Badgers, Rats and Politicians

As the rain continues to fall and the low lying valleys get more and more sodden I noticed how the rats over the last month have been seeking higher and higher ground.  Nothing new in this behaviour, it is something that rats have always done, but I was quite amused on Monday evening while up at the badger sett, again, raining quite miserably I noticed Dini the fox tracking a rat that had made its way with a few others into the woodland.  The rat came to a halt at an inhabited badger sett. If he had stayed above ground, Dini the fox would have had an easy supper.  Going down into the badger sett the risk he was taking was equally as dangerous as the one he faced above ground with Dini the fox.
Nature showing its true tenacity, for the fox would never enter a live badger sett.  Just as the rat went down a badger returned  and there she stood quite quizzingly, quite uncertain what to do with her new guest. She seemed to decide her best course of action would be to go back where she had just come from and give the rat time to sort itself out and get on its way. The saying 'as cunning as a ....house rat' was again well and truly founded on Monday evening.
The badger's expression reminded me of the Liberal Democrat MP, Stephen Gilbert for  St Austell and Newquay on how he has changed his mind and now opposes the badger cull and instead, opts for the vaccination of badgers and cattle calling the cull 'a complete failure.'  The remarks are so reminiscent of his party with the statement on the last election of, 'we will never put up tuition fees.' They capitulated totally on the tuition fee front, let's hope the Liberal Party can be a lot more belligerent and to be seen doing something for the good of the badger rather than a lot of hot air and broken promises.
But may I say, on behalf of all badgers and myself, Mr. Gilbert MP please do as much as you can in the House to try and help fellow MPs to see the error of this government's futile, senseless, shambolic, barbaric badger cull nonsense.
Please take a look at my short film:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQz4-6dgH8k

Badgers Politics. A Belly Full of Badgers Chin.

Chapter 2

Wednesday evening and I had a phone call from Nimrod saying that the stone and saplings I had asked him to order was now on site and could I please pull my finger out and get on with the Foxton’s badger protection programme as soon as possible as the Foxtons were starting to give him a real ear bashing about the situation.   He also reminded me that we would soon be at the end of January and so far nothing had been done.  I explained the situation to Jackie who was very understanding about the whole thing and so 6am yesterday, Saturday morning I was trundling along in the dark on my way to the Foxton’s Estate. 

After about 25 minutes I arrived at the site to find three lorry loads of walling stone that had been delivered just sitting there waiting to be turned into a wall.  I got out of the Land Rover in amongst dreary, murky, drizzling rain.  Mud six inches deep under foot.  No wind to speak of and the sun had not yet risen.  All in all, a pretty uninviting prospect.  If only it had been a good frost. 

I struck up the little Captain Scott’s stove, put the kettle on top of it, put a teabag in a Christmas Mickey Mouse mug and surveyed the location while waiting for that glorious, heart-warming whistle of the kettle. 

As I walked to the side of the woodland I could see the bundles of Hawthorn and Blackthorn saplings which Nimrod had ordered along with the stone. I walked back from the wood over to where the proposed wall was to be built and where the footings to the wall had already been dug by Nimrod. Now I could see the size of the protected wall and planting area.  Three loads of stone was going to be nowhere near enough.  The kettle whistled and I made my mug of tea.  Everything always seems to be a lot more enlightening and doable with a mug of tea in your hand.  I finished my tea and went to the back of the Land Rover where Mitch and Shep were.  They both reluctantly jumped out. They didn’t like this weather either.  I got the stock axe and spade, a bundle of saplings and went over to the small section of stone wall in front of the Foxton badger sett and started to dig the holes and plant the young trees.  I planted them in a zig zag fashion away from the wall out towards the opposite bank and out towards the track Nimrod had ploughed up late last year to counter a badger baiting attack.  As I planted them, the thought of this new plantation in five or six years’ time created a vision of impregnability. For those of you who know about hawthorn and blackthorn barrier planting, if planted thick enough, a great habitat for all wildlife but almost impossible to get through by human endeavour.

I had missed the coming up of the sun due to the industriousness of the work and looking up into a very dreary, drizzly sky I could see that it was approaching 12 noon.  The dogs ears pricked up and they both looked up the track in the direction of the Foxton’s house.

 “Someone is coming,” I thought and within a couple of minutes Nimrod’s Land Rover appeared.  On stopping the Land Rover I saw he had a passenger, as it turned out, he had two passengers. It was my old friends, Conrad and Teddy.   They all sprang out of the Land Rover and I couldn’t help but notice how surprisingly dapper they all looked.  “Hardly tree planting attire.” I shouted over.

