The Badger Cull Is Over....It's All Very Confusing

 

Cheers all round?  Read the part that says "Both the Badger Trust and Cumbria Wildlife Trust said they were concerned a culling licence remained potentially active in Cumbria, despite Defra's reassurances."

I have already stated several times that until the Government gives an absolute, in writing, guarantee that there will be no more culls there is ALWAYS the threat of a "required special licence cull".

Sadly, if possible, it will take many decades for the population to recover although extinction in some large areas is likely.  Over 300,000 badgers kill;ed due to bad science and corruption.

We should all be thankful for the work of anti cull groups who have risked a lot over the years including vicious assaults. 

Here is the BBC article https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c172zyqwrzdo?fbclid=IwY2xjawR9ZKVleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEew67CFtR1F9v1pu5VEcAgSWB_QHO2zkDh9_f3ixMT12iFi8Fz8Z3xQffovME_aem_XEiDMpl8qi7gw2NHqIAQhA#comments

Federica Bedendo

North East and Cumbria

Published

22 May 2026, 06:07 BST

2 Comments

Badger culling has effectively ended in England, the government has confirmed.

 

The practice was widely used in farming to control the spread of bovine tuberculosis (TB), which resulted in the slaughter of more than 270,000 cattle in the last 10 years, according to government figures.

 

The last badger culling licence, which was granted in Cumbria in 2024, expires in 2028, but the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) said it was subject to an annual authorisation from Natural England, which would not be renewed.

 

The Badger Trust said the move was "good news for badgers" as culling was not an effective way to tackle bovine TB.

 

The trust's chief executive Nigel Palmer said: "You can't solve a disease in one animal by killing another animal."

 

The government said it was planning to move towards vaccinating badgers to control the spread of TB, but development of a vaccine for cattle was still under way.

 

"Until they address the problem in cattle, which is where the problem lies, they're not going to get on top of it," Palmer said.

 

Nigel Palmer, chief executive at the Badger Trust. He has short brown hair and he is speaking to a crowd, which is out of shot, holding a microphone. He is wearing a t-shirt with the word 'badgers' on it.

Image source,Nigel Palmer

 

The National Farmers Union (NFU) said badger culling had been effective in controlling transmissions, together with other measures such as cattle testing and movement control.

 

NFU president Tom Bradshaw said a decision to end wildlife control when effective cattle vaccination and testing were not expected to be available until 2030 left "gaping holes" in TB control policies.

 

He said: "There needs to be much greater urgency, attention and investment given to TB eradication. We still believe a comprehensive approach is the best way to eradicate this terrible disease."

 

Defra said the most recent data showed 5% of tested badger carcasses were positive for TB in 2024.

 

It said cattle testing and surveillance had always been "the foundation" of its strategy and a new plan to control TB was expected to be announced soon.

 

"Bovine TB remains one of the most difficult and persistent animal health challenges, causing devastation for farmers and rural communities," a Defra spokesperson said.

 

Cumbria Wildlife Trust said bovine TB took a "horrendous toll emotionally and financially" on farmers and they were "very keen" to see the government develop a vaccine for cattle.

 

"We share a lot of sympathy and empathy with the farmers who are affected," Cumbria Wildlife Trust's chief executive Steve Trotter said.

 

He added wildlife organisations would be open to working with Defra on a scheme to vaccinate badgers.

 

Steve Trotter, chief executive of Cumbria Wildlife Trust. He has short salt and pepper hair and wears glasses. He is wearing a dark fleece over a blue shirt. His arm is leaning on a drystone wall and there are green trees behind him.

 

Both the Badger Trust and Cumbria Wildlife Trust said they were concerned a culling licence remained potentially active in Cumbria, despite Defra's reassurances.

 

"It's very confused messaging," Palmer said.

 

"We would rather see them end all licences and actually focus on supporting farmers and supporting them to get on top of this terrible disease."

 

The Hunt Saboteurs Association, which opposed badger culling, said the practice had been a "disaster" for the environment and it was important to ensure it would never happen again.

 

Chairman Simon Russell said: "We need to step away from this attitude that as soon as we have a problem with any form of wildlife the answer is to kill it - we need to see that - at best - as the very last resort."

Badger Trust Still Trying To Push Out BBG

 

It HAS to be deliberate. Woke up this morning and there it was: The Badger Trust telling me it is setting up a Bristol badger group.

This is just to get more funding and the Trust has NEVER helped local badgers before and had I left it up to them more than a dozen setts would have been built on in the l;ast 6 years.

This is just the big corporate group wanting more groups for more funds.

"Caution Badgers"

 Although drivers still do not slow down (it is THEIR road) it was good to see that someone fed up of badgers being killed on one stretch of road that Bristol City Council were not interested in doing anything about put up their own sign. 

We still have not found out who put the sign up -BCC were quite annoyed at me and I will make it clear now that I had nothing to do with this BUT I commend the person who put it up.

A big problem for badgers

A big problem for badgers (ignoring cars, netting, rodenticides etc) are garden gateways being left open then closed trapping a badger in a garden and come daylight -"HELP THERE IS A BADGER OUT IN DAYLIGHT!!!"

Yes, because you closed its entry/exit route.

The other problem are people. Don't get me started on humans. Anyway, they do not want badgers in their gardens even if they are passing through. What do these humans do? They fence off, board up or otherwise block traditional entrances/exits of clan travel routes.

And the next person tells me that they did this because "I don't want my kids getting TB or rabies" is going to receive a very blunt response.

Badgers are not a rabies threat -people use this as an excuse when it comes to foxes as well- and the risk of TB is based on BAD science using the badger as a scapegoat species for poor farming practices (such as craftily selling off infected cattle).

Badgers are a good environmental indicator just like the fox (or for our streams and rivers the otter).

