Save East Devon District Council's Badgers from Culling

Vaccination & biosecurity will be effective in the long term - culling is cruel & ineffective.

Wildlife is a big tourist draw. BTB decreasing every year, cull inhumane, proven not to work. Cost over £4k per kill, spend it on vaccination instead

This is an ill thought through campaign that you must reconsider. Badgers are vital and important animal in our countryside and further more how do you explain that 2 farms near us and next door to each other. 1. has had TB and one does not ever. Same badgers roam over each farm

I really think badger culling is wrong .. all the experts that you consulted think it is wrong .. you are really not doing any good by letting this continue to either your reputations, the dairy industry but most of all to the badgers. They own the land more than we do really .. doing to them what you do is like doing to the Native American Indians was done by the invaders and to the Aboriginis by the invaders and to the Maoris by the Invaders .. they are no different .. they deserve respect and gratitude that we use their land for our own gain .. Think again .. there are many of us that think this way.

Badgers are a vital part nature and of us. They mean so much to so many different people. They have a right to life and to be protected from harm. Vaccination is the only really solution to TB in cattle. It is in the farmers interest as well. Please leave the badgers alone.

I strongly disagree that killing badgers will do anything to improve cattle tb. In fact would probably make it worse. The reason cattle tb rose was due to lack of proper cattle movement checks and lack of biosecurity when restocking from outside of the area after the epidemic and NOT due to the poor old badger. Bovine tb is a disease from cattle and is not a badger disease. Very very few badgers ever get tb. Many cattle who do get Bovine tb pass this on to other cattle via water droplet transmission. Cattle whose immune systems are depressed due to intensive farming & overcrowding are more susceptible to catching it & other diseases. Tb can be passed on by many animals but by far the main transmitter is cattle themselves. Improved biosecurity measures on farms and more highly supervised hygiene systems at cattle markets & during transportation across the country would go a long way to keeping this reduction in cattle tb figures falling yet even further. For most of its existence, the poor old badger has been scapegoated.....hence the saying..to be "badgered". A very, very small percentage of badgers ever get tb.There have been many figures to prove this by wildlife charities who by law have to check badgers who are regularly brought in .I advocate Badger vaccination programs, taking full advantage of volunteer assistance help plus improved biosecurity measures on farms is the way fwd. For example...one improvement cd be to ensure that all cattle water troughs are routinely cleaned /sterilised before cattle are put back in the fields after overwintering in barns. Many species of wildlife drink from these stagnant pools of bacteria. This may be cattles only access to water. Badgers are not the problem..Cattle tb figures have been falling steadily for the last few years by almost 12% and NOT increasing as was previously announced by those pushing for the cull. The latest cattle tb figures are awaited and we read that they are to be revised 'substantially downwards!'

Vaccinate not exterminate! Many volunteers at hand to do so. So many reasons not to kill...failure of both culls, impossible to estimate badger pop.figs, as shown by the fact they have been altered so many times,...both before culling and then revised downwards mid- cull, seemingly to suit as wasn't going too well and now after culling upwards! If the slaughter of our native badgers continues, apart from being totally inhumane & barbaric and importantly unsupported by Science, it will have a catastrophic effect on the mood of the electorate. The electorate are not fools and those who have approved this have been left with a lot of egg on their faces as they have tried to push ahead despite the ever growing list of errors of judgement, public dismay, faulty badger figures, cost to the tax payer!!!, cost to the local community, loss of tourism, reduction in sales of West Country produce and now faulty cattle tb figures to boot. We now learn from Defra figures that cattle tb figures have actually been dropping for the 2 years previous to the cull by nearly 12%!!! After all this, I believe that a lot of families, as these facts are widely publicised, will choose to avoid the West Country for their breaks & annual holidays and will discover that there are other just as beautiful parts of the UK which have already decided to oppose any further cull on council owned land. There seem to be an awful lot of angry electorate around these days with regard to this issue and I also sympathise with those that have flooding as yet another unsavoury and upsetting situation to deal with. ...Please do not allow badger killing fields in East Devon council land.

Stop , think, vaccinate !

Enough of this scapegoat killing and unscientific slaughter - Vaccinate !

! all my 65 years on this planet, i've never felt so ashamed to be English!

If they cull,i don't visit or by dairy products.It's that simple!

Vaccination of both cattle and badgers is the only credible way forward. Devon has one of the largest, if no the largest group of volunteer badger vaccinators in the country, who will vaccinated badgers for just the cost of the vaccine. As well as being humane, causing no disruption to either the badgers or to rural communities, this is also far cheaper than hosting a badger cull.

Put a stop to this endless slaughter. NOW.

The culls have been shown to be unscientific, inhumane, inneffective and costly. Why go with a failed policy? Stand up, use common sense, listen to the evidence on all sides and then please vaccinate. These wild creatures are a part of our heritage and deserve respect, care and concern.Cattle need a cleaner farming environment to prevent disease spreading. Using BOTH of these approaches will be much better for the animals and the countryside.

Vaccination is one way of protecting badgers and cattle. Please start a vaccination programme on council owned land.

Science was bypassed by DEFRA and the NFU. You cannot Cure Infectious diseases with a Bullet.

I am a farmer and I do not believe culling badgers will make any difference to the disease in the cow. This is a bovine disease and needs more money concentrated on solving the problems with our current TB test, which is only 80 % accurate, not in culling our wildlife. We had this disease under control in the early 60s without a single badger being killed. During the 50s after the introduction of pasteurisation we vaccinated both humans and cattle with the human BCG vaccine, it must have had an impact because by the early sixties the disease was down to practical nil, except on two farms, one in Devon and one in Gloucester. Its my opinion that both these farms had what is now known as Anergic cows, that is cow that consistently tests negative even when riddled with the disease, this is only discovered in the abattoir when the animal goes for slaughter. After years of TB problems , my neighbour has just discovered one of these cows in his herd, it was born and the farm, and never left the farm till killed. We cannot rely on killing badgers to solve our problems we really do need to sort this problem in the cow. Its my belief that making the Gamma interferon test compulsory we would have this TB problem reduced in just a few of years , not killing for 25 years only to find we still have a problem. Jan Curtis

please vaccinate , they have killed enough badgers with no end to tb, better bio security on farms and cleanliness is needed .

On 20 February, 2014 Devon County Councillors will vote on whether or not to prohibit badger culling on Devon County Council land. Devon County Councillor Jill Owen (St David’s & St James) proposed the Notice of Motion: “that the recent badger cull in Somerset and Gloucestershire has been more difficult and costly than predicted by the Government. Its effectiveness is as yet unproven and the cull may well be counter productive. Therefore this council prohibits badger culling on its land and asks that more research be undertaken by Government to find more effective and cheaper vaccinations for badgers and cattle to help eradicate Bovine TB." 'Badger vaccination is a cheap and painless alternative to a badger cull. This short video, filmed at Killerton Estate in Devon, shows how quick and simple vaccinating badgers is. This vaccination programme is using FERA staff, (part of DEFRA), and is therefore more expensive than using volunteer vaccinators, but both are still far cheaper than hosting a badger cull, with no harm to the badgers, the local community or to the tourism industry. TBVAC can vaccinate badgers anywhere in Devon for just £30 per badger using this same technique.' - TBVAC Totnes Badger Vaccination Action Campaign

The justification for the badger cull is not based on science but on prejudice and ignorance.