'If beavers can’t be tolerated under the present regime on this land, then maybe it’s time to re-examine that regime'
Licences to kill beavers in Scotland were issued by the Government to protect ‘prime agricultural land
I found myself wondering, what is this farming, which is evidently so important to Scotland that it justifies such slaughter of this recently returned species, known to create wildlife habitat and provide ecosystem services much needed by humanity in the current climate, biodiversity and pollutions crises?The NFUS has worked hard to make translocation of beavers difficult and shooting easy, and has been treated, on the whole, very supportively by government and its nature agency NatureScot,...
The website goes on to say this: “The main cereal crop in Scotland is barley and 28% of the UK’s barley area is in Scotland. 35% of it goes into malting. 55% goes for animal feed. There are two types of barley: winter barley is sown in the autumn and spring barley is sown in March or April. 80% of the Scottish crop is spring barley. Milling wheats grown in Scotland are mainly used for biscuit making. Wheat is also used in distilling and for animal feed.
In Scotland, whisky and beef production seem to be closely aligned and perhaps to some extent beef production could be seen as a by-product of the whisky industry in general. NFUS president Martin Kennedy told me recently that the straw from the barley is used to bed cattle in winter. He also pointed out that whisky brings a lot of money to the UK Treasury which helps to fund the NHS.
These processes are needed along the whole river catchment – and prime agricultural land in the lower reaches of our rivers should not be permanently exempt from change just because it is so designated. After all, for these natural processes to function well, connectivity is essential, and the most intensive farming in particular should have functioning buffer zones next to waterways to help protect water quality, biodiversity and other essential river ecosystem services.
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