“That’s because we are not tree planting,” they all sniggered pushing Mitch and Shep away from their moleskin shins.  As Conrad and Teddy fussed the dogs at arms-length, trying to keep their pristine look, Nimrod wandered over, “Where’s the rest of the work force?”

“I’m on my own Nimrod.”

“Crikey, you must have planted going on two hundred trees here.”

“Yes, I have been at it since half six this morning, but it will be a bit easier now you three are here, I’ve got a spare shovel.”

“As much as I’d love to Al, we three are just going along to Boston’s Micro-brewery.  They have just brought out three new ales which we have been invited along to sample.”

“Lovely,” I remarked. 

“Do you want to come with us to try them?”  They all had that look in their eye that was so irresistible, because through all the years I have known them, a look like that after an invitation like that was generally a good time in the offing. I downed the tools quicker than I had picked them up.  Conrad and Teddy were already sat in the Land Rover.

“You’d better get in the back with the dogs Al, dressed in that state,” and soon we were all off bouncing along in Nimrod’s Land Rover to visit Boston’s Micro-brewery.

On arriving on the gravel drive of the brewery, Nimrod wasted no time in letting me out the back.   We were greeted by Anne and Ben Boston the proprietors of the brewery.  We followed them round to the barn which was about 50 meters from their house. The barn housed two big silver vats, a lot of stainless steel pipe and stacked up at the far end of the barn looked like a couple of hundred casks of ale.  Also in the barn was a large, very old oak table.  On the table were the three flagons of ale we were here to sample.  Whether it was the smell of the ale or the planting of all those saplings, but I was absolutely starving.  I went and sat down at the table where there were two chairs only and I was determined to have one. Ben handed us all a glass each and Anne followed him round with the flagon releasing some of the new brew into each glass.  Nimrod, Conrad and Teddy all took a considerable slurp from their glasses.  I looked at their faces, to me they didn’t seem to overly enjoy that one, so I sipped mine and the taste was rather disappointing. 

“What do you think Allan?” asked Anne.

“Poor.”  Nimrod, Conrad and Teddy glared round at me.  Ben then asked the other three what they thought.

“Not too bad,” was their reply rather tactfully.

“What this needs Anne, is a loaf of bread and a lump of cheese.”  The dogs sat there.  On the mention of cheese they both licked their chops, for there were no dogs in the Cotswolds that were more partial to cheese than Mitch and Shep.  Ben and Anne then went off to get the requested victuals.  No sooner had they left the barn, Nimrod, Conrad and Teddy all pitched in. 

“What do you think you are doing sat there like Wurzle Gummage?  That was just plain rude.  Cor, wish we’d never brought you now.”  I looked at the three of them standing over me.

“The first ale was rubbish and I am starving and the best you three could do was say, ‘ooh not too bad,’ they want honest opinions, that’s what we’re here for.”

“Yeah, but they didn’t invite you,” snapped Teddy.  Anne and Ben duly appeared with a French stick a yard long and with 2lb of cheese wrapped in brown paper. They placed the appetizing food on the table.  I immediately started to free the cheese from the brown paper.  A beautiful lump of cheese.  You could see it had just been cut from a large round.  I broke off a foot of the French stick, took a large bite and immediately started to feel satisfied.

“Shall we try the second ale?” I asked cutting myself another lump of cheese. 

“What was the first ale called?” asked Nimrod. 

Ben replied, “We won’t say now, we will wait until the end so you are not influenced by the naming.  Anne duly poured the second ale from the second flagon.  This time I was as keen to try it as the other three, mainly because the bread was starting to dry me out a bit. 

“Oh dear,” I said after taking a large gulp.  Ben and Anne looked me straight in the eye.

“What did you think of that one?” asked Ben looking quite worried.

“That one was as bad as the first.” I replied, wiping my mouth with the napkin they had supplied.  Their deflated faces made me feel quite bad and the looks I was getting from Nimrod, Conrad and Teddy made me feel even worse, but true opinion is something of value.  Slanted opinion is worthless.  Ben and Anne didn’t even bother asking the others what they thought.

