We want future generations to have the chance to continue to enjoy the delights of badgers, but our badgers after living here for 250,000 years are now under extreme threat.
7,878 Badgers have been slaughtered in Derbyshire with much suffering since 2020 under the badger cull. Our current government is proposing to pretty much wipe out all badgers in some cull zones and kill almost three quarters of all badgers nationwide by the end of 2024. There will be next to no monitoring or btb testing . This is horrific!
Our badgers are the scapegoats! It is false news that badgers are an important cause of cattle herds going under with bovine tuberculosis. This false news is the basis for justifying murdering our badgers in the badger cull.
We want our government:
- to take note of the science based reports and experimental research such as the Gatcombe project, The Tom Langton Report & The Godfray report which show that Badger Culling does not significantly reduce btb in cattle which is mainly a cattle to cattle disease;
- to halt badger culling and adopt a scientific and sustainable approach of stronger cattle measures, better cattle testing and badger vaccination to help farmers eliminate BTB in cattle rather than the current policy that we believe is not fit for purpose.
- to take note of their commitment to the Bern International Treaty which the UK has signed (See the Born Free & Badger Trust Link)
The recent Covid experience showed how important contact with nature can be in helping with our own mental health. Horrifically, here in May 2024 there are now over 230,000 fewer badgers nationwide than there were 11 years ago when the government introduced killing BADGERS as their best answer to cutting bovine tuberculosis in CATTLE! In case you did not know, badger culling continues and is now happening in a quarter of England including in Derbyshire, but it just is not helping the btb issue it was introduced to help solve. The current government is now proposing to increase the number of badgers to be killed and is aiming at killing more than 7 out of every 10 badgers by 2025, exterminating them completely in some areas all based on what we believe to be fake news and a serious disregard of the science.
All this inhumane killing of our iconic and much loved wildlife is being done in the name of reducing bovine tb in cattle. This is all so very sad and an abomination as if you browse the links and information below you will find that badgers actually have next to no impact on cattle developing btb! The small reduction in btb claimed in badger cull areas is most likely to be linked to better cattle testing and cattle management that has been introduced in high btb risk areas alongside badger culling, but is publicised as being due solely to killing of badgers which is a complete nonsense and an unscientific conclusion.
The Badger Trust and Born Free jointly complained to the BERN international treaty committee in 2019, pointing out that no scientific study had been conducted to investigate the effect of badger culling on the wider wildlife ecosystem or the badger population as a whole as at the time before culling the UK held 25% of Europe’s badgers. The complaint was upheld and put on file. Wildlife groups have now updated this complaint in the light of the government’s recent proposals.
Don’t get us wrong, we feel deeply for the farmers who have lost cattle and money to the dreaded btb, but this badger culling process is not helping farmers and the tax money spent on culling could be spent in much more productive ways to help stamp out the curse of btb. Farmers and the general public have been misled to think that badgers are the root cause of this disease which simply is not the case, badgers are merely a political scapegoat. We should all be able to work together to help solve the btb problem but instead we have a cruel divisive policy which sets people against each other and seems to solve nothing.
Culling Badgers must stop….NOW! Please spread the word.
Please browse the following information which supports the above comments.
The
Badger Trust Cull Information
A BBC Interview with Senior Vet Dick Sibley
The Gatcombe Project, Brian May
Protect The Wild Cull Information
The Badger Crowd & The Recent Consultation
Born Free
& The badger Trust Complaint Against the Government policy To BERN
International Treaty
