Returning to the discussion as to whether badger predation is the major cause of hedgehog decline as suggested by a friend of one of the HART volunteers, see earlier post, this seems to be a case of someone deciding what was true before even being in possession of the facts, let alone giving them due consideration. She even cited the British Hedgehog Preservation Society as confirming her view, but I strongly suspect that she took from the conversation what she wanted to hear. In further confirmation of my counter-argument, a piece by ecologist Hugh Warwick, author of the forthcoming book Cull of the Wild, writes of a study carried out in Denmark carried out by Dr Sophie Lund Ramsmussen using liver samples from 115 dead hedgehogs. Rodenticides were found in 84%, insecticides in 43% and herbicides in 50%. Microplastics are likely also causing untold harm. Furthermore, one member of our badger group (and I have since heard this from others) reported that badgers and hedgehogs can be seen feeding together in his garden all the time.
Our badger survey this month was rather different from our usual forays. We had been called to a green space in an otherwise highly developed area of Reading, Berkshire, to check on two setts and to look for any outliers. A planning application to build housing was rejected some eighteen months ago, but developers simply never stop. As is so often the case, what they are doing now is insidiously ruining the space one step at a time so, presumably, that they will be able to say that it is not much used and devoid of wildlife. It’s a pre-emptive strike. The damage was shocking – huge patches of scorched earth, trees and bushes chopped down or uprooted, and the footpaths turned into rutted quagmires by huge vehicles allegedly ‘clearing’ them. It’s been extraordinarily wet this year so far, but the loss of trees has already meant that the recreation ground at the foot of the hill is badly flooded.
The two setts did not look to have been disturbed and were certainly active. One of the ‘cleared’, i.e. completely churned up footpaths was very close to one of them though, a lot closer than the buffer zone within which such things are not permitted. We surveyed the site thoroughly but found only the two main setts, but we did come across a large number (20 or so) of latrines which almost certainly marked one of the clans’ territorial boundaries, or even both. It is not just a case of protecting the setts themselves from housing development, but should also be about protecting their entire territory. Where, if the development goes ahead, are they supposed to forage?
Meanwhile DEFRA Secretary of State Steve Barclay has today confirmed that badger culling will continue & be expanded to 2030 & beyond. He doesn’t say, for some reason, how sorry he is that the government lied to us by pretending not so long ago that the cull was coming to an end, not that that was remotely true in the first place.
Our hearts were lifted to some extent when we met one of a 200-strong group of local campaigners but she was already clearly deeply saddened by what had been done and was not optimistic about the future. In spite of repeated requests for information, the ownership of the land and the name of the employers of the machinery operators remain closely guarded secrets.
One of the setts occupies a long stretch of a steep bank of a stream. The stream contained a broken supermarket trolley, a discarded car battery and … a dead badger, which one of our number pulled out and placed on the other bank so as to avoid further contamination of the water. This, we had been told, was the second badger found dead out in the open since the works had begun. They may, of course, have died from natural or other causes but it seemed quite the coincidence. I’ll spare you pictures of the latrines but these are of a humble thistle which made me think of fractals and a beautiful blackthorn, whose white flowers are beginning to appear and of which I wrote in Animal Wild “Driving to HART one morning I noticed the profusion of white blossom in the hedgerows and wondered what it was. Blackthorn. Suddenly, I started seeing it everywhere.” There was plenty of birdlife still, including a pair of Buzzards spotted in a dead tree which they use as a lookout post.
I stopped on my way home not far from the site at a corner shop at one end of the nearby housing estate. Suddenly a Red Kite appeared, only a few feet above my head, probably the closest I have ever been to one. It swooped down almost to the ground to send away a Magpie which seemed to be doing nothing other than minding his own business. Within seconds as the Kite began to rise again, a Crow joined in, harassing the Kite, as they do, and driving it away.
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