Badgers in the garden

[scottycelt]

I think they're quite timid creatures in relation to humans.

It's time you dropped the Guardian for The Daily Mail ...

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-180640/Badger-attack-like-horror-movie.html

I tend to be with Mr Pee on this. I've only spotted a badger once in my lifetime in the glare of a car's headlights. If I had them in my garden I'd probably have binoculars ever-present on the window ledge and cameras all over the place.

Apologies to Doversoul if this comes across as unsympathetic to his plight. It isn't. If I carefully grew and tended vegetables (which I don't) I'm sure I'd have somewhat different feelings about badgers in my garden so I do hope a solution to the problem is found.

[amateur51]

It's time you dropped the Guardian for The Daily Mail ...

I think the give-away lies in the line "during a 48-hour rampage around the town in what is thought to be an "unprecedented" attack." scotty

[Richard Tarleton]

Like so many of these stories (which usually involve foxes) this one raises more questions than answers, e.g. what had happened to the unfortunate badger prior to its incarceration to make it behave so uncharacteristically, how did it come to be in the garage (not to mention in Evesham), etc. Badgers are quite short sighted so making a beeline for the man in his front door sounds odd too. I used to live next door to an active badger sett (on a nature reserve) and occasionally taking a stroll after dark would meet a badger or two coming the other way in the dark. Once I was accompanied by my cat. We stopped (the cat froze at my feet), the badgers came quite close, sniffed, turned and trotted off.

[umslopogaas]

We have been warned. These are large (bu UK standards) animals with powerful jaws. The index to Roper's 'Badger' book has extensive entries under 'aggression'. They mostly refer to aggression between badgers, rather than against humans, but he notes that observers have been attacked.

[jayne lee wilson]

Giant badgers! They eat children! They gorge on vindaloos!
Oh wait, a minute, that was foxes, or was it Magpies. Or maybe those well known terrors of the earth, Grey Squirrels...

Whatever the tabloid fashion is last month. No wonder we don't read The Sun in Liverpool anymore. And feed the foxes, cuddle the squirrels and admire the Magpies...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

On the subject of Badgers (if not how to keep them out of the garden), did anyone else see The Burrowers which started last Friday on BBC2? I nearly avoided it - anything with Chris Packham I have to treat with caution, but he was at his very best here. Equal amounts of excellent science and cute factor - I found it irresistable. Still available (until 6th September) on the i-Player:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b038lx3c/The_Burrowers_Animals_Underground_Episode_1/

[Richard Tarleton]

Giant badgers! They eat children! They gorge on vindaloos!
Oh wait, a minute, that was foxes, or was it Magpies. Or maybe those well known terrors of the earth, Grey Squirrels...

Whatever the tabloid fashion is last month. No wonder we don't read The Sun in Liverpool anymore. And feed the foxes, cuddle the squirrels and admire the Magpies...

Quite. Our anthropocentric view of things has a lot to answer for (though this is not to understate the importance of dover's vegetable garden ) - even as we speak, sheep farmers in the French Pyrenees are having this conversation about brown bears, and let's not start on Norwegian wolves.....

[Richard Tarleton]

- anything with Chris Packham I have to treat with caution, but he was at his very best here.

A paid-up member of the awkward squad, which I like, though I can't abide Springwatch these days.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

A paid-up member of the awkward squad, which I like, though I can't abide Springwatch these days.

[David-G]

My aunt (on the edge of the Chilterns) used to put out nuts for badgers every evening. They came up to the house every evening at 10 pm, for several years. I think the decoy idea might be quite effective.

[ahinton]

...require the services of a certain jazz pianist/vocalist.

Jamie? Cull 'em!

Ahem...

[Anna]

Oh, it's a Gas, said Mr Badger ...........

[Richard Tarleton]

Are we finally talking about the cull ?

Everyone interested should read this before making up their minds - the 2007 Final Report of the Independent Scientific Group on Cattle TB Presented to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs [David Miliband, remember him?]. John Bourne's report, following as it did the 8-year study by Professor John Krebs, demolishes the case for a cull as the way to control the spread of bovine TB. Krebs and Bourne describe the cull as "mindless". , and Krebs on TV called it "crazy". Defra have responded by saying, erm, it will work. Their evidence seems to come from other countries, with different ecologies and ecosystems.

Basically, a cull will make farmers feel better, and the Tory government (which is very ready to give out licences to kill things which annoy farmers or landowners, eg recently buzzards) thinks culling, or killing, badgers is the way to go, regardless of the science.

[Serial_Apologist]

Are we finally talking about the cull ?

Everyone interested should read this before making up their minds - the 2007 Final Report of the Independent Scientific Group on Cattle TB Presented to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs [David Miliband, remember him?]. John Bourne's report, following as it did the 8-year study by Professor John Krebs, demolishes the case for a cull as the way to control the spread of bovine TB. Krebs and Bourne describe the cull as "mindless". , and Krebs on TV called it "crazy". Defra have responded by saying, erm, it will work. Their evidence seems to come from other countries, with different ecologies and ecosystems.

Basically, a cull will make farmers feel better, and the Tory government (which is very ready to give out licences to kill things which annoy farmers or landowners, eg recently buzzards) thinks culling, or killing, badgers is the way to go, regardless of the science.

Yes, and I wasn't aware that New Zealand, where culling has allegedly been successfully carried out, had any badgers to cull.

[jayne lee wilson]

Are we finally talking about the cull ?

Everyone interested should read this before making up their minds - the 2007 Final Report of the Independent Scientific Group on Cattle TB Presented to the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs [David Miliband, remember him?]. John Bourne's report, following as it did the 8-year study by Professor John Krebs, demolishes the case for a cull as the way to control the spread of bovine TB. Krebs and Bourne describe the cull as "mindless". , and Krebs on TV called it "crazy". Defra have responded by saying, erm, it will work. Their evidence seems to come from other countries, with different ecologies and ecosystems.

Basically, a cull will make farmers feel better, and the Tory government (which is very ready to give out licences to kill things which annoy farmers or landowners, eg recently buzzards) thinks culling, or killing, badgers is the way to go, regardless of the science.

Yes, and the RSPCA are dead against it too. An NFU leader on R4 Any Questions last week, said "Badgers have killed 3000 cattle..." Well, I think you can see what's wrong with that statement... (They rip their throats out you know.) Or you have someone like the Spectator's Melissa Kite setting up the tired old "ignorant townie vs. real country people" opposition, saying, "Badgers aren't cuddly!" No, and they're not murderers either. Just like those notorious "verminous killers" the foxes, They are wild animals who live near or alongside us and whose natural interests often clash with our overpopulated, wasteful, often greedy, commercial and social ones.

Perhaps the worst thing about the cull going ahead in this way is the pressure upon the Coalition and the NFU to insist - to make QUITE sure they "prove" - that it has been successful. The consequences could be appalling for farmers, cattle and badgers.

As one who has thrilled this year to the regular sight of Buzzards calling and soaring here in North Liverpool, (I used to have to go halfway up a Welsh mountain to see them, or Kites) I feel scandalized by the killing of Buzzards and Lesser Black-backed Gulls up on the Trough of Bowland, purely to protect the profits of overpopulated grouse-shoots. Most of the game ends up in landfill, shot by various businesspeople who enjoy playing lord and lady of the manor for a few days. Now their numbers are recovering well, left to themselves neither buzzards nor gulls would take any more grouse or eggs than they need. Some landowners also burn the heather, because grouse tend to breed better in younger growth. But they destroy complex ecosystems by so doing.