“Right,” said Ben, “Try the third one and tell us what you think.”  Anne brought over the third flagon and filled only my glass.  Nimrod, Conrad and Teddy stood there, their glasses empty, staring at me in bewilderment.  Ben and Anne watched me with bated breath as I tried their third and final ale.  I picked up the glass.  The bread and cheese had made me dry. The finest mouthful of ale was that of years ago after a long hard working day on the summer hay making or harvesting and I was as equally dry now as I had been then.  In need of nature’s tonic of barley and hops.  The taste was instantly refreshing, it passed straight down, over my taste buds with a mellowness of divine quenchment and now the glass was empty.  They all looked down at me and the two dogs looked up at me.  I looked at the flagon that Anne was holding. 

“To get a real true judgement of this one, the flagon you hold doesn’t hold enough to do it justice.  Let’s tap a barrel.”  A cheer went up in the barn, Mitch and Shep stood up with their tails wagging. Nimrod went over with Ben to get a casket.  Up on the table they put it.  Ben stuck a tap into it and all glasses were filled.  As we drank the delicious brew, Ben and Anne asked us all to guess the strength of this concoction.  Nimrod, Conrad and Teddy all seemed to think it was 4.5 to 5 per cent.  The drink that I had just experienced had immediately taken me back to my youth, when ales reigned supreme before all the new stronger lagers had flooded the markets.  Most ales in those days were no stronger than 3 per cent and that is why, in my humble opinion, there was never the disturbances around drinking in those days compared with what you see today.

“I reckon, it is about 3 per cent.”  Anne and Ben immediately started to pat me on the back. 

“You’re right,” said Anne.  Nimrod took it upon himself to re-charge all the glasses. 

We sat around the table congratulating Ben and Anne on how good their ale was, reminiscing about old times, stories of bygone years, the arm wrestling champion is the same now as it was thirty years ago, Teddy, and the joy of trying to beat him was as much fun for us all now as it was all those years ago.  We discussed the rights and wrongs of the badger cull and the politics of the countryside. In amongst all this camaraderie I hadn’t noticed that the dogs had been lapping up the ale that had been leaking from round the tapping of the cask.  I don’t know how much they had drank, but I know we had drank a lot. The time now was 4pm and Nimrod, Conrad and Teddy were looking decidedly the worse for wear.  I said that we all needed to make a move.  I looked over to the dogs and whistled them.  They lay there flat out on their sides, underneath the stainless steel piping connecting the vats.  I whistled again and again, their heads lifted, they pulled themselves to their feet rather hesitantly, and then Anne said.

“Your dogs are wobbling Allan.”  We all averted our gaze over to the dogs, they were very heavy eyed and they were wobbling. To be honest, we were all wobbling.  We were in that embarrassing position of not any of us being able to drive. “How are we going to get home?” asked Teddy, “It’s pouring with rain outside.”

“You’ll have to ring Foxton,” said Conrad.

“I can’t do that, he’ll go mad, it’s more that my job’s worth,” retorted Nimrod in a slur.

“Antonio will be alright,” I said, “tell her we’ve been working on her badger sett.”  Nimrod made the call and we waited for our lift. 

“By the way, what was that third ale called?” I asked. 

“Badgers Chin,” was the reply, and we all nodded in approval.

Mitch and Shep, the most loyalist of company and better friends a man has never had.

It Passes Inspection

A female badger in peek condition looking over her newly excavated quarters.

So far the winter has been extraordinarily kind to the badger population.  Although it has been awfully miserable for a lot of people, flooded homes, water everywhere, the badger has seldom had a winter so good.  Foraging on soft ground has been easy and although we are now into the third week of January the odd autumn berry can still be seen.  Frosted ground this winter has been so noticeable by its absence.
The badgers now from the main sett are starting to disperse.  The female badger in this short film has moved some hundred yards from the sett and her new abode has been a week in the making. This is the place she has decided to cub down.  She has got another month to 5 weeks looking at her before she brings new badger life into the woodland.  But I feel sure we are going to see a lot more winter before we see her cubs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovWTnmvmsd4

A female badger inspecting her new sett ready to settle into and have her cubs.

Nature, The Earth's True Prize Fighter.

As I sit here watching the Roe deer from my window in a totally wild state, I am only too well aware that they are there because they want to be, just like the badgers, up at the badger sett and the fox that visits regularly. 

Nature left to its own devices provides an eco-balance within the countryside which is maintained through flood, through drought, through scorching summers and biting cold winters.  An equilibrium is sustained, although looking on as an observer it seems at times a very harsh existence, but the older one gets and the more one sees, nature always has it just about right. 

