Floods may have impacted badger numbers, charity says
Badger numbers are"likely" to have been affected by flooding, HSI says.
Following severe floods across the country earlier this year, an animal protection charity is calling for Defra to reassess the badger population in Somerset and Gloucestershire before culling starts again.
The Humane Society International (HSI) says Defra will breach its own badger cull policy if it does not assess how badly the badger population has been affected by flooding.
The Government's Badger Control Policy (para 5.36) states its commitment to "prevent local disappearance of badger populations."
According to HSI, farming minister George Eustice said in a letter to its executive director Mark Jones that the Government "would not require a further assessment of the badger population" in the cull areas.
Mr Eustice reportedly added: "There is currently no evidence that the national badger population has been significantly affected by the recent flooding."
HSI argues that flooding in both cull zones "will likely have had an impact on badgers" and Defra must assess the impact on the local population if it is to comply with its own policy.
Mr Jones said: "Both Somerset and Gloucestershire were badly affected by adverse weather conditions including severe flooding and freezing temperatures only weeks after badgers in these areas had already endured shooting during the Government’s culls…
"We know that the bodies of drowned badgers were reported, including by farmers, and a few lucky but exhausted badgers were rescued. We fear these few may have been the tip of the iceberg. It’s quite possible that hundreds of badgers in a local area could have died."
The charity is calling for the culls to be postponed until an independent survey has been conducted to determine the effects of culling and floods on the badger population in the cull zones.
Defra has published guidance for the vet sector ahead of a proposed UK-EU Sanitary and Phytosanitary agreement.
