another anti huint chav up before the beak

[endymion]

Has it? Has it really? And if it has is there anything wrong with that?

Surely having fixed views like you is a bad thing.

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

Nothing wrong with that at all. Just that debating is always good when it causes people to revise there views that is all.

What makes you think my views are fixed? I learn stuff all the time.

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

I used to be strongly anti hunt so a bit silly to say I don't change my views really.

 

[endymion]

I not so sure I believe you were ever anti-hunt.

I'm haven't revised my views on hunting. There is some ambiguity surrounding fox pops. The only way of proving anything conclusively would be a complete ceasation of hunting with hounds AND shooting and for a cencus to be done before and after. This was done to some extent during foot and mouth and it was shown that fox pops didn't change. This is the best piece of evidence so far regarding fox pop dynamics in the absence of hunting.

Regarding the cause of death by hounds, this could be resolved easily if hunts donated fox carcasses for postmortem examination. But they won't.

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

Surely I am in a better position to know what views I have held during my life than you??

Have you any evidence that the general health of an animal population does not diminish when its predators are removed?

I'm not interested in reducing fox numbers.

 

[endymion]

Ok well I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and say I believe you. Kind of.

I'm sure in many cases the health of prey animals does suffer in the absence of predation - look at rabbits in countries like Australia where they have been introduced and have no real predation pressure. The population explodes, exhausts the food sources and then they starve to death.

I do not believe this is the case with foxes. They are not a typical prey animal and their population ecology does not function in that way.

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

So do you accept that if there were lynx and wolves about to predate them when a fox became sick and weak it is pretty likely it would get caught and eaten. Given that these animnals are significant fox predators?

 

[endymion]

It is not given that these animals are significant fox predators. They are not significant fox predators.

Picking off sick animals has NO affect on population as these animals would likely die anyway.

If a sick/wounded animal strayed into the path of a any predator it would get eaten. A bloody crow could kill a fox if it was sick enough.

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

Exactly and taking out sick animals saves them from a more grisly end yes?

Also if diseased animals are killed rather than being allowed to hang around then they spread less disease.

Agreed or not?

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

Are you still trying to make out that a lynx would only kill a fox every ten years or have we moved on from that bollocks?

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

Good article here

"Large predators also keep numbers of medium-sized predators such as foxes (Vulpes vulpes) in balance. This in turn reduces the pressure that foxes can have on ground-nesting birds such as the capercaillie (Tetrao urogallus)." - couldn't agree more

http://www.treesforlife.org.uk/forest/ecological/predation.html

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

Info here about how removal of fox predators causes increase in fopx numbers and reduction in ground nesting birds

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=...amp;oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

and another one here demonstrating the top-down mesopredator release effect of wolf and lynx extinction on red fox numbers.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez/17305803?dopt

 

[endymion]

Will have a read of all you have posted next week and give my humble opinion. But not till Mon cos 'tis now the weekend and there's a beer with my name on it waiting for me in the pub.

Has been a pleasure going round in circles with you again, just like old times, haha

Have a nice weekend and be good to the deer

E

 

[HeWasGeeBee]

Not completely circles I think. We have made some good progress.

I think you will maybe come to accept that the presence of large predator pressure on red fox populations has a beneficial effect on bio diversity.



As for the deer another key effect of exposure to predators or perceived predators (like my dogs) is dispersal, reducing the damage they can do when they cluster in one location. Another good example of wildlife management that requires less killing not more.

 

[soggy]

Foxes are known to control their own populations by adapting birth rates and delaying dispersal rates in response to factors such as habitat and food availability.

How do you think animals at the top of a food chain with no predators regulate their numbers? This mechanism exists and foxes are known to display it.

Utter sh*te. Starvation, dehydration, disease, RTA's and hunting in its multitude of forms control fox numbers. To try and claim anything else is total and utter garbage.

But then the antis are always full of BS and garbage.

 

[soggy]

No because that article is posted by a pro. It's pro hunt propaganda.

I think you have just proved that either you're not on the same planet as the rest of us, or all that snakebite and large scale drug consumption has fried what little brain you were born with.