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Main Boards => News and Articles => Topic started by: richardh1905 on 10:35:05, 21/05/19

Title: Rewilding Britain
Post by: richardh1905 on 10:35:05, 21/05/19
Interesting article in The Guardian today:
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/21/rewild-quarter-uk-fight-climate-crisis-campaigners-urge (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/may/21/rewild-quarter-uk-fight-climate-crisis-campaigners-urge)

As well as the obvious environmental benefits, this will be wonderful for future generations of walkers!

I've signed the Government website petition in support of re-wilding.
Restore nature on a massive scale to help stop climate breakdown (https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/254607)


Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: richardh1905 on 10:35:50, 21/05/19
..and Alladale in Sutherland looks wonderful!
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 10:59:43, 21/05/19
I am prepared to stop mowing my lawn if it helps. There are corners of my garden where rewinding is already well underway.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 11:40:57, 22/05/19
The first thing I notice about the overall tone of the article is 'how good it is going to be for farmers'. But is the subsidies really going go into the pocket of landowners? Also it is the NFU responding to the ideas suggested not the CLA, before I would make a commitment to an idea that seems intrinsically good, I would like to test the motives of the recipients of our taxes. The farmer would benefit from the popular commitment to this idea, if they are the ones working the land, should reward then go to the tax payer by being welcomed into the idyllic settings being fashioned out of our landscape. If the identity of the farmer is replaced by the landowner, we will see a group traditionally opposed to public access, whose track record shows little reversal of this mindset and sits on enormous wealth from increasing land values.

How much has pumping public money into the countryside played into the hands of landowners, as opposed to true farmers? The environments created by re-wilding can well be seen to be complimentary to leisure activities that benefit all, but how soon would we see it twisted to the advantage of those would argue that visitors are an unnecessary complication to true re-wilding.


   
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Mel on 18:14:18, 22/05/19
I'm doing my "bit"....


My garden is already a nature reserve.  I hate gardening and the most I do is cut the grass and trim the shrubs.  Can't remember the last time I used weedkiller or any kind of chemical feed.  As a result I have loads of wildlife foraging and nesting and get a cracking crop of the sweetest brambles ever.


My neighbour, on the other hand, has a beautifully manicured lawn and wonderfully tended plants.  Yet very few birds use her bird feeders.  She can't understand why, despite me having a cat, all the birds choose my garden over hers.



Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Bigfoot_Mike on 19:00:54, 22/05/19
My garden s similarly wild: grass, moss (probably more of this than grass), daisies, dandelions, clover, bushes and trees - plus a few randomly appearing wild flowers and fungi. We get quite a lot of birds and used to get loads of rabbits. The feral cats have reduced the number of rabbits significantly. We also get deer, red squirrels, hedgehogs, occasional foxes, voles and moles. One of neighbours has also spied pine martens on his camera trap, although we haven’t seen one here. I prefer this to a bowling green in the back yard.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Mel on 19:25:13, 22/05/19
Aaah, yes... moss.  My front garden's full of the stuff  ;D


I remember scarifying the lawn a good few years ago to try and keep the front looking something like presentable (so it didn't show the rest of the street up) and ended up with a bald lawn, barring about 3 blades of grass  :D   :-[


Needless to say, I've not done it since  ::)


I bet you don't have flying snails though ...
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Bigfoot_Mike on 20:00:50, 22/05/19
Moss is generally green, so it is part of the lawn. The only flying snails would be those in the beaks of crows or gulls (which can fly off with a cat’s food bowl). Aberdeenshire gulls are also know as pterodactyls.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Jac on 07:39:46, 23/05/19

I bet you don't have flying snails though ...



Do tell...................... :)
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Dyffryn Ardudwy on 10:49:34, 23/05/19
The only problem i can envisage, with a tiny island the size of the Uk, trying to reduce our carbon footprint.
No sooner we are all made to drive electric vehicles, and other so called green lifestyle choices, the likes of India, China and the US, will increase their pollution levels, because we have reduced ours.

There's little point of us here in the Uk trying our level best, when the rest of the world are not following our example.

How do you remonstrate with developing superpowers such as China and India.

Until everyone goes GREEN, theres little or no point in tiny nations such as ourselves, trying our level best, when the real culprits are doing nothing, and intend doing nothing.


I am all for saving our beautiful countryside for future generations, but our token effort will amount to nothing.


