Which is more important: money and ego or the wildlife?

 

If people think that this is a stress-free "little hobby"n they ought to try running things, dealing with idiots and supposed badger groups that are spouting dogma and clearly have never studied badgers.

Just saying.

Ridiculous having a certain organisation trying to undermine your group on a weekly basis but this is what wildlife work has become in the UK. Less concern for wildlife and more concern about £££££ and no cooperation.

Apparently People Are Trying To Annoy BBG

 Here is one I received by accident third hand.

072           Wednesday 01 07 2026 (only rteceived report 03 07) dead badger Canford Road, Westbury-on-Trym. Reportee contacted Badger Trust who told them there was no one in Bristol.

Here is a screenshot of the post:

The absolutely galling thing is that the person posting was a member of the Bristol Foxes and Badgers Group where repeated posts have reported on dead badgers and foxes which shows group members do not read posts. 

 The other thing is the Badger Trust who know perfectly well that Bristol Badger Group has covered the area since 1995 told the reportee that there was no one in Bristol.  This is how bad wildlife organisations have become:no membership money to them then you do not exist and 😠 the wildlife.

A Strange Beast

 A "strange animal" was reported and the person had not seen anything like it. They said they would put a camera out to see if it came back. 

I waited with baited breath then came the message "We got it on camera!"

I watched the clip ...it was a badger. Told the peron who replied "I thought that badgers were huge things the size of a labrador?" 

Any... I need to cut back on the bad language.

Number of Badger Setts

 

There are now 62 confirmed badger clan areas in the City and County of Bristol. There are no doubt others but people tend to keep quiet about them. That is good until we get a situation where a sett is under threat and we have to try to protect it with no warning.

Total number of clan setts the BBG has now stopped from being developed on is over 15. Long Ashton Parish Council and Bristol City Council still refuse to respond to the presence of badgers and otters on one of its developments. This is the criminality of local authorities who cherish developers money over conservation and the environment.

Someone asked how BBG can say an area has a badger sett if it only has a report of a badger being seen? Well, unless badgers are teleporting (not had that confirmed yet🫣) a badger has to be living somewhere which by definition would be a sett. We do not draw attention to areas where badgers are seen for very obvious reasons and also if you go entering peoples gardens to check if there is a sett in it you'll either end up withy a copper feeling your collar or punch in the bracket.

The list of "where" badgers are is confidential and neither Avon Wildlife Trust nor BRERC has a copy of the list since they have been downright uncooperative over the last 30 years for reasons I cannot fathom. One other person, who I trust (very, very few of them) will get a copy of the list "in case" mortality catches up with me as there doers need to be a record for conservation and protection purposes.

I ought to point out that there are rumoured to be others but I cannot list those without confirmation and householders want to keep it a secret nothing we can do other than ask that they PLEASE let us know if they have a sett "just in case".;

Bristol City Council and Long Ashton Parish Council and South Gloucestershire Council: "We see no badgers"

 

Added another two sett locations to the ones known which takes know urban and countryside territories to over 60.

Which sounds good until you realise how many are being killed.

It should also be noted that two current sites where established setts and badger activity has been noted are still under threat: one by Bristol City Council and the other by South Gloucestershire Council. Despite the evidence both authorities claim there are no badgers present and neither will respond to correspondence on the matter.

Money and development is far more important to these people than saving/conserving a protected species. Lonmg Ashton Parish Council have repeatedly been informed of badgers and otters as well as other species in an area they cover: six emails, messages via Twitter etc -no responses.

 

They Were Scared About What Might Be Found. That is A Cover Up.

 

I had a "little whisper" from a reliable person that the reason I was lied to about badgers not undergoing post mortems due to the possibility of bovine TB was that if we submitted all the badgers recorded and each one was shown not to have bTB (it was considered "highly unlikely" that they would) it would undermine th reasons for the badger cull.

I further decided to check with the Health and Safety Executive and their rule of "no badger post mortems in the PM lab".  No such rule. Just the "natural and proper pre PM checks".

Guess what? While I was being given the "HSE will NOT allow it" crap the PM lab was undertaking badger post mortems.

The question is, and I think we have the answer now, WHAT were they trying to cover up?

The UK is an awful place for wildlife and trying to gain knowledge about wildlife health issues and treatments.

As an addenda this is what you will find online:

Badger post-mortems (necropsies) are strictly regulated to manage the severe risk of zoonotic diseases—primarily Bovine Tuberculosis (Mycobacterium bovis). They must not be performed on standard clinical premises or by the general public; examinations are exclusively handled by specialised facilities like the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) or specific research projects

The APHA were the ones allegedly refusing permission to carry out badger PMs while authorising badger PMs -ON standard clinical premises.  The bTB excuse is a good cover.