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Hedgehog Cull

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Tryphena Absent

19:25 / 17.12.02

Plans to cull an estimated 5,000 hedgehogs in the Outer Hebrides have been approved by a government body.
The board of Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) sanctioned the slaughter in an effort to help preserve rare birds on the Uist isles.
Campaigners accused the organisation of "flying in the face of animal welfare advice and public opinion".

There's really not much more I can say to this except that I think it's sick and just expresses everything that's wrong with humanity's attitude to animals, not to mention other human beings, just kill, kill, kill. The above has been pulled off the BBC website.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

21:23 / 17.12.02

Just read this in tomorrow's Times and was about to post it myself. Fucking disgusting. Not much more to add, really.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

23:25 / 17.12.02

Oh, and this from the Guardian:

"But there may be some hope for survival for at least some of the hedgehogs. Although SNH has ruled out the option of moving the animals to the mainland, it has agreed to advise any animal rights groups who want to move them."

Well whoop-de-do. How nice of them. Not giving cash to animal rights groups to have them moved, just advising them. What, like "um... put 'em in a box with some lettuce?". The hedgehogs, you see, aren't native to the area. So hell, may as well kill 'em, why not? You know, "shit, there goes the ecosystem".

Bastards.

01:44 / 18.12.02

I don't know why people are angry.
In the interests of conservation the hedgehogs, an alien species, must be removed somehow and culling them is far more humane than carting the poor blighters around the country - making most of them die slowly and in great stress.

So, I'm wondering. Is the feeling that the hedgehogs should not go and to hell with an important population of rare birds, or that they should be relocated despite it being more cruel than a simple cull?

Tryphena Absent

03:02 / 18.12.02

We shouldn't fuck around with ecosystems, we moved them there in the first place and they didn't die, who says they'll die if we move them back again.

03:19 / 18.12.02

While the idea of a "cull" is pretty repugnant, there is an ecological dilemma inherent to this. The transportation of Hebrides hedgehogs to the mainlands poses epidemiological problems to the native population of hedgehogs and kin, not unlike the to the reasoning behind the cross-borders regulations regarding transportation of fruit and vegetables (that most of us are more familiar with). Moving the hedgehogs means moving their infections, parasites, and bacteria carte-blanche, into an alien ecosystem not necessarily braced. It also means 5,000 new competitors with native insectivores for resources.

06:39 / 18.12.02

yeah, but hodgepigs used to do very nicely on the mainland once upon a time, so it could be done. It's just that the gov. can't be arsed to do it right, hence the call for AR groups.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

09:22 / 18.12.02

As janina says, we put 'em there. And people have been saying there was a problem for about fifteen-some years... but official agencies weren't willing to do shit about it until they'd done research (for FIFTEEN and SOME YEARS!) to find out that the stark staring obvious was actually true. By which time, it's got to this level.

We've already fucked the ecosystem. So killing our unwitting pawns in this is somehow a good thing? I don't think so.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

11:23 / 18.12.02

Oh, but Flame- Hodgepigs these days, they're not a patch on the 'odgepigs we 'ad when I were a nipper. Back then, you could catch 'em, take 'em from their own ecosystem, and dump 'em on an island, wivaat a word of regret from said pigs.

Naah, they daahn even knaah they're born!

(Back to normal "voice" and serious point)- Flame's right. We moved them. It was a big mistake. Surely we don't have to kill the fuckers to make it right?

Try extending the hedgehogs v native birds argument to humans, and see what you end up sounding like. (And no, I'm not advocating repatriation for ethnic minorities, BEFORE anyone gets the wrong end of the stick.)

Letting nature take its course, strangely enough, means also letting the works of man (as part of nature) take the potential & risks inherent in nature.

The ecosystem has been fundamentally changed. Personally, I'd let the hedgehogs run free.

And no, the rare birds won't die out. They'll move elsewhere to get their food. That's why they evolved the wings in the first place. They may not be happy, but at least they won't be being slaughtered in their thousands.

WE fucked up. Not the hedgehogs. Nor, indeed, the birds, though I think we may possibly have doomed them. The bacteria etc. the hedgehogs brought- if they affect the birds, and already are, then will killing the hedgehogs make us any better? No. As for the food issue- we really should have thought of that back when people first pointed it out. Rather than wait until death is the only option.