Our CO2 footprint is non existent compared to the likes of India and China
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 11:32:57, 23/05/19
So, we do nothing but wait until someone else blinks. And so ended life on earth.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 12:40:16, 23/05/19
Indeed - the politics of despair that ignores the efforts being made here and elsewhere including the countries mentioned.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: richardh1905 on 13:32:24, 23/05/19
The UK emits far more per capita than India and China.

To do nothing would be the ultimate act of betrayal of our children, and of future generations.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: richardh1905 on 13:34:00, 23/05/19
I didn't intend this thread to become a debate on climate change, by the way!
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 13:45:34, 23/05/19
Yes - back to rewilding.  How about some more exotic fauna as well as flora? 
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Dyffryn Ardudwy on 13:54:42, 23/05/19
I am not being political, just pointing out the fact that however well meaning we are here in the Uk, there are far more powerful nations, that are emitting vast amounts of CO2, and due to their growing economies have no plans to change their way.

India and China are developing brand new fossil fuelled power stations, using coal to power them, here in the Uk, we thankfully turned our backs on that heavily polluting way of producing energy.

We can all get heated and dismayed about comments pointing out the almost futile attempts made by small economies.

Until America, China and India change their ways, global warming will continue at its alarming rate.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 14:18:58, 23/05/19
Yes - back to rewilding.  How about some more exotic fauna as well as flora?
High on the list would be wolves, to replace the wild deer in walled estates, once homes for a decrepit aristocracy and now if not owned by Russian oligarchs, funded by their laundered money.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 14:44:04, 23/05/19
What walled estates? There are none north of the border that I know of. There are estates owned by Swiss, Dutch and English people plus a few owned by pension funds. One is owned by Saudi prince. None have a wall.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 14:47:02, 23/05/19
They've made a start with Woburn and Longleat!  :)
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Jac on 15:51:10, 23/05/19

Rewilding is controversial even between the members/officers of wildlife trusts. Some favour a hands off let nature take it's course approach whilst others promote a managed approach mainly, as I understand it, to achieve a greater biodiversity in a particular area. One reason given by the DWT land manager at a recent talk was that 'all our woodland including that considered ancient has at some time been managed so we need to continue to do so'
Personally, I don't think nature worries about biodiversity it's every species for itself in the struggle to get to climax vegetation - usually woodland, at least at lower altitudes - and the fauna associated it.
Naturally some environments would only exist in small areas - particularly lowland heath which if left would quickly become woodland with small open patches.  It's humans who have kept larger areas free of woodland by grazing and other agricultural activities since the disappearance (humans again?) of large free roaming herds of  deer/aurochs etc.
Unless we reintroduce apex predators - lynx, wolf, bear - and others such as boar and beaver it cannot be considered genuinely rewilded to a condition similar to pre-human intervention.
A really nice idea but obviously only practical where large areas of land are involved, though in the case of beavers they are now living wild in several areas (eight families currently in the R Otter catchment).

Rewilding or not? I suspect that more important is to reduce the usage of pesticides and herbicides in agriculture.

when you look at that beautiful field of wheat rippling in the wind remember it has been treated with snail and slug killer and who knows what else - listen for the song thrush - can you hear it? Probably not. After all there is nothing for it to eat in that 40+ acres even if the scraggy hedges could support a nest.


Sorry if that is perhaps a trifle political or slightly off topic but I think we do need to look at the bigger picture

 

Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 17:09:44, 23/05/19


Unless we reintroduce apex predators - lynx, wolf, bear - and others such as boar and beaver it cannot be considered genuinely rewilded to a condition similar to pre-human intervention.



But when was that? There were people of various type here before the last glacial period. Once the ice started melting trees started growing and animals wander back including the people. Before the ice ages the world was a very different place. So it's very much a question of which "wild" are we looking at?
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Bigfoot_Mike on 18:53:49, 23/05/19
There are plenty of beavers on the Tay. There also still seem to be quite a few song thrushes in rural Aberdeenshire. Most of the farming here is pasture for sheep and cattle, with some barley, oilseed rape and neeps.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Bigfoot_Mike on 21:28:21, 23/05/19
The garden is suitably wild, as a small roe deer has just visited. It can’t have been more than 2.5 feet to the top of its back. The deer we had last week were much bigger.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: richardh1905 on 08:36:26, 24/05/19
The alternative to the introduction of apex predators such as wolves in the Highlands is aggressive deer culling - it certainly seems to be working on the Glen Feshie estate; the regeneration of the Caledonian Forest there is remarkable.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Mel on 22:03:19, 25/05/19

I bet you don't have flying snails though ...


