if the answers are politically embarrassing for some-then we will end up with egg on our faces

Wynne

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

plantagenet — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:30:20 GMT

If only a small but efficient cull had been done years ago, many badgers would have been spared this disease as well as the cattle and the knock on effect on farmers.

People blocking the cull now will be culpable when a much larger cull happens eventually.

And again, we have to consider the damage to other wildlife, and in some cases archaeological sites, that uncontrolled badger numbers are causing.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

James Laidlaw — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:28:36 GMT

[quote user="plantagenet"]

[quote user="James Laidlaw"]Was something done wrong in the previous trials? [/quote]

yes check back to previous posts on this subject - it was not a good trial. However, the perturbation effect alone provides convincing evidence for the importance of badgers in TB transmission.

I've said it before but just look at the spread over the last 20 years and compare it to what you would expect for cattle movement - it would not stack up.

[/quote] Wasn't restocking after foot and mouth disease a significant contributing factor in the recent rise? What was the problem with the initial cull trial?

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

plantagenet — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:26:37 GMT

[quote user="James Laidlaw"]Was something done wrong in the previous trials? [/quote]

yes check back to previous posts on this subject - it was not a good trial. However, the perturbation effect alone provides convincing evidence for the importance of badgers in TB transmission.

I've said it before but just look at the spread over the last 20 years and compare it to what you would expect for cattle movement - it would not stack up.

Re: Badger cull - does BVA represent your view?

Bob Russell — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 15:34:50 GMT

The real answer seems to be that nobody knows whether it will work or not. If badger control is going to be tried it must be full on, unlimited resources and for long enough.

If it is not going to be done aggressively enough it is likely to be a pointless exercise and should not be done at all. I have serious doubts about its efficacy and suspect insufficient money will be made available to try it out properly. I accept that badgers carry TB, cattle and badgers suffer from the disease. I fear control will have to wait for a vaccine and that is unlikely to be round the corner.

Overall I find a cull hard to support. I stand firmly in the I don't know camp.