2024 / 25 - A happy New Year.

As 2024 winds down so do a few of the 'badger management areas', funded and operated by - farmers. Even though the Ministry in charge of the eradication of this grade 3 zoonotic pathogen was the signatory. 

 

The success, even through times of interference, criminal damage and much abuse, has been staggering.

The following is a 'thankyou from one such cull area to the farmers who made it happen.:

We write as the directors of the {}  which has now been completed. Over the last 9 years we have all worked hard to reduce the level of TB in our cattle. We are pleased to say that our project has been a great success.

When we started we were told that we could only expect to achieve 24% reduction in TB outbreaks but in fact nationally we have achieved 65% reduction with the failures we do see, having less cattle affected.

These breakdowns are often as a result of purchased cattle or around National Trust property and large wooded valleys.

We have proved without doubt that the policy of reducing numbers of the infecting species, across an area with good boundaries, reduces levels of infection and creates no perturbation. 

.Countless hours of work has been put in by many different people, to hear the vet say those magic words “You have a clear test” means so much to all cattle farmers.  

But having achieved such a reduction in the incidence of zoonotic tuberculosis, are we to see all that hard work go to waste? If the main Uni party (Labour and Tory) are to be believed, then the answer is yes, we are. Mainly because of the shrieks from the animal rights protesters and their sponsers' very deep pockets.

Which brings us neatly to today's story from Leigh-on-Sea. where the Telegraph reports that residents in this offshoot of Southend on Sea, are having problems with our stripey friends. Gardens and their sheds, allotments and roads were damaged, but then the foundations of very expensive seafront properties began to be undermined too.

And that is when:

 " The residents found themselves perplexed by the amount of red tape involved in moving the badgers on and re-homing them. Natural England will only grant licences to seal badger setts in the first half of the year. For the second half, when badgers mate and their cubs learn the ropes of independence, virtually no licences are granted. "

Welcome to our world.

The report continues, 

In Leigh’s case, the council had to wait until this six-month period was up before it could do anything. Meanwhile, homeowners feared their properties would collapse.

But worse was to follow. The Leigh badgers, so expensively moved by NE, were unimpressed by their new abodes. The report continues:

When the time finally came to remove the badgers, relief was quick-lived as, months later, they returned – thus re-setting the clock before any work could be done again.

Councillor Stephen Aylen adds his thoughts:

“Badgers have been tunnelling under our roads, sheds and even under our houses. It is becoming a concern.

Back in 1972, we only had one badger in the whole of Leigh-on-Sea. Now we’re overrun with them – and that’s partly because they’re protected.”

But that is what happens when an apex predator is not controlled, within a finite space, but with infinite food sources with which to nourish its offspring. And of course celebrity backing..

A happy New Year to all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The RBCT - a gift that keeps on giving.

We knew the smell of this most politically motivated piece of so called 'research' may permeate for a while, but it seems that Oxford University want to keep its emissions rolling on. John Bourne (pictured) led the RBCT from 1998 - 2005.

Reported this week in the Guardian was an ascertion that cattle herds on the edge of an RBCT (Randomised Badger Culling Trial) - or as like to refer to it - the Badger Dispersal Trial, were more likely to have reactors.

After their eight night forays into infected populations, catching a few badgers daft enough to grab a few peanuts, was never going to clear TB from the area. But according to the trial leader, it was never meant to.

The Guardian's report states:

"In the two-part study, researchers re-analysed data from the randomised badger culling trial that took place between 1998 and 2005. The initial study produced data consistent with the RCBT showing beneficial results to cattle in the areas where culling took place.

However, a secondary study using peer-reviewed analyses of the RCBT found a 29% increased risk of bTB infections in cattle in surrounding areas.

The secondary study aimed to address scientists’ concern around the “lack of evidence” supporting the RCBT experiment. It also suggested that irrespective of the statistical methodology used, badger culling during the RCBT was associated with an increased risk of tuberculosis in neighbouring cattle.

So it is with the greatest respect, that we remind the researchers, trawling through data from 25 years ago, of the words of its leader, the diminutive John Bourne when he addressed the EFRA Committee about 'his' trial in 2007.

The phrase ' culling in this way', was not the answer: in other words, as many as we could trap in a very few nights, leaving a fractured and highly infectious community behind. And ' it's important we do say this. Protocol was not set by the team, but by politicians'.

. . Thus the way the trial set up, was to enable a pre arranged conclusion to be reached. The RBCT was designed to fail. Some of the Wildlife unit staff involved, were equally scathing. As were several very experienced veterinarians.

Nevertheless, those highly intelligent folk at OXford have grabbed the data, rearranged it and come up with fairly obvious conclusion.

It's such a great pity that their research didn't reach the depths of John Bourne and his team's duplicity, obfuscation and downright dishonesty when addressing politicians, but especially the farmers about this expensive farce.

The result is that we all see more of these, on our fields.