Do tell......................  :)




Sorry Jac, missed this.  I was sat quietly in my garden once.  I could hear my next door neighbour gardening on t'other side o' fence.  Suddenly, thud, a snail flew over the fence and landed on the grass next to me.  Needless to say, it flew back over the fence!  :D


To be honest, I don't mind snails and slugs... they eat the dockleaves and get nice and fat for the hedgehog  O0
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Jac on 07:19:25, 26/05/19
Sorry Jac, missed this.  I was sat quietly in my garden once.  I could hear my next door neighbour gardening on t'other side o' fence.  Suddenly, thud, a snail flew over the fence and landed on the grass next to me.  Needless to say, it flew back over the fence!  :D

To be honest, I don't mind snails and slugs... they eat the dockleaves and get nice and fat for the hedgehog  O0

;D better than the neighbour using slug pellets
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 07:39:32, 26/05/19
;D better than the neighbour using slug pellets
Trouble is in my garden the hedgehogs and thrushes are not keeping up their end of the bargain.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: EnglishHiker on 19:38:43, 28/10/19
Unless we reintroduce apex predators - lynx, wolf, bear - and others such as boar and beaver it cannot be considered genuinely rewilded to a condition similar to pre-human intervention.


I can't imagine the likes of wolves and bears being re-introduced. Look at the trouble people have with foxes coming into their back gardens. Can you imagine if that becomes a wolf or a bear? :D
Also, I'm not sure how much longer I'd be hiking for if a chance encounter with a bear was on the cards!
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 21:07:20, 28/10/19

I can't imagine the likes of wolves and bears being re-introduced. Look at the trouble people have with foxes coming into their back gardens. Can you imagine if that becomes a wolf or a bear? :D
Also, I'm not sure how much longer I'd be hiking for if a chance encounter with a bear was on the cards!
We had a fair bit of wild life in the Pyrenees including bears.  It was not an issue.  Wild life tends to hear you coming and make itself scarce. We did have a bear help itself to a local hive one night but the only animal that was a concern to walkers was wild boar, of which we had hundreds.  They did a lot a damage to local fields too but in return they were delicious.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: EnglishHiker on 22:08:22, 28/10/19

I never even thought of the Pyrenees. My mind went straight to the US!

They did a lot a damage to local fields too but in return they were delicious.
;D

Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 08:13:53, 29/10/19
I found wolf prints in the sand near where I camped in Sarek NP northern Sweden. There were supposed to be Bear, Wolverine and Lynx but didn't see them unfortunately. Knowing that they were around didn't both me in face I found it quite exciting. Their population density is very low so the likelihood of a chance encounter is very remote.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: EnglishHiker on 10:38:38, 29/10/19
I think I'd feel I would need some kind of protection just in case. Specially where bears are concerned.
I might have an American media induced irrational fear though, of a bear poking its head into my tent one night or stumbling across a mother bear and her cubs... ;D


We have boar now in the UK right? And lynx?
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Jac on 11:13:47, 29/10/19
I think I'd feel I would need some kind of protection just in case. Specially where bears are concerned.
I might have an American media induced irrational fear though, of a bear poking its head into my tent one night or stumbling across a mother bear and her cubs... ;D

We have boar now in the UK right? And lynx?

Lots of wild boar, yes, but no lynx to the best of my knowledge.

Seeing a bear, face to face at 10 metres, was the highlight of my walking holiday in the Polish Tatra mountains.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: fernman on 11:20:31, 29/10/19
We have boar now in the UK right? And lynx?

And beavers.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 12:04:19, 29/10/19
No Lynx at present but their are some who want to release them.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 13:41:36, 29/10/19
How will rewilding affect access? There is no legal or moral requirement on freehold for the occupier of our countryside to consider how their occupation affects the communities need to access the countryside.
We see the imbalance in favour of the freeholder in many ways, a new bridge across a town byepass, which cuts the population off from their surrounding open spaces yet the value off putting in new rights of way cannot be established.

