Matthew Paris Proposes A Humane Solution To The Badger Problem
In his column today in The Times, Matthew Paris tells a tale about how the llamas he keeps have chased the badgers away.
Matthew’s proposal may sound silly, but I’ve had many a drink with a friend, where he has told me endless tales about his llamas and their instincts and habits. Some of his used to stand up tall and spit at passengers waiting to catch a bus. I believe the stop was moved.
So will be seeing farmers using llamas to protect their animals from badgers.
Or will friends of the badgers try to get the keeping of llamas near badger sets made illegal?
It’s Not April The First!
This story about exploding cows in Germany is straight out of the Guardian’s list of April Fool Jokes. There is a serious side though, as the article says!
Cows are believed to emit up to 500 litres of methane – a potent greenhouse gas – each per day.
Perhaps we should link all cows to the gas grid or have a cow in the kitchen connected to the cooker.
A Man Bites Dog Story
Judging by how many times it has been read, the readers of the BBC web site, find this story, where a cow goes through the roof of a house and kills a man in his bed, funny.
But then anybody who has lived in the country, knows that farming is not a totally safe business.
The Plight Of The Bees
It would appear that bees are not doing well. Over the years, I’ve known a few people who kept bees and we even had a Primary School teacher called Adams, who was a bee enthusiast and sometime keeper. My physio at the Angel, was even given a jar of Stamford Hill honey from an Orthodox Jewish client. Read why honey is kosher here.
I like my honey and I would miss it, if it disappeared, so I’m watching the arguments on whether neonicotinoids should be banned. Many of the arguments are outlined is this article from the BBC in Scotland, about whether if a ban is brought in, Scotland should delay implementation.
It is the classic argument, where commercial interests, which in this case are farmers and pesticide manufacturers are arguing against the emotions of various lobby groups.
We seem to be getting a lot of arguments like this these days, with fracking, nuclear power, waste incinerators and HS2 producing similar stands-off.
With the bees and neonicotinoids, there is a solution and that is research, performed scientifically over a period of years. But I suspect both sides of the argument, would probably not want to wait for any conclusions and then if it was against their views, they wouldn’t accept it anyway.
Janice Turner in the Times last week, published an article entitled, Hectoring won’t persuade the MMR-deniers. The title alone says it all, about those who are against MMR.
So this argument about bees and neonicotinoids, will buzz on for years.
A New Food Source To Develop
As someone, who has planted more than a few trees in his time, I’ve had the odd runs-in with deer, who feel that the new shoots of saplings are tasty for breakfast, lunch and dinner. C also hit a deer in my car, which to say the least didn’t do it much good.
So although they are nice to see in the countryside, when the University of East Anglia says we have too many deer, as reported here, I tend to agree. The researcher, Dr. Dolman is quoted as follows.
We are not killing something and then incinerating the carcass – what we are talking about is harvesting a wild animal to supply wild free-ranging venison for or tables – for farm shops, for gastro pubs.
“What we are advocating isn’t removing deer from the countryside – what we are advocating is trying to get on top of the deer population explosion and try to control the problems that are being caused.
“And in a way, [venison] provides a sustainable food source where you know where it comes from, you know it is ethically sourced, you know it is safe to eat, and that puts food on people’s tables. As much as I love deer, to be a meat eater but then to object to the culling and harvesting of deer seems to be inconsistent.
That sounds all very sensible, but I suspect that the RSPCA and others will be against the large scale cull, that he suggests. The RSPCA’s view is in this part of the article.
In a statement, the RSPCA said it was “opposed in principle to the killing or taking of all wild animals unless there is strong science to support it, or evidence that alternatives are not appropriate.
“Even if a cull is supported by science, it is very important that it is carried out in a humane and controlled way.
“Any decision to carry out a cull must be taken on a case by case basis based on the specific issues which impact a specific area. We don’t believe this should be rolled out in a uniform way across the whole country. It is certainly not a case of one size fits all.
If we don’t cull the deer to reasonable levels, we will get a double destruction of the countryside. By the deer on the one hand and on the other by farmers and householders putting up more and more secure fences to keep the pests off their land.
With all the trouble over horsemeat, it does strike me, that we ought to develop our taste for venison and support those like Marks and Spencer, who are using it in high-quality ready meals.
After all, venison is supposed to be good for you and certainly doesn’t have the health problems that are being reported today for processed meat.
Has Anybody Lost Any Sheep?
If so, they may be in someone’s garden in Sussex according to this story on the BBC.
