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Originally Posted by eeyore  again you are missing the point - if you tennant grazing it is not about what you believe but what the potential tennant believes and most tennants wont rent grazing inundated with ragwort - thus the wildlife trust needs to remove it.
aftermath grazing is largely done with sheep so equine grass sickness isnt an issue.
on the issue of legal requirements you are partly correct - there is no specific legal requirement to remove it from embankments etc however if you dont remove it and it spreads into a third parties land and contaminates their hay crop or grazing then you would be guilty of private nuisance under the law of torts and thus open to litigation.
you are also legally required to remove it from hay fields as it is an offence to sell hay which is contaminated with anything that could cause harm to the customers livestock.
There is a long thread running on ragwort so i strongly suggest we take this debate over there, rather than hijack this thread - I will pm a mod and ask them to move these posts. |
I am sorry if you think this is an inapproprate thread. If moderators wish to move it they can but this is a VERY IMPORTANT CONSERVATION ISSUE.
It doesn't just relate to ragwort it relates to the harm being done to all wildflowers in fields,verges and uncultivated land due to ignorance caused by hysteria and unscientific thinking. Do you think the gangs of people sent out to clear verges in the false belief that ragwort can spread easily can tell it from other plants?
I am sorry but I don't think that you understand what I am saying.
Firstly Ragwort poisoning is rare. Ignore the propaganda and look at the peer reviewed data. So rare that you can probably count the annual cases on your fingers and if you look again at the peer reviewed data it is caused generally by neglect. Your legal arguments are, looking at the peer reviewed data, spurious. The risk of anyone being able to prove that ragwort spread onto their land ( It does not spread quickly. Ignore the propaganda look at the science. ) and then causing the incredibly rare event of poisoning is so minute as to be irrelevant. Even small quantities in hay are probably not a problem.
I used the example of Equine Grass Sickness to illustrate a point you seem to have missed. It is associated with horses eating grass. The published data show that it is COMMONER than ragwort poisoning. Therefore grass is actually more dangerous statistically. I know this may seem strange but it is true from the published data because ragwort is that rare a problem.
I am puzzled why you should seem to think that conservation grazing could be done always by sheep. Sheep are frequently not appropriate.
A number of conservation charities , including Buglife are working hard to undo the damage being done by ignorance on this issue. It would be a pity if the charity running this site would be allowed to undermine this valueable work. Please before you use these charitable facilities, check the science.
Please stop talking up these minute risks into a massive problem.