[Closed] Well done Chris Packham

I got attacked by a squirrel at the weekend in Chester, scary stuff I can tell you... God knows what I'd have done if it was a Fox!! 🙁

All that on foxes seems very sensible.

the RSPB, Wildlife Trusts, Hawk and Owl Trust and National Trust said Packham’s criticisms were baseless.

i have to make do with the foxes eating babies nappies out the bins

Whereas it's the magpies that rip open my bin bags looking for stuff. Maybe we should wipe them out as well as the gulls for daring to pick up waste food? Of course we'd have less problems with scavengers if people would actually look after their own locale and not treat it like a rubbish dump.

Of course we'd have less problems with scavengers if people would actually look after their own locale and not treat it like a rubbish dump

this 100% ^

Whereas it's the magpies that rip open my bin bags looking for stuff. Maybe we should wipe them out as well as the gulls for daring to pick up waste food? Of course we'd have less problems with scavengers if people would actually look after their own locale and not treat it like a rubbish dump.

It was pet cats around here, until we got wheelie bins. I'd be perfectly happy for those to exterminated, though.

Certainly think when it comes to the NT Packham has a point to an extent. Certainly it's a point worth raising about some WWT's too.

So he raised an issue for discussion in a magazine where such issues should be discussed (as a member of the NT, WWT and Wildfowl & Wetlands Trusts it's not an area they are particulalry vocal about).

However as MR Smith purports to have come from the strata of countryside society that is being criticized; no surprise there....

The RSPB and the National Trust are scared to criticise any of the rich land owners or supporters or the government.
So they continue to support grouse shooting, even though it is linked to illegal persecution of a variety of other animals. While hen harriers and pine martens are now almost extinct in much of England.

"I got attacked by a squirrel at the weekend in Chester, scary stuff I can tell you"

Was she called Tracey?

So they continue to support grouse shooting, even though it is linked to illegal persecution of a variety of other animals. While hen harriers and pine martens are now almost extinct in much of England.

probably because better the devil you know. those environments where hen harriers/grouse can thrive are managed and not natural, without the grouse £££’s who else is going to pay for it’s management?
in an ideal world the state would create a bucolic rural idyll where local people and wildlife co-exist in harmony and all fauna and flora thrive, reality is somewhat different.
the answer is to educate and prosecute any illegal trapping/poisoning while encouraging those who are best placed to manage the land while encouraging a local economy and wildlife. it is possible.

those environments where hen harriers/grouse can thrive are managed and not natural,

There is a balance between the people who manage the land and the people who pay (through their taxes) for many of the [url= http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jul/01/farm-subsidies-blatant-transfer-of-cash-to-rich ]subsidies[/url].

Now I get that many small & tenant farmers struggle financially but much of the grouse hunting landscape is owned by very, very rich people.

he answer is to educate and prosecute any illegal trapping/poisoning while encouraging those who are best placed to manage the land while encouraging a local economy and wildlife. it is possible.

I think you will find that this was the broad thrust of Chris Packhams' comments- he just may have a slightly different emphasis on the 'encouragement' and how the land is best managed. Hence the antagonism from the CA

i dont think you need a BA in the subject to post on here?

being a natural born pedant, I think he has a BSc rather than a BA in zoology

Not sure who I dislike more him or the CA. Both represent entrenched narrow minded focus on a single interest at the expense of anyone else.

I have no respect for him after his misrepresentations of proposals for a closed circuit cycling track near the velodrome at Pride Park in Derby. As far as I could see, beyond the short term disruption, the proposal would have little impact on nesting birds etc on the land. The way he represented it was that the proposal would despoil a pristine natural environment (The land was given over as a nature reserve after the development of Pride Park because the soil buried just below the surface is seriously contaminated and couldn't be built on without decontamination). As a member of Derbyshire Wildlife Trust and BC I couldn't see why both couldn't coexist.

Having been to Chatsworth this weekend and heard some prat in pink trying to explain that fox hunting was basically a working class pursuit (I am sure he didn't say pursuit of the working class) my view on the CA is pretty similar.