You have a badger sett in your garden it is there to stay and is protected BY LAW (even if the law on "Protected species" is a complete crap show).

Educate yourself on badgers and enjoy them being present where you live!

Badger Cubs

 I had a report on Saturday night that a badger cub had been taken in to Highcroft Vets on the Wells Road.

I contacted the practice and got a very quick response from the RVN there. I was given the rough location and told that the cub had checked out fine and was handed to Secret World to take care of. My thanks to the RVN in question.

Apparently a woman had spotted the cub in a garden and rather that check the local sett (known locally) and see if the mother came to retrieve the cub she took it to the vet. A healthy badger cub, as with a healthy fox cub, close to home should be kept under observation and patience to wait and see if the mother turned up.

Secret World will not give out information on whether they will try to reunite mother-cub or whether the cub will be released elsewhere. Like the four cubs transported from the Isle of Wight that SW are caring for ((the IOW badger group made the 1,800 miles journey there ?!) any badger lost toa local population can have a ripple effect.

The IOW cubs were just handed over and "Secret World will decide where they are released" which is four healthy7 cubs lost to an island population.

WHERE SW can release 5 badger cubs is a mystery since Somerset is a cull/badger unfriendly area and you can't just dump four cubs anywhere and definitely not near another clan area.

It would be lovely to just be given facts and information on release areas so the badgers can be looked after in future.

There is still the question, which Secret World will not answer, as the what happened to the two cubs taken from Ashton Court?

Everyone should be working together.

Island Badgers?

(c)2026 Badger Trust Isle of Wight

 Island populations of any animal whether fox or badger is of interest. In my two Red Papers I looked at island foxes as well as island wild cats. Badgers on islands indicate two things:

1. They are an ancient population inhabiting the island since it became water locked.

2. They were transported to the island simply to introduce them there or for hunting/hunting reasons -badgers were being caught and transported all over England in the second half of the 19th century.

If (1) then they need DNA testing and to be studied and given full protection by the law and not subjected to any cull.

If it is (2) then records need to be search for when the introduction started. Foxes were transported to the Isle of Man, Isle of Wight, etc for hunting purposes.; Because of the introduction of mange due to the poor conditions imported foxes faced before being sold on it became a problem noted in thw 18th and 19th centuries.

Hunt masters would kill any population where mange was seen even if the foxes appeared healthy the fact that one had mange meant the entire population had to be killed -cubs and all.  Some bright spark decided that foxes had mange due to them being dirty animals and not cleaning out their dens. Badgers didn't have mange and were seen as clean and they cleared out their setts daily. No one accused hunt masters of having high IQs but they worked out that if they got badgers and put them into fox dens their constant cleaning out would mean future foxes did not face mange.

Your brain can hurt if you try to work this all out logically. If the foxes were alive then badgers could not be moved in. If the foxes were gone and the badgers moved in to clean up an area before more imported foxes arrived...where did the badgers go?  Where they killed or moved on to another hunting territory?

It is very odd to write that after centuries of melecide the badgers of England only survived because they seemed useful to fox hunts. Otherwise like the original British fox and wild cat badgers would now be extinct -for 'sport' they were not much use ("unless there is a shortage of foxes") so would not have been trapped in Europe and imported in their thousands as foxes, deer, hare, red squirrels and other species were.

Which means that if (2) then we know why -unless some local squire wanted to have a "typically English animal" on his property.

The history of island canids and felids is interesting but island badgers are never mentioned.

Interestingly, every search will tell you that foxes and badgers are absent on the Isle of Man and yet we know from records (written not online because internetters do not study archives) that there are foxes there -again, imported for 'sport' in the 19th century. And:

"No Extant Population: Reports of badger sightings are rare and usually considered to be escapees, not a established population."   Escaped from where?  The fact that there is no bovine TB on the Isle is stated to be proof that badgers do not exist there and yet that claim of badger introduced bTB can be shot down over and over again.

Removing a badger from an island population, say an orphaned cub, would or should be difficult since there would be questions re. any disease introduction OR if returned back to the island the risk of bTB.

There are a lot of questions about island populations but dogma (spread by armchair 'experts' and internet bloggers) has taken the place of field work. Why get wet and cold when you can just copy and paste 'facts'?

Badgers actually went extinct on the Isle of Wight by 1909. The current population stems from about a dozen badgers introduced in the 1920s by the local hunt.

Three Teenage School Boys Did More Than Wildlife Organisations

 Sarah Mills received a call from Somerset Badger Watch over an injured badger near Bath (always considered Bristol territory so she let me know).

Somerset Badger Watch had no one who could help or handle the situation. HOWEVER, if she wanted then the badger could be taken to Secret World to be put down.

Three teenage school boys had come across the badger and put their coats over it and bags around it. They called the RSPCA -nothing. Secret World -they could not come out and the boys tried other numbers just to get help for the badger.

When Sarah arrived she took the badger to vets in Bath who were not willing to deal with the badger until this afternoon -it was in shock, had its spine poking out and needed to be put down asap not wait half a day. After a couple tries the badger was brought to Bristol where the vet told Sarah "It's a protected species -we have a duty of care" and the sow badger was put to sleep.

It had empty milk sack so had young but likely those are old enough to forage and fend for themselves.

The disgrace here is that wildlife groups were not willing to do eff all about an injured protected animal and that Bath vets (probably with farming clients) were not interested in helping via the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons Duty of Care ethic, It was up to a Bristol vet to act immediately and relieve suffering.

Three teenage school boys did far more than any wildlife body. That says a lot.

(c)2026 Sarah Mills

(c)2026 Sarah Mills

(c)2026 Sarah Mills

(c)2026 Sarah Mills

To the three school boys -THANK YOU