They should've had you blowing the Trumpet with all the practice you like to get in...
Woman saves fox from hounds
- Thread starter Mr Joshua
- Start date
They should've had you blowing the Trumpet with all the practice you like to get in...
I love it we have this assumption that culling is actually necessary or even effective. There's nothing quite like making an a priori assumption that has very little basis in evidence. When you have an essentially omnivorous animal that is territorial and is capable of controlling its litter size due to the prevalence of food and competition in its territory then it seems like you are trying to hold back the inevitable to me. Kill all the rural foxes and the urban ones will move into the space and have massive litter until the populations stabilises. Moreover, during that time the rabbit numbers will rise and you'll have another load of farmers moaning because bugs bunny has gobbled all their carrots up.
I got bored of reading all the posts after the 5467th uttering of 'townies are just ignorant' whilst yet another question was completely avoided.
Your boring me now, by just taking points and using them in a manner they where not stated.
The "townies are just ignorant" quote was in reply to someone suggesting about constructing better fences/sheds. The ignorance to farming practices, farming environoments and the countryside/wildlife in general was displayed pretty clearly.
Vermin populations are so high in certain areas (be that rats or foxes) for one reason.
We don't take adequate precautions in the disposal of food or safeguarding potential food sources.
Perhaps both people in the city and country have something to learn (not me obviously, but not everyone can be as cool as me
) (kidding btw lol)I now live in a town so maybe you could educate me? As I have some questions that I feel may aid my ignorance:
Is it true that the research indicates that half to three-quarters of the rural foxes diet is derived from rabbits and hares?
If rural foxes are removed would those very rabbits and hares cause problems for crops?
If foxes are territorial if you kill one will another not move into the area?
If foxes change their litter size depending on the prevalence of food and available territory would killing them just increase the birth rate to compensate?
Wasn't it estimated that you would need to kill three quarters of the fox population to successfully cull it?
Is it not thought there are about 200000 rural foxes in the UK?
At the rate of 2 foxes per hunt would that not mean there needed to be 75000 hunts in short order to cull the population successfully?
Isn't that rather unfeasible?
Why is it so difficult to build suitable enclosures for chickens? Are foxes trained by Ethan Hunt or something?
Why are people thinking that a cull means wiping them out rather than simply keeping local populations healthy and stable?
Simply because the fox population self-regulates depending on the food and the space available. Which is my point. To actually reduce their numbers artificially you have to reduce their numbers by 3/4. For the reasons I have given - litter sizes move from the usual 4-5 to 6-7 and any space is moved into by other foxes. They themselves leave larger territories behind therefore increasing the litter sizes there. What actually happens is when they are culled there are more the following spring from over compensation.
We don't have any control over it unless we aim to remove them totally.
Populations are dynamic. They do not intrinsically fluctuate around an optimum value.
You know generally the best way to stop an inhumane practice is to highlight it , demonstrate the ethical faults behind the position, undermine any scientific points that are being assumed and by challenging any a priori assumptions that are being made.
Alternatively, you can just come out with stupid comments like that. But each to their own eh!
Ar ok, dynamic eh, I guess then it would be dependent on variables such as food, space for territory, litter size etc. Like I said. There was me thinking that the fox numbers will regulate themselves quite happily up and down depending on those variables but I guess I am wrong.
Demonstrations; you mean like the Arab Spring, the fall of the Soviet Union, the suffragettes? Those kind of do nothing demonstrations? + I never actually mentioned demonstrations I said demonstrate it has a different meaning look it up.
That's right.
At the risk of repetition, it is wrong, because populations don't 'regulate themselves'. They are dynamic.
It's why some species become extinct.
The problem is that there is no substantial evidence to prove that, localised Rural Fox populations have been managed since records began and continue to be, there are no accurate figures for the number of foxes in the UK or their distribution, the Head of the study from the Mammal Reaserach Unit that most people point to admits the figures are 'guesstimates'. He also admits that overpopulation, food availabilty and disease are generally the triggers for increased or decreased reproduction and mortality rates. It is true that estimates since the Hunting ban suggest stable populations, but two things need to be considered, Hunting with Hounds only accounted for a very small percentage of Fox hunting deaths anyway and the ban coincided with the discovery of Sarcoptic Mange in Fox populations (another reason why some populations are culled), not to mention the increases in road kill (this has adversely affected Badgers as well).
There are a range of factors in assessing Fox populations, including those you mentioned, but the issues with Fox predation are largely localised, intermittent and seasonal, they are more concerned with the predation of ground nesting birds and game and other economic factors rather than overpopulation/disease and is primarily about dispersal at those times.
Since the Hunting Ban has been in effect Estate and Wildlife mangement simply rely more heavily on other methods.
But the main point is that Rural Foxes are part of a managed wildlife program and have always been (at least for the purposes of this debate) so it impossible to make a definitive judgement on what might happen should that management cease.
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Ok we are at odds here because I take regulate to mean control using a series of variables or rules. The fox population is controlled by a set of variables. I think you are taking regulate to mean like some homeostatic function? I get you now. Yes that would not be correct.