Listening to the program on Countryfile last night the proposers were so sure of the good they were going to do for conservation the modern need to access countryside for the health of the nation was not mentioned.
We have laws, regulations and established practices on how the conduct of access is allowed, do these fit in with yet another vested interest promoting that their occupation is going to benefit all?
Suppose a beaver builds a dam and a right of way is flooded. There is a parallel in the Ceiriog valley, where the river Ceriog has eroded a few yards of the PRoW, as the freeholder of the land blocks the only feasible alternative way, part of a 1/2mile way is rendered useless and the whole way of 1 1/5 miles fails to provide a route of significance.
 There will be countless of practical examples of the needs of the minority enthusiast being given precedence over a greater public need. How possible is it to get a simple PRoW deviation to correct an obvious public danger from traffic yet the landowner, who blocks it is safe from H&S investigation.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 14:06:02, 29/10/19
How will releasing wild animals affect access? Not much I wouldn't think.


Where beaver's have built across a footpath in Knapdale they've built a floating pontoon to divert the path around the pond.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Jac on 14:44:26, 29/10/19
Devon Wildlife Trust's River Otter 5 year beaver trial - originating from beavers who rewilded themselves about ten years ago (from where is still not admitted but most likely from a nearby wildlife park) - now has 'seven family groups living wild in East Devon and a further six areas of activity which may be territories of young pairs or solitary beavers' Quoted from the DWT magazine which arrived today.
Hopefully, they'll be permitted to remain when the DEFRA licenced trial ends. In fact it would probably be difficult to remove them all now as I understand that they are well spread into the tributaries of the R. Otter from where it is but a short bimble into the other rivers originating in the Blackdown Hills. Perhaps they have already as the report states 'East Devon' rather than river Otter.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 22:49:33, 29/10/19
How will releasing wild animals affect access? Not much I wouldn't think.
I used the example of beavers altering the landscape as a snap example, it is those people / organizations promoting wilding, who may well alter the access network, to suit their own purposes.
After all the footpaths in the Ceriog valley probably remained open for centuries, whilst it was a local way to the Llanarmon DC church, but when it became PRoW the landowner jumped at the chance for closure and used this example to back up the argument for closure on a petition to No 10 Downing Street.
Where beaver's have built across a footpath in Knapdale they've built a floating pontoon to divert the path around the pond.
This the situation now; the site is being used as a flagship example of a conservation experiment with money spare for the path rescue, what happens when they have to become self sustaining?

After all the Definitive Map was intended as a promise of access to all of our countryside for the sacrifices two generations made in 2 World Wars so that their heirs would have the freedom of their countryside.
It was in fact supposed to be a War Memorial, not a short cut for lawyers and estate agents to be able to prove where private land starts and finishes.

I may be a bit cynical, but there are too many examples of where this ideal has been derailed, so I remain suspicious of one more well meaning interest occupying our countryside and the integrity of ways not being properly understood or safeguarded.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 05:36:55, 30/10/19
Where wild animals have been successfully reintroduced, of rare ones have been encouraged to breed they draw more people to the area in the hope of seeing them, think Ospreys in Scotland and the Lakes as an example.  This leads to the growth of footpaths and pressure for more and improved access. Granted in the short term there may be restrictions on access while the critters breed and become established but in the longer term they are an asset.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: vghikers on 08:43:52, 30/10/19
Quote
Where wild animals have been successfully reintroduced, of rare ones have been encouraged to breed they draw more people to the area in the hope of seeing them...

Every silver lining has a cloud  :(
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 09:18:18, 30/10/19
Assuming generalities from a few observations is risky, I think there is a lot of truth in Ninthace's post, however I would not like to give carte blanche to conservationist without investigating some of the counter situations. One springs to mind;
There is a gorge on the River Theme just west of Ludlow. So beautiful by repute that it was part of a leisure walk landscaped by one of the Georgian or Victorian landowners, however the land has little agricultural value, so it was off loaded to some nature organization. There are non highway bridges at either end, one a right of way the other not, but strong circumstantial evidence that it is a lost public way.
The warden upto 10 years ago arranged bi-yearly visits through the gorge and by all reports these were more of a personal ego trip for himself rather than a true allowance of access. I know a person who lived in the neighbourhood of this person, who promoted himself as a great conservationist, yet his local reputation as a control freak was well established. The legacy from the occupation is no permissive way along this beauty spot, which could highlight the second bridge as a strong contender for further access. If that was so it would show on even a cursory glance at an Explorer map a route that joins Ludlow to a station on the central Wales line.