I'm sorry if I rant. I just don't like killing stuff. (I may wear leather, but then I never claimed to be Buddha or anything.)

12:53 / 18.12.02

I agree that moving the hedgepigs would be better than culling them (though it does say in the BBC piece that last time that was tried, half of them died after being transported - I suppose it would still mean 2,500 fewer dead hedgehogs and would be morally preferable). But it's not as simple as the birds flying away and finding new feeding grounds, is it - it's their nesting habitat as well, and given the rarity of suitable habitats for waders in Britain as a whole I'd go for the birds over the hedgepigs if I had to make a choice. Poor Mrs Tiggywinkle.

01:21 / 19.12.02

I really can't see how making lots of hedgehogs die terrible deaths just to save some of them is better than humanely and quickly culling them all. What I find repugnant is the idea of causing great suffering and lasting ecological damage just to "save" a few lives and make animal rights/welfare ninnies feel better, the biodiversity cause is more important then keeping those short-termist wet blankets happy.
And anyway, all this outcry about these hedgehogs and yet the nightly carnage on our roads isn't given one second worth of thought. A price worth the hedgehogs and their crushed skulls paying for us, huh?

pointless and uncalled for

14:52 / 19.12.02

Economics is probably playing a part in the plans as well. I doubt that a cull was the first solution on the tale. The cost of removal and redistribution is most likely prohibitive to the SNH, an NPO, and it's difficult to suddenly come up with a lot of money out of the local and national govermental budget without causing shortfall in other areas.

Of course if you can come up with an effective budget restructuring that will allow for the SNH to move the 'hogs without causing shortfall in essential expenses, revenue generating programs and doesn't mention the words "war, Iraq or evil repression of developing countries" then I would imagine the SNH would love to hear from you.

Tryphena Absent

22:42 / 19.12.02

At the end of the day it comes down to this, yeah we can cause more suffering for the hedgehogs but somehow this little part of my brain tells me if they understood what was going on they'd choose the right to life. They're living creatures and we just assume that because they aren't human we can just kill them. Ideologically it's disgraceful and personally I have to extend that to practice, apparently we're more intelligent beings, if the situation was reversed I wouldn't want to be put to death by the giant hedgehogs because I would want to live.

Potus, once again you're reducing life to economics, apparently money outweighs the importance of actually being on this planet and having rights. I'm going to say this once and only once to you though probably many more times in my life, do you think this thing that we've created, this vastly exaggerated barter system takes precedence over living and do you think that's logical or actually just terribly upsetting? I find it awful that over and over people try to excuse our aggressive and murderous tendencies as a race through economics, in fact I find it wicked, to accept such an argument is simply wrong. We invented this system and if you look hard enough there is always a way people just don't care enough to find it.

pointless and uncalled for

09:35 / 21.12.02

I didn't think that I had reduced life to economics.

However, instead of repetition of someone elses sentiments, something that I have received flack for in the past, I thought I would introduce an essential element to the debate. I have a very strong dislike of money and the entire methodology of currency and finance. But it would be wrong to address this issue without covering the economic element. Other posters have said we should be doing this, that and the third but it seems that for the most part they are disregarding how these endeavours are going to be financed.

My apologies for upsetting you.

Tryphena Absent

11:45 / 21.12.02

You haven't upset me but you're always making excuses for bad bad things because of money, when people are being killed by the state, when hedgehogs are being killed by the state, I mean if you were being killed by the state would it be OK because no one had the money to keep you alive? Of course it wouldn't, this isn't about there being no money, it's about people not taking time to see how the money can be made to work- damn spend it on donating a little to the charities who will move the bloody hedgehogs.

17:10 / 21.12.02

I don't think he's saying it's okay. I think he's saying that the various governmental bodies are making this decision partly (or mostly) based on money. Which is undeniable. Moving hedgehogs is expensive - there are missiles to buy and bungs to provide, you know.

03:02 / 22.12.02

Well surely money must have been a consideration but having said that cruelty and havoc caused by moving the hedgehogs and then finding them a place to live, as opposed to humanely culling them, rather renders the issue of cost irrelevant anyway - well so long as you're not some pro-life animal nut (i.e. those people pretty much saying; 'let animals live in pain and misery, just please let them live!'). I'm not sure there are many of those on the board of Scottish Natural Heritage.

