So not a true reintroduction
Beaver reintroductions in the UK
- Thread starter vogelcommando
- Start date
The first licensed release of beavers into the wild in England has recently happened, with a pair of Eurasian beavers being released onto the Isle of Purbeck in Dorset. It is the first time that beavers have been officially released without being contained behind a fence. The two beavers were captured from the Tay Catchment in Scotland, and moved to England after being quarantined at Five Sisters Zoo Park.
ZooNews2024
Well-Known Member
It seems to take comments from New Zealand and the Czech Republic to bring some rational to this rose-tinted argument.
Quite how an over-populated, net food-importing country can afford to alienate its remaining food producers, and give over the land needed to feed itself, is beyond me.
You can stroll along river-banks to watch these wonderful animals if you like, but you will have to go to the supermarket to buy food imported from the third-world (at a huge environmental impact) to feed yourself.
It may turn out in the end to have been advisable to support your food producers and go to the zoo to watch these animals. We will all have to wait and see...
ZooNews2024
Well-Known Member
Maybe in the end it will prove to have been better to have left them in Scotland...?
Experience from an even more overpopulated country, the Netherlands, shows that the damage beavers do towards farmland is negligible. Farmers get a 100% compensation for any damage caused by beavers here and the total damage in 2023 was 46.000 euros (compared to some 40 million euros caused by geese and >2 million euros by tits). Can a beaver reintroduction cause damage, certainly, but that is mainly because they dig burrows in places where they shouldn't, not because they damage crops.
If you really care about food produced at a huge environmental impact, it is better to look at many regular farmers who import animal feed from Brazil and use huge amounts of fertilizer and pesticides to the detriment of the environment. You will find a bigger impact there..
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ZooNews2024
Well-Known Member
Perhaps its the tits that need eradicating then, if they do such huge damage you suggest - never mind the geese.
If your food is not grown at home or imported from abroad - what does the population of your country eat? Unless you are going to eradicate the humans, they have to be fed on something grown somewhere. If you continue to re-wild your productive arable land, then that will have to come from abroad, be it Brazil or anywhere else.
The Dutch may compensate its farmers from general taxation, but if that has been even suggested in the UK, no link or reference has been provided - be it for geese, tits or beavers...
The much publicised release this last week at Littlesea on, or rather near, the Purbecks, of 4 animals to augment the three already established there, was the first legal release and long planned. Made so quickly after the legislation finally came through, in order to adhere to seasonal rules apparently.
I believe releases can only happen between certain dates excluding the spring and summer months with October now being the starting point again. But are there any more impending releases planned before the spring cut-off date, whatever that is.?
I believe releases can only happen between certain dates excluding the spring and summer months with October now being the starting point again. But are there any more impending releases planned before the spring cut-off date, whatever that is.?
Lafone
Well-Known Member
Indeed and any response to releasing a handful of beavers which suggests they threaten the food chain is over dramatic in my view. There are some great practices in other countries and the Netherlands example is excellent.
Time would be better spent debating the use of Neonicotinoids in OSR production and how important alternatives are, or highlighting the role farmers play in preserving the landscape and our wildlife, which is increasingly incentivised under SFI, vs thinking a few beavers will mean we suddenly can’t produce crops any more.
Setting food production as contrary to rewilding or having the right environment for wildlife to flourish, is to misunderstand the direction of travel sustainable production is taking in the real world.
DEFRA has confirmed it will consult with UK farmers on any beaver reintroduction plans going forwards and these release schemes are highly researched, supervised and controlled.
I don’t think we are going to find ourselves waking up to a U.K. food crisis caused by beavers any time soon.
A pair of beavers has recently been released into a 37 acre fenced enclosure in Shrewsbury Beavers return to Shrewsbury after 400 years. Shrewsbury has had significant issues with flooding in recent years, leading to hundreds (probably thousands) of acres of farmland being submerged for weeks. I think that presents much more of a problem to farmers than the risk of crop damage by beavers.
Lafone
Well-Known Member
It would be good to see floods reduced - a useful summary of the positive impact in regard to flooding of an earlier release here
Five years of beaver activity reduces impact of flooding
I have it on good authority that the window for any more (legal) Beaver releases is over until the autumn now, to avoid disturbance during the breeding season. So the recent Littlesea release that generated so much publicity was a one-off for now it seems. But it will give time for other applicants to submit and have their applications processed I guess.
I also wondered if this recent Beaver legislation was made now to try and prevent further the growing trend to 'dump' other species like Lynx and Boar in our countryside.
I also wondered if this recent Beaver legislation was made now to try and prevent further the growing trend to 'dump' other species like Lynx and Boar in our countryside.
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