This would be a significant step in creating an A1 route across the South of Shropshire, a county that only has a meandering circular route as it main contribution to the countries access and manages to block the East to West approach to the Welsh border from the densely populated Midlands on South, Mid and North bands.

Sorry but I would like to see more recognition that withholding keys parts of our countryside and infrastructure that can benefit access needs to be understood before we risk making a class of occupier more reactionary than the hereditary landowners, who still need to come clean about the political crime they perpetrated.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 09:29:42, 30/10/19
Every silver lining has a cloud  :(
Think it through vg.  The car park and paths will there all year, the tourists won’t be.  It’s all about timing.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: fernman on 09:30:24, 30/10/19
A couple of days ago I glanced over a news headline stating that wild cats are going to be reintroduced to England, but searching online now it appears to be just a re-hash of an article that appeared in The Independent in May.

What it boils down to is that an animal breeder in Devon plans to release some wild cat kittens into his own enclolsures, and he has pipe dreams of releasing them into the wild. (Hope you like pussy cats, Ninthace!) As expected, the National Farmers Union were a bit huffy about it.

@BWW who has just posted, you seem to be going off at a bit of a tangent? While the case you cite is interesting to read, I see little connection with 'rewilding Britain'.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 09:35:19, 30/10/19
@BWW who has just posted, you seem to be going off at a bit of a tangent? While the case you cite is interesting to read, I see little connection with 'rewilding Britain'.
I think my thinking is not beware the animals you introduce, more beware the humans, their organizations and ambitions who introduce them.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 09:45:35, 30/10/19
A couple of days ago I glanced over a news headline stating that wild cats are going to be reintroduced to England, but searching online now it appears to be just a re-hash of an article that appeared in The Independent in May.

What it boils down to is that an animal breeder in Devon plans to release some wild cat kittens into his own enclolsures, and he has pipe dreams of releasing them into the wild. (Hope you like pussy cats, Ninthace!) As expected, the National Farmers Union were a bit huffy about it.
If they keep the village Tom off my garden they are welcome.  The problem with letting Wild Cats loose in anywhere but the wildest areas is the risk they will interbreed with domestic moggies spoiling the blood line.  Then again they may fall foul of the various  “Beasts” of the region.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 09:47:16, 30/10/19
There aren't any wildcats in England, those in Scotland are so inter-breed with domestic moggies that it's questionable whether any true wildcats exist at all anywhere in the UK. Why should they be a problem to farmers they don't pray on livestock. The main problem for them is the lack of suitable habits and pray, without the latter they tend to be reduced to scavenging from bins, which is when they come into contact with domestic cats.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 10:02:40, 30/10/19
There aren't any wildcats in England, those in Scotland are so inter-breed with domestic moggies that it's questionable whether any true wildcats exist at all anywhere in the UK. Why should they be a problem to farmers they don't pray on livestock. The main problem for them is the lack of suitable habits and pray, without the latter they tend to be reduced to scavenging from bins, which is when they come into contact with domestic cats.
And that exactly where the risk to farm L/S exists. Domestic dogs are causing real problems in dairy herds close to urban population, with this ride in a nematode that can pass through the gut wall and attack the liver, in high yielding stock it produces a cataclysmic stress on the animal very quickly. Some control is possible with dog, as they are under supervision.
I strong population of feral cats with a yet unknown parasite or disease may well be lurking in those bins to be mutated.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 10:12:05, 30/10/19
A lot of "if's and maybe's" in that statement, is there any evidence of risk to livestock from felines?
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 10:16:48, 30/10/19

@BWW who has just posted, you seem to be going off at a bit of a tangent? While the case you cite is interesting to read, I see little connection with 'rewilding Britain'.





BBW always goes off on the same tangent, he really tries him best to twist any thread around to his only interest - moaning about access.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 14:15:34, 30/10/19
I should have thought that the possibility that rewilding might affect access a justifiable inclusion in a discussion on a walking forum as the pastime we all share is dependent on access. Far from moaning, I enjoy exploring terrain both practically and theoretically so it is fairly natural that I might use some the examples I have walked in and experienced.