And when all the arguments have come to a head there is just one more point worthy of note; for heaven's sake they're only hedgehogs, get a grip.

pointless and uncalled for

10:36 / 22.12.02

Thanks fridge, that covers the matter far better than I seem to be able to manage.

Tryphena Absent

00:59 / 23.12.02

Fair enough, I'm sorry if it sounded like an attack on you Potus, it's just that I've got a bit of a mass-murder hate thing going on and people bring up economics to justify so often you wouldn't believe! Or maybe you would, I dunno.

D, I think there's a fundamental difference of opinion between us, you think hedgehogs are less important then people. I regard people as animals and really think killing other creatures is only obviously OK if we're going to eat them, we are predators after all. But what makes people assume animals can't reason? We can't speak to them, we have not developed the mental capacity to learn to speak to hedgehogs yet somehow we are brighter then them, we are stupid enough to assume that they have no form of speech. I don't believe that, they just don't have the tools that evolution has given us (like thumbs) and so have not developed the same things. So... we're so bright, let them have a little bit of free will, let them live their own lives and stop moving them from place to place like our little minions and as for killing them. Yeah, that's nice isn't it, aren't we the big boys of the animal world!

Aethelwine Jedi

12:22 / 25.12.02

What have the hedgehogs ever done for us, anyway? Feh, I say.

And how is, say, killing an animal to eat it any better than moving it about, if we're doing both things for our own convenience? We don't /have/ to eat animals/turn them in to shoes/make things out of their various bits.

14:18 / 25.12.02

I'll have you know some of my best friends are hedgehogs, as is the head of Cardiothoracic Surgery at my hospital - despite having no opposable thumbs.

Tryphena Absent

22:51 / 25.12.02

To say it again:

I regard people as animals and really think killing other creatures is only obviously OK if we're going to eat them, we are predators after all.

I crave meat, sorry, it makes up a significant portion of my diet and I'm not willing to give that up. Morally I have to excuse it by placing myself as a predator because I cannot be a vegetarian. I think this relationship is obvious, others wouldn't, I understand their point of view and if I could be a vegetarian then I would be one. That doesn't make it right to kill animals because they happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

03:13 / 26.12.02

let them have a little bit of free will, let them live their own lives and stop moving them from place to place like our little minions and as for killing them.

With rights comes responsibility, all the hedgehogs had to do was stop eating rare bird eggs, give the birds some free damn will.

D, I think there's a fundamental difference of opinion between us, you think hedgehogs are less important then people.

Nah, I'm just not the least bit interested in relieving the suffering of small animals which haven't got anything like the cranial capacity to know what's going on. As if battery hens somehow lay on their feeble broken legs and get terribly sad dreaming of the farmyard their tiny pea-sized brains would have to completely invent for them. No, basically they are automatons, so why care?
Might aswell campaign about cruelty to cars, VCRs and wallpaper.

15:21 / 26.12.02

D: I really hope you're being ironic. Really.

Pain is a function of the nervous system. It's not a function of 'cranial capacity'. The experience of pain is not conditional on being able to imagine an existence without it.

Your opinions are cruel, stupid, and beneath contempt.

Aethelwine Jedi

15:55 / 26.12.02

[QUOTE]I regard people as animals and really think killing other creatures is only obviously OK if we're going to eat them, we are predators after all.[/QUOTE]

Sorry if I'm repeating myself in places here...

I'm certainly not a vegetarian. I also crave meat, but I know that if I stopped eating it (as I did, once) I'll eventually go completely off it. And even if I didn't, there are plenty of meat-substitute products available on the market for me to buy that should satiate my craving for dead flesh. In this day and age, meat doesn't have to be a staple part in my diet any more. So I know that I /could/ be a vegetarian if I was willing to put the extra effort in or fork out the extra money. But instead I continue to eat meat, because it is convenient. I can't be bothered to check every product I buy for animal parts or pass up the prospect of a tasty BLT in the morning.
So I can't claim that I only eat animals because I'm their predator when I actually have other options and the intelligence to be aware of this. Nope, I eat them because they're tasty, and it's not nice and it's not fair, but hey.