 Our own Owen Paterson, Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs would profit more from looking at nature rather than trying to destroy it. The business of massaging figures to suit whatever argument he happens to be into at the time is just not good politics.

There are six species of deer that live in the UK, however, the Roe deer and the Red deer are the two native species of Britain and as I sit here and watch this small herd of Roe deer, how they have evolved through changing farming practises, de-forestation you cannot help but think and admire how amazingly well nature enables them to adapt and the insulting remark from Owen Paterson on how the badgers have move the goal posts, nothing could be further from reality.  Yes, for our large mammals, the goal posts are being continually moved, but our icons keep managing to roll with the blows.  Their numbers have diminished but they are still here.  But when a government massages figures to try and justify the most shambolic, ill-judged, unscientifically backed persecution of one of our greatest icons the badger, the deflated feeling of disappointment overwhelms you.

The Roe deer, the Red deer, the badger, even the good old country fox should all be held up and applauded for they are the wealth of a democracy.  A beacon of light to show that it still possible to thrive in amongst an atmosphere of change and oppression.

The badger is an animal very close to my heart, like many other people I am sure, but I cannot help but draw the comparison to the river otter.  An animal over many years blamed for depleted fish stocks in our rivers.  A culprit for the decline in river and wetland bird numbers.  Just as false now as it was then.  But the otter in most wild regions of the UK is extinct simply because his face was the right face to blame at the time. 

Species decline has been a 19^th, 20^th and 21^st century problem but now the take up of speed in the declines is happening at an unprecedented level.  Even in my lifetime I have seen the river meadows which were once covered in lapwing or pee-wits or plovers, whichever name you want to call them go to near none existent numbers.  All our species of bees, butterflies, moths, insects and invertebrates. All these things too in decline. The water vole that was once so plentiful throughout the country has almost disappeared, but for me, the most alarming decline is the humble house sparrow.  You would see them everywhere.  They would follow the corn carts at harvest time, they would be around the gable end of every house.  Now to see a group of six is a head turning experience. 

Species depletion is a situation which we all find ourselves in worldwide. It should concern everyone, none more so than our own Owen Paterson. 

And as I gaze down from my bedroom window onto this small herd of Roe deer I cannot help but to be amazed at the awe inspiring tenacity of the most wondrous being on the planet, Mother Nature.  She is fighting on all fronts and although millions of years old, her beauty is so still heart stoppingly sensational.  She is hit down time and time again but still rallies to her feet.  Constantly taking on all comers, punching above her weight. The earth’s true prize fighter, whose prize when won is given to each and every one of us. Governments come and go worldwide but it is Mother Nature who is always there trying to put wrongs right and to pick up the tab for governments all over the globe with their ongoing short sightedness.

But as you look around worldwide that gorgeous face that is millions of years old is starting to show the odd wrinkle.  Each species extinction is a wrinkle that can never be made erased.

It is in every being’s interest to be as gracious and as caring of nature as she tries to be within the world that we all love.

Roe deer outside my bedroom window.  Roe deer and Red deer are the only two native species to the British Isles.

Badger Politics New Week, New Challenges.

Chapter 1
I arrived home on Friday night, the end of a very wet week only to be greeted with an answerphone message from the Coopers.  The message wasn’t very clear but I had caught the word flood.  They had had a little flooding in their cottage last year which I thought I had put right in the spring, so fearing the worst I wasn’t in a real hurry to ring them back.  Nevertheless, after supper I returned their call. My concern however, was ill-founded as they had rang to tell me that the work I had done for them last spring in alleviating their cottage from any further flood damage had been accomplished and  had stopped them from being flooded yet again.  They were sitting at that moment in front of a roaring log fire and had never felt so safe and cosy.  Halleluiah, I thought.  The wettest week of the winter and the water had been kept at bay. 

 I remember their cottage from years ago and it never used to flood.  The thing with water courses, once blocked and restricted they can then start to create havoc in areas that were once trouble free.  Mrs Cooper then went on to say that Lord Foxton wanted to see me the following morning early.

“What’s that about?” I asked.

“Badgers” was the reply. 

Saturday morning at 8am, just getting light, I drove along to the Coopers’ cottage. Parked outside their cottage was the Range Rover of Lord Foxton’s.  As I knocked on the door I heard laughter and through the window I could see Mrs Cooper rise up from her armchair in front of the fire on her way to give me entrance.  She quickly whisked me into the sitting room where there was Mr Cooper, Lord and Lady Foxton and Alexandra.  But it was noticeable to me that on entering the room their faces which were a radiance of smiles appeared to go stony straight.  

