Badgers to be gassed

Other mammals also spread the disease - Badgers are probably an easier target. I agree that vaccine should be used. I think it is a matter of money. Bullets are cheaper than vaccine. Another thing, To vaccinate the farmer would surely have to have his animals tested to see if they are immune or need the vaccine. If they are infected then the farmer would lose the herd probably. Not sure - just from my James Herriot days.

Did you mean algorithms? Or the album by Australian electronic-synthpop group Boxcar?

Personally, I think it's like comparing apples with algorhyms!

I'm not happy with comparing the gassing of badgers with the use of chemical weapons in Syria. No one with any sense of humanity could surely do so?

Farmers are compensated for cattle that have to be slaughtered because of TB so their concern is over losing an animal that they have reared, not necessarily for the meat market, but as part of a breed line. Of course it's a business but the majority of farmers care for their animals and do not want to see them slaughtered due to infection.

I suspect it's because a cow with TB is no use to a farmer whereas a cow sold for meat is valuable. It's nothing to do with concern for the animal, it's just business.

Good thought!
Is the problem then about the method of death?

merlot Of course, if you're a farmer then you have to send livestock for slaughter but I would have thought there's not much difference to the animal whether it's destroyed because it's ill or because it's going to be eaten.

The
Re was a trial locally several years ago on my region( before I moved here 35years ago) of total eradication of badgers by gassing.
There were no new cases of bovine TB until several years later the badgers recolonised!
I think that proves the effectiveness, but, does this mean we have to eradicate a species nationwide?
Like Bags ,I'm just asking?

I think it's a ridiculous comparison as well, jingle but the thread title is about badgers.

You can't let that go by without expressing outrage. Can you?

Quote "So, we've to be outraged about children being gassed in Syria but it's OK to gas badgers at home!?"

And you carry on chatting about badgers?!!!

Is there no sense of decency on this website at all?

I can't believe this.

Eloethan. If beef cattle farmers don't send their animals for slaughter, what on earth are they supposed to do with them?

It's now being suggested that the plan to cull badgers in order to prevent the spread of bovine tuberculosis may in fact have the reverse effect. I don't know either way, but it seems that the whole exercise is becoming rather chaotic.

I also find it a bit ironic that those farmers emoting about the suffering of the poor cattle (which presumably are destroyed as soon as they are diagnosed with TB) aren't quite so tender hearted when it comes to sending their livestock off to the abbatoir.

Galen You don't have goalposts in cricket.

I don't understand. If it's bovine TB surely the cattle spread it among themselves and to the badgers, rather than its originating with the badgers. Obviously, either way, it's still a problem but I don't think gassing badgers is likely to be an effective answer from what I have read. That's quite apart from the fact that I instinctively dislike the idea.

Didn't they gas them before? When we was younger? Didn't it not work?

Also have they tested the animals they shot to see how many were carrying TB?

I heard it this morning on the wireless. Made me smile! But I agree, incompetence!

Here is where MrBags must have got the goalpost-moving from, probably indirectly. The annoying thing is that this 'result' was predicted and then ignored.

And that's another reason to be against the gassing – the incompetence of the culling project so far.

Does one expect an animal to know what is cricket and what is not?
At least they are BRITISH badgers and therefore must have known it was not sporting to move the goalposts(in reply to Mr Bags)

Vaccination is practicable. They have been trapping them to shoot them so there's no reason why they can't vaccinate them and release them.

I understand they are concerned they have not managed to shoot enough and this means they may have actually increased the risk of them infecting cattle. It does seem as though they had completely miscalculated the numbers in the area and then the damned things just wouldn't stay in one place so they could be shot. Very unsporting of them. I agree with Mr Bags.

Gassing is inhumane. Badgers can suffer. Nothing wrong with saying that. Nobody's saying badgers are more important than children.

I live in an area that has high rate of bovine tb. I'm sorry,but my sympathies are with the farmers. If vaccination was viable and practicable I would obviously prefer that.

I'm speechless at the comparison - nothing else to say.

Children and badgers are both animals that can suffer. My point is that I think it's wrong to gas animals.

As for 'wanting a reaction'... well, I do want to know what other people think. I hadn't decided in advance what reaction I wanted. I was just putting forward my reaction to the news. Take it or leave it.

Thank you for your reaction.

It that the reaction you wanted?

Sick in fact.