So how is moving/killing/molesting hedgehogs any worse than eating a burger? Where do you draw the line when it comes to animal suffering?

My cynical side is screaming that people are only griping about the hedgehog cull because hedgehogs are cute. If they were lizards or fish, how many people do you think would care? At least the hedgehogs are being culled humanely and for a good reason, which is more than you can say about they way that pigs/poultry/cattle are treated.

Aethelwine Jedi

16:03 / 26.12.02

Oh yeah – if anyone is that upset about hedgehogs being killed because it’s the most economically feasible way of reducing the threat the pose to endangered birds, why don’t they toddle of to the Outer Hebridies and smuggle some ‘hogs out themselves. :P
(For the record, I’m joking. I’m still of the opinion that it’s more humane to just ice the poor little sods.)

Tryphena Absent

18:35 / 26.12.02

Let's agree to disagree. You stay happy with killing the hodgehegs and I'll stay unhappy, if it was fish I'd still be miserable, I'm anti-hunt and I'm anti-gun and I'm anti-battery farm. I just think we should treat animals with a little respect for their sentience. The majority of Britain seems to disagree with me, if I tortured their pets, they might change their minds. I'm fucking sick of trying to change people's minds.

Aethelwine Jedi

18:59 / 26.12.02

Whatever. Either way, I say your argument is a bit redundant when you’re still willing to happily munch on a dead cow’s ass.

21:00 / 26.12.02

Redundant isn't the word I'd use.

I /could/ be a vegetarian if I was willing to put the extra effort in or fork out the extra money

works out cheaper to be veg, at least from where I'm standing. As for the effort: I'd say that whilst going veg certainly requires an act of will, being veg is no harder than eating animal products.

04:20 / 27.12.02

I've got a utilitarian solution that should satisfy both sides of this debate. Let's put the critters to good use:
hedgehogs can be converted into a useful building material

hedgehogs can be converted into a useful building material

04:42 / 27.12.02

Naked Flame

The experience of pain is not conditional on being able to imagine an existence without it.

Never said it was, but that doesn't for a second mean that the animals experience of pain is anything like ours. For most animals it's mere a simple function, like hunger, and without no appendage of humanistic sentiment.

But if it makes you feel better to believe in the world of Peter Rabbit and friends, knock yourself kiddo.

12:31 / 27.12.02

For most animals it's mere a simple function, like hunger, and without no appendage of humanistic sentiment.

Leaving aside the question of precisely what you mean by an 'appendage of humanistic sentiment', where's your proof for this? Or are you simply asserting this to try and prop up a failing argument?

And- desperately trying to de-rot the thread- what exactly is your argument? You began this thread in favour of a cull because the animals would feel less pain: now you're arguing that they're 'only animals' that don't care about the pain they experience. Are you trying to wind us up, or are you just confused?

16:45 / 27.12.02

"My cynical side is screaming that people are only griping about the hedgehog cull because hedgehogs are cute. If they were lizards or fish, how many people do you think would care?"
Thats so true.

Also, how many species have humans made extinct? God knows. I was gonna say we dont go around killing each other, but strictly speaking thats not true. I say, i bigger human cull. Lets start with George bush!

01:43 / 28.12.02

You began this thread in favour of a cull because the animals would feel less pain: now you're arguing that they're 'only animals' that don't care about the pain they experience.

Yep. Given the belief* that animals do feel pain like us, the cull will be less cruel than moving them.

where's your proof for this?

Depending upon the animal there is no definitive proof either way, however in humans pain perception takes place in the frontal lobe, an area of the brain massively developed in humans, something fairly unique to us.
Sure most animals will respond to painful stimuli but most reactions can easily be interpreted as merely behaviourial rather than pyschological, i.e. hard-wired physical response rather than a self-aware emotional one.

(*Ironically a belief that often seems held by those wishing to move rather than cull the hedgehogs.)

Aethelwine Jedi

09:32 / 28.12.02

Naked Flame, what's your point? If you're concerned about hedgehogs feeling pain, why are you against what seems to be the most humane way of eliminating the threat that they pose to rare bird species?

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