Game & Fishing Orgs Call For Cormorant & Goosander Culls (1 Viewer)

An array of game & fishing groups have aligned together with a call for Cormorants & Goosanders to be added to The General Licence allowing them to be treated as pest species and controlled without licences see here.

Rare Visitor said:

An array of game & fishing groups have aligned together with a call for Cormorants & Goosanders to be added to The General Licence allowing them to be treated as pest species and controlled without licences see here.

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What is the present status of Goosanders in the UK?? - AFAIK 20% of the Cormorant population are already culled every year. I would be rather concerned where all this could lead given some of the groups behind this call, including this lot http://www.thepredationactiongroup.co.uk/

Irish Kite said:

I would be rather concerned where all this could lead given some of the groups behind this call, including this lot http://www.thepredationactiongroup.co.uk/

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The tenor of their website is the angling fraternity as victim. Despite the use of the word 'research' in a lead heading, there is no mention of anything that resembles a scientific approach. I can well understand their concern about the illegally-released crayfish that have spread through English waterways. However, they seem content to have as their starting point the demonisation of the RSPB and Natural England. It would seem (from their words) to be the kind of inevitable rationalisation adopted by bullies in order to avoid any reasoned discussion. That's a shame, because the angling clubs I've encountered do not resemble this lot in any way - they have their concerns, but have worked with other bodies to resovle them. Much more important, they insist on self-discipline from their members, something that BF members visiting the PAG website wouldn't get from the page wording.
MJB

What is perhaps most concerning about PAG is that they aren't just some minor splinter group. Read the profiles of those involved on the committee and most are involved in angling professionally and have vested business interests in the industry. Read Chairman Tim Paisley's statement and they are in this for the long game and have already made up their minds the 'problems' exist and need to be dealt with via culls.

Rare Visitor said:

What is perhaps most concerning about PAG is that they aren't just some minor splinter group. Read the profiles of those involved on the committee and most are involved in angling professionally and have vested business interests in the industry. Read Chairman Tim Paisley's statement and they are in this for the long game and have already made up their minds the 'problems' exist and need to be dealt with via culls.

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Hi Alan,

Having been an angler myself, I cannot make up my mind whether this is just spin or whether it is a genuine concern. There are some people (not always just anglers) who believe that cormorants are a problem but would probably be less concerned about goosanders. This is because the nonsense about the sinensis race of cormorants being ill-adapted to inland waterways has gained common knowledge. I excplained to a friend of mine within the last few weeks that these birds were genuine inland birds from central Europe and (largely) not the coastal birds moving inland. Sadly, this means that efforts by the RSPB, WWT and BTO to educate everyone have often fallen on deaf ears.

What concerns me most is that concessions were made back in 2005 and now the angling bodies are asking for more and it feels like give an inch and they will take a mile. Extending from this and part of me thinks that the people at the top already know what they are doing and it is a calculated way of showing that they are actively working for all angling interests rather than a genuine issue of concern. After all, it begins with cormorants, extends to goosander but wqhere does it end? Biologically speaking, herons, grebes and ospreys all take fish so are indistinct from cormorants and goosanders. Therefore the question is whether this is all bluster from people who should and probably do know better or is it the thin end of a wedge?

Given that they are organising fund-raising events to raise funds for a lobbyist, have a website and have someone managing their finances they seem to be taking it a bit seriously for bluster Ian. As mentioned above the Chairman's statement was extremely revealing.

Rare Visitor said:

Given that they are organising fund-raising events to raise funds for a lobbyist, have a website and have someone managing their finances they seem to be taking it a bit seriously for bluster Ian. As mentioned above the Chairman's statement was extremely revealing.

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Apologies Alan, I had not meant it to sound like we should just ignore the matter but it is true to say that stuff like this has been in angling magazines for years. This makes me slightly sceptical about whether they expect their special pleadings to be heard irrespective about just how much they are seen to be doing.

The thing about the cormorant cull quota was that it was raised because of calls for protection where fish were being farmed. In other words, as a protection against stock losses. DEFRA did a tremendous job in making sure enough safeguards were in place to prevent cormorants accidentally being treated like a General License species such as the fisheries having to show that they had employed deterrents and other non-lethal measures. Nevertheless, the quota is 3,000 birds per year if all the licenses are issued and this would be extremely serious to the cormorant population if it were sustained every year. The truth is, the number of licenses is still around the original level (1,200) from what I can gather and this means several things - 1, the extra quota was not needed in the first place; 2, deterrents are effective; 3, deterrents are not being employed so a given fishery is not granted its licenses. The chairman will know all of this but given what I said about how cormorants have got into lore, he can make a statement knowing that everyone will start wringing their hands in anticipation.

Note: If it is difficult to understand poult losses to common buzzards, I imagine it would be almost impossible to know what percentage of fish fry are taken by fish-eating birds. Even more so if we are to understand if it is the farmed species that are being taken. In this regard, I just cannot see how the science would ever support these calls.

Ian,

The other thing that strikes me is that with the decline in Goosanders in the south over recent times I would imagine that there are a lot of younger anglers out there who have never seen one or those with a few more years under their belt would likely not recall the last they encountered eating their fish stocks - certainly on rivers and smaller lakes.

Robin Edwards said:

Ian,

The other thing that strikes me is that with the decline in Goosanders in the south over recent times I would imagine that there are a lot of younger anglers out there who have never seen one or those with a few more years under their belt would likely not recall the last they encountered eating their fish stocks - certainly on rivers and smaller lakes.

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Hi Robin,

Nice point and I admit that I had not thought about it from this perspective. The range expansion in recent years has mainly been in in northern England, Wales and the Midlands so it is difficult to see how the species could be a national problem.