Stop the badger cull petition. Please sign

I'll be staying in Glos. in October and visiting my cattle farming cousins.........I'll ask but I think I'll know the answer.

Butty will you be able to make the meet up at Gallys, or would that be too far for you to travel? It would be lovely to meet you.

Strangely enough, the inititial independent research, which proved that culling often makes things worse- was done at the lovely Woodchester Park in Gloucesterhire.

Thanks * granjura* that was a very interesting and reasoned argument.

...and I you, soop. It's not going to be possible which is a pity - the cost of the train tix. alone gives me the shivers!

One day I'm sure we'll meet up. x

There's a lot of emotion around badgers buf thinking about it I really don't know much.

Do badgers just carry TB or do they die from it?

How infectious is a cow to others in the first stages of TB before a cowman notices and removes it? How infectious is it to the cowman?

How is TB passed on to us - in the meat, in the milk? I thought the main reason for pasteurisation was to prevent passing on TB.

I also understand there is far less of a problem in the east of the UK. In fact most badgers in East Anglia are apparently TB free. Why?

Granjura can you help?

An interesting article;

Members of the public who may know little about farming – or wildlife – could be forgiven for thinking that farmers' lives are being ruined by badgers.

It is a message being peddled by the farming press, by some – but not all – farmers, and even by the BBC's Countryfile programme. They say that thousands of cattle are being slaughtered every year (30,000 in 2010) because of bovine tuberculosis (bTB) – an airborne respiratory disease – at enormous cost to farmers and the taxpayer: £100m last year. This much is true. They also say that bTB is being passed to cattle by badgers. This I dispute, based on evidence from those who know better than me – scientists.

Those of us who want to protect badgers from such bad press are forced on to the defensive. Particularly now, as the government has said it is "minded" to authorise a massive cull of badgers in an effort to control bTB.

It wasn't always like this. Bovine TB was almost eradicated by 1970, when there were only about 1,000 cases. Eleven years of localised badger culling failed to reduce the toll further. But the end of annual cattle testing in the mid-80s, and the devastating effects of BSE and foot-and-mouth disease, when testing was abandoned altogether, meant that many farms lost thousands of animals, and afterward there was a rush to restock. Regulations were relaxed, so cattle were bought and sold and – crucially – moved all over the country. Bovine tuberculosis was back. These relaxations of the movement and testing regimes – not badgers – were to blame.

So, to the question of whether badgers are responsible for increasing infection rates in cattle. If they are, how have cattle remained free of bTB in Scotland, where no badgers have been killed? Why do they have it in the Isle of Man, where there are no badgers? And why are bTB rates twice as high in Ireland, where so many badgers have been killed that they are extinct in many areas?

Could it be possible that cattle are infecting badgers? After all, cattle far outnumber badgers – 9 million cattle to, at most, a quarter of a million badgers.

George Pearce, a wildlife consultant, used to be a farmer. In his new book, Badger Behaviour, Conservation and Rehabilitation: 70 Years of Getting to Know Badgers, he explains how his family's farm, which always had badger setts on it, managed to remain free of bTB from 1950 to 2008, when the herd was dispersed.

Since the 1930s, there have been four important measures used to combat bTB: very strict movement controls, thorough cleansing of livestock buildings, good ventilation and double fencing on all boundaries to prevent cattle in adjoining fields from exchanging saliva.

Pearce says that if we want to solve this crisis, we should be talking about cattle, not badgers.

Aside from these measures, he suggests that we look at the bloodlines of our cattle. All bulls, whether used naturally or artificially, should have blood tests to assess their susceptibility to bTB. The reduced gene pool of bulls over the past 60 years could be contributing to the problem.

Cattle that were largely bTB-free in the 60s and 70s, he adds – mostly British breeds – have gradually been replaced by continental breeds. Are they less resistant?

What's more, cattle are bred much more intensively now, and bTB is known to be a stress-related disease.

What about dietary deficiencies? Dick Roper in Gloucestershire was anxious to find out why one of his farms was hit by bTB when his others were not. On the affected farm, the cattle were fed on maize, which badgers also love. But maize lacks selenium, a mineral that – in humans and livestock – is necessary to maintain a strong immune system. So, Roper introduced selenium mineral licks for his cattle, and for the badgers on his land – to the amusement of his neighbours – and cured his problem, despite all the farms around him becoming infected. Are cattle getting bTB because their immune system is compromised?