What Do You Do With Urban Foxes?
There’s a story in the Standard about foxes plaguing a smart part of London. Here’s what Brent Council said.
When contacted by residents, Brent council said it did not have the funding to deal with foxes but hoped to serve a legal notice on the owner of the property to remove the vegetation.
The council claimed it could leave itself open to prosecution if it moved the animals.
Craig Johnstone, of the council’s Public and Animal Health Team, wrote in an email: “Dealing with foxes is quite a specialist field. It’s not that simple to just trap and relocate them.
“Doing this could leave us open to prosecution as releasing a fox into another area (countryside) could cause the fox unnecessary suffering.”
A farmer friend of mind has had urban foxes dumped on his land. As they have never had to hunt and have just scavenged, they are rather lost and get very hungry. He’s even seen them begging round his tractor, whilst he sits there eating his sandwiches for lunch.
They should be humanely destroyed.
The Stepney City Farm and Crossrail
At Stepney Green, there is going to be an underground junction for Crossrail. The main line will come from the east on the Limmo Peninsular and then past westwards to Canary Wharf and Central London. It will be joined here by the more northern of the eastern branches to Pudding Mill Lane and Stratford.
Surprisingly, over the top is the Stepney City Farm.
But they both have their objectives and I think with a little bit of give and take on both sides, they have come to a compromise that suits both. The farm has lost a field for some period of time, but Crossrail have put in new fences and were starting to put up a new barn.
It is a bit of a mess in places now, as these pictures show.
But then time is a great healer and I suspect that when Crossrail opens, the farm will be as it should be. I was shown round by Richard and was impressed at the quality of the livestock, the fences and buildings. You can’t have a good farm without the latter, as why should animals not be warm and secure.
By the way, the farm sells eggs, so if you want hens or duck eggs laid in East London, is there a better place to go?
How To Move An Agricultural Roller! Or Not!
Some years ago, I needed to move an agricultural ribbed roller from my house to my stud, which were about a mile apart. The roller was built from a series of sections and was about two metres long, with a stout triangular frame at the front to hitch it to the tractor.
I had a Land Rover Discovery at the time, so using some rope, I tied the frame of the roller to the toe-hook on the back of the 4×4.
As I wanted to do it slowly, I felt that six o’clock on a Sunday morning would be best, as there was little traffic about. It took me about an hour, with no mishaps en route.
It was only on Monday, that I found I’d woken everybody up, and they’d all wondered what made the amazing noise.
Cynicism About Organic Foods
I should say before I continue, that I do buy organic foods.
But!
I am always suspicious that they don’t live up to the hype.
Take my supper yesterday. I ate several Jersey Royal potatoes, which were not organic. But they are produced by farmers who care about the quality of their product. They were exquisite.
Take just before Christmas. A farmer brought me some washed supermarket parsnips round, as a favour for his wife using a stable for a pony. They were much better than those you get from Waitrose or Sainbury’s, but that is where they would have ended up. However, that takes a couple of days, whereas they arrived from his field in a couple of hours.
So it seems that how the product is handled after picking is perhaps as important than what goes on before.
I suspect that it is more true with something like meat. After all I’ve kept animals for years and know that the better you treat them the better they perform. Or in the case of food animals, does that mean taste?
So where you know about the provenance of the animal and can trust the farmer are you getting a better and perhaps a more humanely kept product. After all organic means that some drugs used for medicinal purposes are banned. Is that humane?
So when I read this report in The Times yesterday, my cynicism was increased.
This says that a study by Professor Benton of Leeds University has shown that organic farms are not necessarily the best for wildlife.
The research found that organic farms had, on average, 12 per cent more biodiversity in terms of the number and variety of plants, birds, earthworms and insects. But the yield from organic fields was 55 per cent lower than from conventional fields growing similar crops in the same areas. While there were more plants and butterflies on organic farms, there was no difference in the number of bees and there were 30 per cent more hoverflies on conventional farms.
Organic fields contained more magpies and jays but 10 per cent fewer small birds such as yellowhammers, corn buntings, linnets, skylarks and lapwings. The researchers found that the larger birds, which were attracted to organic farms by their denser patches of woodland, were scaring away the smaller birds and preying on their nests.
It is all very interesting.
One point Professor Benton said was that greater benefits were detected where there were clusters of organic farms. That I would understand as in the studlands of Newmarket, there appears to be a much greater diversity than on ordinary agricultural land. That is also because horses are such inefficient grazers and leave lots for hares and deer.
The Anonymous Widower 