On the subject of a moan;  :D Downton Gorge is an pre-wilding example of rewilding, it was private before being taken over by a nature trust and is still effectively off limits for most of the year. Unless you can get onto one of the "Open Days" with limited availability. A broader view that I touched on, means it could be part of a way that would provide a route including Kinver, The Clee hills with entry into that lesser walked area of the Welsh Border, which is the old county of Radnorshire.
Here is an example where a conservation group has failed to see the value in sharing part of the countryside they manage in a meaningful way and to exploit that to the betterment of their aims. The knee jerk conservation attitude that says human intervention upsets the balance of nature is weak here because the zone occupied by the walker is minimal.

Now I responded to the issue of cats as it was a family member, a farmer who has bought and sold several farms around Stafford, who first told me about the nemotode issue in Stafford Stoke Gap. Each time as an owner occupier has had a dairy enterprise, which he has managed to increase as the need to stay efficient, so I have heard at first hand the disease/parasite experience on the urban fringe. They get regular feral cat population explosions in there buildings.

Forgive me, if I question the use of 'if'. In a large and closed genetic pool with a potential a number of potential hosts in close proximity with a very high breeding index, the likelihood of 'eventually' is more probable. I am not sure but the discussion I had, I am very sure there were a number of possibilities cited but as this discussion was several years ago I do not remember the detail. So it is possible that discussion of this is around in farming circles.


What I can clearly remember is chairing a NFU meeting when the reduction in temperatures of processing meat and bone meal was being discussed and a farmer I knew well forecasting BSE 19 years before the first outbreak. OK nothing to do with rewilding but it may explain my tendency to question experts.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 21:20:34, 30/10/19
It's difficult to understand quite what you're rambling on about, what has BSE and Canine cross contamination got to do with reintroducing wildcats who are felines. Totally different species, totally different genus.   
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: fernman on 08:45:43, 31/10/19
BBW always goes off on the same tangent, he really tries him best to twist any thread around to his only interest - moaning about access.

Well, someone's got to blow the trumpet.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: barewirewalker on 09:58:05, 31/10/19
Thanks Fernman, O0 I do not think that my trumpet blowing is a mis-call on this topic.
The simple fact is space, acreage or hectares we are only just into using open access for leisure. Conservation is a powerful lobby, it can swamp many smaller interests and enthusiasm for it may well take those, whose interests could be affected down a risky path.

If a bit of lateral thinking in attempting to draw parallels has confused some, I apologize, I have memory of a wiser, experienced mind telling me as a young man of a danger. No expert forecast that a minor disease of sheep would become an epidemic in cattle and then inflict untold misery on many families and yet I listened to exactly that scenario being described, not by an expert, an elderly tenant farmer at a local branch meeting on a Thursday night 19 years before the outbreak of BSE.

Are the warning signs on this forum? Whitstable Dave has posted a lovely photo, a highlight of his walking experience, a Red Deer in Kent, an animal very much larger than the Sika or Fallow, which can very many more ticks. Elsewhere a discussion on the increase of tick bite, where? Surprisingly in the denser populated south of the country. Another posting about tick born diseases, an increase in encephalitis.


Now another jump of lateral thinking, how many access dependent activities do you see when you are out walking. Caving, rock climbing, hang gliding, photography, landscape painting, canoeing, sailing, children's education projects, fishing............................What are the many scenarios that could be evoked out of these many possibility.

Lets try one, at the risk of being shot down; a Wolf takes over a cave as a den, that cave is the entrance of a major caving network? Maybe it is a flawed example but who has precedence.
The wolf is the property of the occupier of the land, does a legal understanding of access allow the people with the most to lose proper protection for their interests.
Have the laws/regulations yet kept pace to the needs of modern society to be able to risk a project that may well be extend to very large areas of land?

 
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Mel on 17:32:08, 31/10/19



There was an old lady who swallowed a fly....


.... perhaps she'll die....


So, let's hear people's thoughts on the flora and fauna aspect of re-wilding Britain instead of fixating on transmittable microbes that may or may not live in the gut of a feral cat and how that may or may not affect access across land that isn't currently accessible  ::)

Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: ninthace on 19:17:14, 31/10/19
I vote Lynx and Beavers for starters.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Bigfoot_Mike on 19:18:49, 31/10/19
One of our local feral cats did prevent access to beneath our hedge to an off the lead dog that was out of control. A quick swipe across the nose, a yelp and it was running back to its owner that shouldn’t be out with a dog until they have been trained to control one.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: WhitstableDave on 19:38:06, 31/10/19
Rewilding sounded great to me... for a few moments, that is. Then I read everything there is to read on the 'Rewilding Britain' website and I was left with a feeling of unease. There's a lot there and I kept coming across references to hunting, fishing and the necessity for culling (a nicer word than killing I presume).

