Island Life October/November 2018

Country Life
CONSERVATION DILEMMA
– ARE BADGERS EATING THE ISLAND’S HEDGEHOGS?
By Sam Biles, Managing Director of country Estate Agents Biles & Co
If you asked the average person
if they liked badgers the answer
would probably be ‘yes’; if you also
asked them if they liked hedgehogs
the answer would also probably
be positive. It is in vogue to love
animals, especially mammals – and
why not? They look cute, and cuddly
– especially when young with their
big eyes and soft fur.
Loving animals shows that you
are a caring person, however,
to quote the Island’s own Poet
Laureate, Tennyson nature is
often ‘red in tooth and claw’ - it is
an uncomfortable fact that some
animals eat other animals and
badgers eat hedgehogs. There
are more badgers about than
a few years ago and there are
fewer hedgehogs–this simplistic
statement ignores other causes
of Mrs Tiggywinkle’s decline such
as busier roads and reduced
habitat, but when did you last
see a squashed hedgehog on an
Island road? The sight of a roadside
badger scuttling along in the
headlights at night is now common
as is that of a bloodied heap of grey
fur at the side of the road.
It may not only be the fact that
badgers eat hedgehogs but that
they also compete for their food
– both love earthworms. A 2009
Royal Holloway study showed close
geographical links between the
presence of badgers and falling
hedgehog numbers. Badgers
and their setts were protected in
1992 since when the population
has soared. Badgers are not
native to the Island as noted by Sir
Richard Worsley in 1781 but were
introduced in the 19th century.
The Island is currently relatively
free from Bovine TB though here
have been some individual cases in
imported cattle. In the West Country
and other areas where Bovine TB is
endemic in the badger population
it has proved very difficult to control
without large scale badger culling
which is a very emotive issue.
Conservation is a complex
matter – it implies some positive
management of nature by man
but poses a real dilemma when the
protection of a species much loved
by the public leads to a population
imbalance which adversely effects
another adored species. It’s
perhaps easier when rats need to be
eradicated from a Pacific island to
save rare flightless birds. There are
no easy answers to this situation.
COUNTRYSIDE TIP
You don’t need to wait for the
first frost to pick your sloes for
sloe gin, or prick each one to
release the juice – pick them
when they are abundant and
freeze them on trays, this will
soften the hard fruit and split
the skins allowing the juice
to seep out into the gin.
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