attitudes towards invasive species

[tom00_uk]

when ever you see a uk based wildlife show that also combines with say veterinary practices they always seem to feature medical procedures being carried out on non natives, for example muntjac and water deer.

Should this be the case or should the vet put the animal down in the most humane method to hand?

not only pushing the law in some cases but seems a daft waste of time and money to patch up an animal and then comment that it could well be shot etc as its not native and free to hunt or deal with as a pest.

this kind gesture (any one thats ever faced vet bills knows its not cheap to treat even a simple injury) and the subsequent cost (time/money) could be put to better use on natives

[brendaward]

Ric, Don't entirely agree with your Student but I can see where she is coming from. Evolution is happening and the strongest is surviving. We can slow it down by human intervention but can,t stop species x from distinction. Species x will die out if they don't adapt and become stronger. Just as you can't wrap a human in cotton wool, is it being kind to do this to a species?

[Paul mabbott]

Exactly. Bracken is not a problem except when it grows where humans don't think it should and its growth is largely influenced by human management anyway. The most invasive and damaging species are Homo sapiens and its associated livestock.
Otherwise 'native' species are simply a reduced sub-set of the NW European fauna - species would establish and become extinct on the British Isles without human intervention. Furthermore the 'list' will change over time as climate and other factors change.
Therefore the only concern is for species introduced from other, distant ecosystems. As eeyore notes, most of these will be no problem. However, a few such as Japanese Knotweed can become a serious problem and grossly alter the habitats into which they are introduced. Cypus were a prime example - their presence in Norfolk was destroying the Broads habitat: destruction was possible and effective. Destruction of other pests may not be ....

Originally Posted by John_M

....
One problem is that bracken is a native species, so the public perception seems to be that whatever it does is 'natural' and therefore OK, but in the case of say, Japanese Knotweed, it's 'alien' and should be stopped, as it is somehow a 'man made' problem.
I know a few people who seem to think that only non native species need to be managed, as they disrupt our 'natural' countryside; they tend to look baffled when I point out that almost nothing in our countryside is 'natural' as such, but has been to a grerater or lesser extent formed by the hand of man.
I just think it's not sensible to single out a particular species in its entirety; it all depends on the situation. Foxes around my house aren't a problem, but the lady who keeps free range hens a couple of miles away sees them in a slightly different light.

[Cotham Marble]

Originally Posted by Eryri

There have been a number of 'invasive' settlements by Modern Man, Homo sapiens sapiens of Britain. All were eradicated by climate change. The last cull was the Devensian glaciation. The best preserved remains of this 'invasive' settlement by man is the 'Red lady of Pavilland', a ritual burial of a skeleton, in South Wales, dated 29,000 BP. Species like mammoth survived this period but man became extinct (in Britain) around 29,000 BP, only to return later, from continental Europe.

Innaccurate ! As the north sea/English Channel did not exist through the Devensian what are now the British Isles were part of a single uninterrupted land mass across which diverse species migrated - that included, from at least 30,000BP, Homo sapiens sapiens. The periodic advance and retreat of the large ice masses impacted on the extent to which all species could migrate north and west, including cold adapted species such as mammoth. There is to date no evidence of H. sapiens sapiens having 'settled' within the narrow range of the British Isles before the end of the Devensian, and the most likely model of survival is one that involved nomadic hunter/gatherer following of migratory prey species - a model that only changed when the available range was constrained by the eventual flooding of the North Sea/English Channel 'plain, following sea level rise at the end of the Devensian.

The continental glaciers prohibited occupation to all species, what the Paviland specimen shows is that from at least 29,000BP H.sapiens sapiens was active along the southern edge of the Devensian ice mass, as far west as what is now the Gower penninsula, but at the time of the Paviland interrment was an inland cliff faced ridge some tens of kilometres from the sea. Paviland does not show settlement of any sort.

CM

[Hobjob]

Originally Posted by eeyore

what you cant do is see one in your garden and just shoot it for the hell of it (you could however shoot it if it was causing you material harm by eating your vegie seeds, or pooping on your car)

Oooeee - I'll shoot all those blooming starlings and gulls that keep pooping on my car

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by Hobjob

Oooeee - I'll shoot all those blooming starlings and gulls that keep pooping on my car

unfortunately they are protected (starlings used to be on the licence list but were removed in 2000, and most gulls can only be shot under specific licence.)

my post above only applies to those birds on the general licence list ( wood pigeon, feral pigeon, rook, crow, magpie) - you also have to demonstrate that non lethal methods have been tried unsuccesfully first

[animartco]

Oooh Ric, it wooried me you just saying 'some mustelids rats and mice.' That is a bit too sweeping for me! is it legal to kill stoats, weasels, how about otters badgers pine martins, and rats, water voles (ratty), mice, dormice. I envisage people going out to kill rats and killing anything that looks vaguely like a rat!

[STYRBJORN]

Originally Posted by animartco

Oooh Ric, it wooried me you just saying 'some mustelids rats and mice.' That is a bit too sweeping for me! is it legal to kill stoats, weasels, how about otters badgers pine martins, and rats, water voles (ratty), mice, dormice. I envisage people going out to kill rats and killing anything that looks vaguely like a rat!

Relax luv. It is legal to kill stoats and weasels when, and only when, they threaten ground nesting birds. Other mustelids are protected to various degrees. Rats and hice-mice are always fair game, but many mouses are protected. If a farmer has a problem with mouses scoffing his stored crops his best bet is a mean moggie!
Anyway, if it looks like a rat and it votes Conservative . . . KILL . . .

Ahem. Me old leftie views keep sneaking up on me.

Ric x

[brendaward]

Ric, where do I get a gun, I'll shoot them rats with you!

[Brocakat]

As regards Bracken , it's on most hills because early man stripped the hills of the trees, and the underlying soil went after that, as the tree roots died which held the soil there.
The hills had previously been bare rocks with thin soils, that had developed pioneering species like Birch that eventually developed Oak etc - all after the Ice Age.

Bracken is tolerant of peaty soils- the peaty soils there where one finds most of the UK bracken is becuase of the non-breakdown of organic matter.
However Bracken does not like deep (eg Woodland) shade.

But in a lot of ordinary hedgerows where the soils are other than peaty soils- you will find bracken - it's just waiting its chance to capitalise on neglect of the adjacent fields, wher it easilty spread into if they are not cultivated or
grazed.

Bracken isn't much good for very much - whilst it can be used for a primitive
animal bedding - the spores give bronchial complaints. And only pigs can grub-up the young , just-developing fronds.

I believe under the Bracken canopyis a good site for violets - which are a catarpillar food for the High Brown Fritillary Butterfly ( & possibly other Fritilllarys ? )