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Lots of hedgehog saviours appearing now the ability to shoot badgers is slowly being removed.
Remember - people don't shoot badgers to protect hedgehogs. They do this to protect cattle from bovine tb, however flawed an approach that may be (not for this thread)
#hedgehog thread
Remember - people don't shoot badgers to protect hedgehogs. They do this to protect cattle from bovine tb, however flawed an approach that may be (not for this thread)
#hedgehog thread
Badgers do predate hedgehogs, this is true. However, badgers tend to only predate hedgehogs when there is high pressure on food supply and habitat. This is why the increasing intensity of agricultural landscapes is the primary driver.
Where food supply is plentiful, badgers and hedgehogs co-exist as they have for many, many hundreds of thousands of years. They eat largely the same food - soil inverterbrates - worms, larvae etc. So we need to look at the root cause of pressures on this food supply
That's why intensity of farming on habitat is number 1 = mechanisation, removal of hedgerows, use of molluscicides, insecticides, pesticides. Personal story - 3 years ago our meadow was cut by a huge efficient tractor. It resulted in the violent death of 4 hedgehogs. Never again.
Important! Absence of badgers does not equal high hedgehog numbers. This study shows hedgehogs absent in 71% of locations where badgers also absent.
https://rdcu.be/celFr
https://rdcu.be/celFr
Interestingly, higher foxes are positively associated with higher hedgehog numbers ( https://doi.org/10.1111/mam.12107).
How about we stop treating foxes as vermin and halt shooting of them as well shall we?
How about we stop treating foxes as vermin and halt shooting of them as well shall we?
The solution is to enhance existing habitat and expand suitable habitat. Reverse the continuing rise of toxic chemicals impacting their food source. Employ better cutting practices.
The pro-badger shooting lobby will try and highjack to plight of the hedgehog as a proxy for more badger culling. Remember - all badger and fox shooting is related to meat and dairy consumption.
The real solution to the hedgehog - and wider biodiversity crisis - is to take dramatic and urgent action. An immediate thing we can all do is choose food produced with the smallest impact on our environment. Support producers that are doing the right thing.
#savethehedgehog
#savethehedgehog
