As hill walkers, how important is it for you to see our native wildlife flourish while out on the hill? Wildlife crime has increased 12% on last year with badger related crime up 66% and raptor persecution in Scotland doubling!!! Illegal trapping and snaring, poisoning, hare coursing, badger baiting and more goes on right under our noses. What do you think can be done to stop it? Increasing sentences for those found guilty would maybe work, but conviction rates are very, very low as its so hard to prove guilt!!! Would raising public awareness help towards reducing it? Do people know the difference between a legally and illegally set trap? Do you know who and how to contact the relevant authorities if you see something suspicious?
With climate change filling our news feeds, how do we continue to thrive as a species without killing our planet? The most common animal we see while out on the hill, is without a doubt, a sheep. We have 23 million sheep in the UK, leaving our uplands as an 'overgrazed' desert. Those 23 million sheep only account for less than 1% of our food in calorific terms. To produce just 4kg of beef has about the same carbon footprint as a flight from London to New York and back!!!!! Globally, we produce enough food to feed the population about 3 times over. We pay farmers subsidies to help them!! Why cant we pay them the same subsidies to "rewild" some of their land. Planting trees, looking after water courses, encouraging more wildlife. This would help climate control and also give us hill walkers a far more enjoyable day out. Stop draining our moorlands, reintroduction of beavers would help to prevent flooding downstream. Stop 'Muirburn' damaging our peat-lands and releasing massive amounts of locked in carbon back into the atmosphere.
Wouldn't it be amazing to walk our hills knowing that you are going to see golden eagles soaring above your heads, hen harriers skydancing trying to impress a potential mate, mad March hares 'boxing' at dawn, the sounds of skylark, cuckoo and curlew a common thing. Our rivers full of salmon and teeming with life. Foxes living happily without fear of the local hunt chasing them down. The list goes on.