In the past two years, improved cattle testing, biosecurity and movement controls in England have led to a 15% reduction in the rates of bTB infection. In Wales, during the same period, the number of cattle slaughtered because of bTB has fallen by 36%, and by 45% in Dyfed. The Welsh Assembly Government had proposed a cull, before being forced to drop the plan.

And this, without a single badger being culled – despite the fact that a few rogue farmers have been swapping the ID tags of cattle so that valuable animals with bTB were, illegally, kept on farms, while healthy, but less valuable, ones were sent to slaughter in their place.

David Williams, the Badger Trust's chairman

TB in humans and cattle/badgers (and so many other animals, see article above- are we going to cull them all as well?) - are totally different strains, and do not mix. Yes, badgers get very sick and die of TB, but many are carriers for years.

Granjura thanks for all the info, I just wish they had included some of your facts on last night's Counrty File prog. Will sign the petition!

Thanks Granjura. Have signed the petition!

There is indeed a lot of 'emotion' around badgers. If I had evidence from good science that a cull would deal with TB once and for all - despite my like for an animal I've studied and observed for 30+ years, I'd have to agree with it - regardless of 'emotions'. Problem is, that evidence is just not there, and indeed contradicts expectations. I do have great sympathy for farmers who lose cattle - but too many are, as said before, the own worst enemy.

I have to say, if TB gets worse in the proposed culling areas after the autumn cull - I'll find it hard to be sorry and not to say the dreaded 'told you so'.

I still don't understand why they haven't developed an effective vaccine yet - surely they've had more than enough time?

www.bovinetb.co.uk/article.php?article_id=10

Thank you, Nanad - very interesting. It would seem that EU regulations are once more part of the problem.

bump

Thanks bags - signed it.

I switched over after the discussion had started on Newsnight last night, but I think I heard that this petition was one of 'the fastest growing' of all time!
I also think I may have heard that 'the minister for badgers' David (look out Lords, here I come) Heath had declined the offer of appearing on the programme!
Did anyone else see this?
I'm sure this has been mentioned before, but is it possible that cattle pass on the infection to badgers, not the other way around?
Clarrisa Dickson Wright seems, surprisingly, to be on the side of badgers, citing modern farming methods of crowding cows together to be one of the possible causes of the spread of bovine T.B.
Imagine if those 'super dairies' were to be introduced!

It's reached over 100,000 which is the number to trigger a debate in parliament - however this is not automatic so the pressure must be kept on

Beeb News has an article today about a letter from 'experts' in both the UK and the US saying that the proposed cull in Somerset and Gloucestershire could cause an increase in bovine TB.

Well wouldn't you know it.... hrmph! I wonder whether that'll stop 'em.
Will read article in a mo'

Well, I see the producers of 'Country File' have nailed their colours to the mast when Julia Bradbury said....... 'and the part they play in Bovine T.B. ' (Sorry if it is not verbatim.) referring to future prospects for the Badger population.
It was also interesting to see that the early wildlife film-makers valued the badger so much as to make him the subject of their films.

"The majority of warm blooded animals are able to host the disease including cattle, sheep, horses, foxes, badgers, dogs and cats." www.netvet.co.uk/cattle/tuberculosis.htm
Also rabbits!

Should we also be culling all sheep, horses, foxes, dogs and cats? and rabbits?

A very technical survey into Bovine tuberculosis in British farmland wildlife reported at rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/273/1584/357.full.pdf says "Mycobacterium bovis was isolated from badgers on two of the four case farms, and from no badgers on the two control farms, where representative trapping was possible." [from 10 397 samples of assorted wildlife on twelve dairy farms] and one case was found in a bank vole - the first time that has been found.

But which direction did the infection go? Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

No badgers are going to be culled. To cull means to take out the old and sick to improve the health of the animals. Badgers are going to be indiscriminately slaughtered. There's no two ways about it. I think we should not allow them to get away with using words incorrectly to make it sound "nicer".

Hello again carbon, you've hit the nail on the head, again. Of course cull sounds more humane than kill.
Our town council have declared their opposition which could prove quite interesting as our local M.P. is now Minister for Agric. etc. and has declared his support for the 'cull'!

I heard ,on the news last night, that the petition now has reached the magic number and the Gov. will be forced to debate the issue.... I didn't dream it did I?

Has it started yet? It is intended to kill them at night so sows with young may well be killed and the young will of course starve to death - dear oh dear! Is there no compassion at all? Is that legal or a case of animal cruelty?