“Cup of tea Allan?” asked Mrs Cooper. 

“Yes thank you.”  Lord and Lady Foxton along with Alexandra sat on the settee, Mr Cooper sat in his armchair. Mrs Cooper’s empty chair looked most inviting for a second in front of the glowing log fire.  An awkward silence followed, then Mrs Cooper came in and handed me the cup of tea.  She took her place in her armchair and gestured with her hand for me to sit down on an old leather pouffe which was positioned by the side of her chair.  No sooner had my behind touched the pouffe when the barrage from Lord Foxton began.

“What the hell did you think you were up to on Boxing Day?  All that smoke.  The afternoon’s hunting was totally ruined.”  I looked at the Coopers whose eyes didn’t leave the flames of the fire.  I noticed a smirk started to wrinkle the face of Alexandra.  

“Daddy’s friends had never had such a miserable time.”

“I am very sorry to hear that but it had absolutely nothing to do with me,” I fibbed, “but surely you haven’t got me round here just to talk about the Boxing Day hunt?”

“Badgers” replied Alexandra.  At last the Coopers eyes averted from the fire and all five people were staring, their eyes burning into me. 

“What about the badgers?”  I asked slightly uncomfortable.

“You promised us faithfully back in the late autumn that you would make the badger sett more concealed, more hidden.”

“Safe,” shouted Lord Foxton. “We were all up there yesterday and nothing has been done. You received our thoughts and plans on our Christmas card.” Which was true, I had, but the problems with all the rain and all the flooding programmes, I hadn’t given their badgers a thought.  The Coopers looked at me blankly. I tried to change the subject so I started to talk about the success of their now flood free cottage.  None of them wanted to hear it.  

Lady Foxton blurted out, “You said our badgers would have their cubs in the middle of February.”

“No I didn’t say that, I said that badgers have their cubs in the middle of February, I don’t know whether your badgers will or not.” What was encouraging me about this whole conversation more and more was that the Foxtons had no idea of the existence of our own badgers, Daddy Cool and his family.  The Coopers were the masters of espionage.  My fear of them letting it slip to the Foxtons was unjustified.  I could see that it was never going to happen. 

“Right,” said Lord Foxton getting up from the settee, “Let’s get up to the badger sett.”  We all put down our teacups and made our way to the Range Rover.  The Coopers climbed up into the back seat with Alexandra who seemed to be moving now amazingly well.  Lord Foxton at the wheel with Lady Foxton at his side in the front seat which left me sitting in the back with the two Labradors.  After a fifteen minute drive we arrived at Foxton Manor, then carried on through the grounds down towards the badger sett.  As we slowly rode along the headlands of the fields I thought back to the night when I had watched from the dug-out the Foxton family with the Coopers observing these badgers.

Soon we were clambering out the Range Rover looking over the stone wall onto their badger sett.  The leaves now were off the trees.  Everywhere was looking extremely wet, very bare, so stark and open.  I could immediately see their concern. 

“You see, you see,” Lord Foxton snapped, “Nothing has been done.”

“We are already on the 11^th January. In six or seven weeks we could have some baby badgers,” retorted Lady Foxton. 

“I do hope so,” said Alexandra.  Just then, I noticed coming down the track Nimrod, Lord Foxton’s gamekeeper.  He was driving down in his Land Rover to join us.  I walked over to meet him.

“Morning Nimrod. I’m in a bit of trouble here.”

“Morning Al, what have you done now?”

“It’s what I haven’t done is the problem. If you could organise the delivery of four lorry loads of walling stone and over the next week or so see if you can get two  hundred  blackthorn and hawthorn saplings, I can then make a start on the concealment of this badger sett thus making it safe although, it isn’t going to be a five minute job, or cheap.”

We walked over to the Foxtons and I reminded them that the whole necessity of this was down solely to the party they have always supported. 

“With the remarks this week of the government’s inability or unwillingness to test badger carcases for TB and their explanation for this coming out in the guise that they work on the principle that all badges have the disease, these actions have created a climate of destruction for the British badger. They have opened the flood gates to such atrocities and cruelty being caused to the animal which I cannot bear to talk about.” 

Lord Foxton barked back, “The financing for all this is coming from the money that I would have donated to the Conservative Party.”