And I remembered watching a programme on iPlayer a few months ago about an estate in Scotland (Alladale?) where the owner plans to introduce wolves (and bears?) and enclose a vast area with a 9 foot fence. This sounds more like a zoo for the wealthy rather than the reintroduction of animals such as wolves.

I'm a cynic by nature and I'm highly suspicious of the 'rewilding' movement. I read a piece on The Guardian website which kind of sums it up for me...

If, in the future, we can witness not only foxes in Finchley but lynx in Norfolk, wolves in Sutherland and whales in Wales, then their protectors will have to act as vigilant estate managers or even showbiz impresarios.



Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: fernman on 19:57:25, 31/10/19
So, let's hear people's thoughts on the flora and fauna aspect of re-wilding Britain

Flora, did you say? Virtually ever since wild flower seed mixes became commercially available for large-scale use they have contained seeds from sources outside of the UK that are genetically different from our true natives.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Owen on 20:10:55, 31/10/19


And I remembered watching a programme on iPlayer a few months ago about an estate in Scotland (Alladale?) where the owner plans to introduce wolves (and bears?) and enclose a vast area with a 9 foot fence. This sounds more like a zoo for the wealthy rather than the reintroduction of animals such as wolves.




Sounds like a zoo to you and many others, that particular landowner was told that his plans would need a zoo license and there was no way he would ever be granted one. He has now dropped the plan.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Mel on 21:01:27, 31/10/19
Flora, did you say? Virtually ever since wild flower seed mixes became commercially available for large-scale use they have contained seeds from sources outside of the UK that are genetically different from our true natives.


Just desperately trying to get the subject something like back on topic again as per richardh's original post and linked article  O0
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: richardh1905 on 21:12:05, 26/11/19

Just desperately trying to get the subject something like back on topic again as per richardh's original post and linked article  O0

Thanks Mel - amazing how threads can drift!

As for all those worried about apex predators, feral cats and wildflower seeds - I don't see any of these advocated in the article.
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: richardh1905 on 20:50:36, 27/11/19
Re-wilding need be no more than letting nature take its course.

On a minor scale, our new garden is an example - the previous owners were not keen gardeners (/understatement) and there was nothing but a patch of grass, a manky miniature box hedge, some gloomy laurel bushes and lots of gravel and bark chips laid over the top of abominable woven plastic mulch. Upon closer inspection, however, I have discovered the following invaders:

Dandelion (welcome in our garden)
Sow thistle
Buttercup
Hairy bittercress
Foxglove seedling
Wild strawberry
Ivy leaved toadflax (lovely)
Several ash seedlings
Hawthorn seedling
Several buddleia seedlings
3 holly seedlings

Most of these are welcome and will be left to spread, or possibly be transplanted to a more suitable spot. It will be interesting to see what else turns up next summer.

Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: fernman on 22:19:54, 27/11/19
There is a wood in the Forest of Dean called Lady Park Wood, it is in fact a wood within a wood, that has been fenced off and left to its own devices since 1944, that's 75 years. There is no management whatsoever, i.e. no felling, no tidying up, no coppicing or pollarding, and no access to humans other than ecologists who do annual surveys (and other than a fern enthusiast who once nipped in undetected in what turned out to be a fruitless search for an old record of a rarity, cough, cough).
Title: Re: Rewilding Britain
Post by: Bigfoot_Mike on 22:54:48, 27/11/19
We do have the dreaded leylandia, but too many to replace without massive cost. These do provide plenty of nesting places and roosts for the birds. We also have native trees, such as Scots Pine, Roman, Silver Birch and others. We get rabbits, hedgehogs, red squirrels, a fox and occasional roe deer, so we have a reasonable share of wild animals. We get interesting birds, from goldcrests and wrens, up to woodpeckers, sparrowhawks, herons, buzzards and tawny owls. The are lots of smaller birds and it is good to see blackbirds, thrushes and redwings eating all the berries. We also get a lot of geese overhead and very close by. This time of year there are huge flocks of crows and jackdaws circling and calling at dusk on their way to roost. A neighbour claims to have spotted pine martens on his camera trap and there are osprey and otters on the river nearby. It would be great to see wildcats, lynx, wolves and bears again, but I don’t think that is likely to happen.