The Coopers, Nimrod, Lady Foxton and Alexandra all cheered.  A family that has supported the Conservative party for generations had now turned their support wholly to the badgers.  Let work commence.

A Water Course doing what nature intended, draining the land around.

Watching Films of Badgers and Fish

January 8^th and Christmas is but a memory.  There seems to be hardly a place in The Cotswolds that hasn’t escaped the floods.  It has affected everywhere to some extent. 

Over the Christmas period while the family was all together, we thought it would be fun to look over some our films that we had made. There were some of the badgers, the children when they were small and some great fishing ones which showed off the sunny days, the glorious river and some of the magnificent trout I had caught.  Nostalgia can be so very sobering.

Everyday things that we all take for granted until incidents happen that totally shatter our belief and trust in the powers that govern all of us, the greatest environmental disaster of all time, Fukushima.  Every single day 300 tonnes of radioactive water enters the Pacific Ocean.  The radioactive material that is being released will outlive everything living  on this planet, constantly building up in the food chain.  Nobody will ever know for sure how many poor souls will develop cancer and other health problems as a result of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.  It is a nuclear holocaust that is just too horrifying to believe. 

It is estimated that there is 1300 nuclear rods that need to be removed and disposed of.  According to Reuters the combined amount of Cesium-137 contained in the nuclear fuel rods is 14,000 times greater than that what was released when the US dropped the atomic bomb onto Hiroshima at the end of World War 2.  Other estimates put this far higher. 

Something is causing fish along the West Coast of Canada to bleed from their gills, bellies and eye balls, Fukushima cannot be ruled out. 

Cesium-137 from Fukushima has been found in fish as far away as California and the duration of the clean-up of Fukushima will probably be in excess of fifty years.

The true horror of this disaster is only just starting to be understood.  Our drive for cheaper energy is causing circumstances that Mother Nature just cannot deal with.  I am well aware that wind farms and solar farms are a blot on the landscape and their productive capacity at this moment in time is quite clumsy and laboured, but surely it is best for us to try and harness nature to nurture us rather than obliterate the very things, the simple, down to earth things that life will be intolerable to be without.

I know reading this you might think it is terribly dramatic but Fukushima will affect the whole Northern Hemisphere by the time we are finished with it so when our Ministers talk of H20 ripping up more countryside to gain a few minutes at the end of a journey just to waste those few minutes doing something that is often so banal, I think we should all look at the nature that is around each and every one of us.  Cherish our rivers and our ancient woodlands and all wildlife within it. 

Here is a short film of my badgers grooming each other back in September 2013.  Nature has surely got to be one of our major priorities.

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=roFmahwh9h0

Two Badgers Grooming at My Badger Sett

Badgers and Panda Cars

When I was a kid Police cars were always known as Panda Cars. Kids being kids we had no pandas so we used to know them as badger cars.
When I look at this film of my badgers which was taken back in October, I think back to the Spring when I would watch Daddy Cool and Mother badger nurture and reprimand their tiny infants.  The Spring of 2013 was savage.  Cold for so long, food was as scarce for the badgers as I can ever remember.  The Mayfly for my beloved fishing was almost none existent due to the cold weather. When mother badger appeared with her cubs she was skin and bone.  She was struggling to supply her young ones with the nourishing milk that they needed and this was on a good territory.
Badger numbers were depleted countrywide by about 25%.  Then from the middle of May onwards, nature rallied.  It was a great summer, supplying the necessary sustenance for all species.
I watched Daddy Cool and his family gain condition.  It was joyful, and then along came the dreadful badger cull.  Badgers shot, the carcasses not even being tested for TB, however, the most damaging aspect to all of this, it effectively lifted the 'Protected Status' from the badger.  And now there is barely a day that goes by when you don't hear of some atrocity being dished out to the wildlife icon.  Badgers being skinned, badgers being hung, badgers having their paws cut off, badgers being caught in gin traps and snares, badgers being found with cross bow bolts in their bodies.  It is a nightmare I cannot believe that I am having to witness, and I feel sure David Cameron and his ministers could no more shoot a badger than I could.  It is a situation that has now got out of control.
The badger sow is now slowing down all over the country, she is now heavily pregnant and she is thinking of the future.
If we want badgers everywhere to have a future we must all be vigilant and on our guard at all times, especially through these dark winter months.
The deed I despise most is badger baiting. An exercise that can take hours.  Badgers die an agonising, horrendously slow death along with a number of dogs, because no one dog will ever get the better of one badger.  As one dog is depleted they put in another, then another, then another.  A badger will fight to protect its family to the end and the results is always carnage and death.
This practise is on the rise due to this absurd, unscientifically based ill-judged badger cull and if you happen to see activity around any known badger sett that you think is suspicious, ring the police, for the police along with the RSPCA are the strongest allies and best friends the badger will ever have.
The Lord Protector of our woodlands now needs all the protection he can get.
All those years ago, we didn't call the panda car, badger car for nothing.

Watch my short film on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VW62OwcONU

My Badgers Resting

Ministers, Look After the Environment and Let Badgers Look After Themselves.

I don’t think I can ever remember a wetter, windier Christmas. It is always very much a downer once Christmas is over.  I look forward to it for weeks and weeks.  The build-up of Christmas is so exciting with the Christmas shopping, the making of mince pies, the making of the Christmas cake right back in October, and the putting up of the Christmas lights, the tree and the decorations and then once here it is gone in a flash.  Having all my family around me at the most enjoyable time of the year is truly the Christmas present I value above all others. 

Although, it seems only yesterday that we were shopping for presents such as, dolls, dolls houses, action men and tanks, each Christmas is a constant reminder that time stops for no one. Happiness and contentment are two of life’s biggest prizes and are always the true things to strive for. 

As I look out of my window, down the valley towards the river, which now is starting to resemble a massive lake I think back to years gone by when the flooding of river meadows was an annual occurrence.  The talk then was not of global warming it was simply winter floods.  These river meadows would all ice over and we could skate from one end of the valley to the other.  All that we needed was weather like we are experiencing now followed by hard, sharp day after day frosts.  The fun was immeasurable.  However, the fun of yesteryear seems to have been replaced by total and unmitigated misery.  As I sit here listening to the rain battering down on the roof of my house watching the continual run off of the rain down the fields into the valley below I cannot help but think it is the planning departments, the engineering and the infrastructure where the lessons of this misery lay.  Out here in the Cotswold countryside, a wet day, a wet week, a wet month is pretty much the same as it was when I was a kid.  But each time you turn on the television or listen to the radio I see and hear agonising hardship.  Peoples’ houses and businesses flooded out, houses peculiarly perched in lakes of water.

 However, while watching last evening’s news, I was absolutely astonished by the governments’ response to this mayhem in their intention to cut 1500 jobs in the Environmental Agency Department.  Could it be, with the saving of these jobs, it will give Mr Owen Paterson more millions to waste on this country’s futile badger cull?  I bow to superior minds and a much forward thinking government but in this instance it leaves me almost speechless.  The 1500 jobs that are due to be cut are just the jobs needed to keep drains clear, waterways clear, rivers clear, flood defences that are continually breached need to be maintained on a regular basis.  The government need to be employing more in the Environmental Agency, certainly not less.  Our rivers largely are in the worst state that they have been in since 1940.  All water course ways are in conditions of total neglect. Planning permissions being granted on flood plains that were never meant for development.  We unquestionably need more housing in this country, there is no argument there but with it must come better drainage, and a much more adequate rain water run-off system that has been totally lacking over the last thirty years. 

Global warming may be happening, it probably is, but the floods down in this valley I have seen many times before, long before global warming had ever been mentioned.

When our water companies were in the hands of the government the rivers and all water ways were looked after in a much superior fashion to what they are looked after today. As trees fell across rivers and brooks they were cleared but privatisation of all our major water companies have left our most vital resource in the hands of the stock market whose sole interest is the biggest annual dividend for the investor. This can be marvellous, I am sure, for an awful lot of businesses. I have nothing against capitalism per se, but when profits are put foremost on nature’s greatest gift, fresh water, something in whatever society has gone so painstakingly wrong. Many rivers that are fit to bursting in the winter months are brought down to, in some cases, a mere trickle in the summer months. Water extraction from our rivers is at an all-time high, and although we are the biggest beneficiary of that, nature is left very much impoverished.  It is yet another example of putting profits above our most delicate of nature’s eco systems. 

Short term, easy to get at policies is a criticism of not just this government, but of governments of the last thirty years.

My humble personal view on the whole of this wretched, miserable annual flooding fiasco is, it is as much man induced as it is natures’ so my advice to the Environmental Minister is, “look after the environment and let badgers look after themselves.”

The view from my kitchen window,