Albert Watkinson
Senior Member
The only sure thing I got out of the mail article is that Jb can blank like I do sometimes
Albert.
Albert.
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Could all those who know the details and outcomes of the project which Karen Twine undertook please put your hands up. The rest of you I can ignore until you understand what I am talking about.
which according to everyone had been ottered to extinction, yet not a single tagged fish was ottered during over two years of tracking...........
Has anyone got a link to Karen's study so we can all look at the scientific evidence she has?
Maybe a link to the new methods of catching barbel now they have learnt to avoid the old ones would help as well
Well, this is a post to get ones teeth into. Well done Mr Crook for having the nerve to go against the received wisdom and I welcome you to my world of the (hopefully) informed heretic.
It is not possible to review all the many excellent views put forward in a truly scientific manner as there really is no conclusive evidence either way. That will also ultimately apply the young ladies study as well when finally published.
What I would like people to consider is that many of us are brainwashed by an expression often used and that is “The Balance of Nature”. Somewhere in many people’s imagination there is a utopian world with no human beings on it where nature is allowed to take its course and there is true harmony in the world. The prey / predator equation is balanced and the rivers abound with fish of all species and the skies are full of birds (but no cormorants), in fact life abounds everywhere in an endless cycle free from human intervention and the greed and pollutants that man has wrought on the planet. In short a paradise ruined only by meddling humans.
This is of course complete and utter rubbish, and the balance of nature is a myth.
All species of animal and plant on this world are not in harmony but in a constant and never ending struggle for supremacy. As soon as conditions favour one species to the detriment of another then the numbers change. The driving factor usually climatic. The African rain forest has expanded and contracted over and over again during the millennia driven by climate. We think it possible that the dinosaurs became extinct due to climatic change that caused the global temperatures to plummet and favour the previously low population of creatures able to generate heat internally. As soon as the Giant Panda looks like its population is crashing then the conservationist are up in arms saying it must be saved; why? Creatures have gone extinct and new species taken their place since the beginning of life on the planet…..get used to it. Please also consider that we are just another species on the planet. We are not special, we are not God’s children, we are neither destroying nor saving the world, and our tenure on this planet is certainly not secure, as we could be wiped out by disease the same way the dodo was wiped out by humans.
All populations of every living thing on this world fluctuate through natural forces, nothing is ever constant……simples
Well, this is a post to get ones teeth into. Well done Mr Crook for having the nerve to go against the received wisdom and I welcome you to my world of the (hopefully) informed heretic.
It is not possible to review all the many excellent views put forward in a truly scientific manner as there really is no conclusive evidence either way. That will also ultimately apply the young ladies study as well when finally published.
What I would like people to consider is that many of us are brainwashed by an expression often used and that is “The Balance of Natureâ€. Somewhere in many people’s imagination there is a utopian world with no human beings on it where nature is allowed to take its course and there is true harmony in the world. The prey / predator equation is balanced and the rivers abound with fish of all species and the skies are full of birds (but no cormorants), in fact life abounds everywhere in an endless cycle free from human intervention and the greed and pollutants that man has wrought on the planet. In short a paradise ruined only by meddling humans.
This is of course complete and utter rubbish, and the balance of nature is a myth.
All species of animal and plant on this world are not in harmony but in a constant and never ending struggle for supremacy. As soon as conditions favour one species to the detriment of another then the numbers change. The driving factor usually climatic. The African rain forest has expanded and contracted over and over again during the millennia driven by climate. We think it possible that the dinosaurs became extinct due to climatic change that caused the global temperatures to plummet and favour the previously low population of creatures able to generate heat internally. As soon as the Giant Panda looks like its population is crashing then the conservationist are up in arms saying it must be saved; why? Creatures have gone extinct and new species taken their place since the beginning of life on the planet…..get used to it. Please also consider that we are just another species on the planet. We are not special, we are not God’s children, we are neither destroying nor saving the world, and our tenure on this planet is certainly not secure, as we could be wiped out by disease the same way the dodo was wiped out by humans.
All populations of every living thing on this world fluctuate through natural forces, nothing is ever constant……simples
Direct counting of otters is impossible due to their mobility, often secretive behaviour and largely nocturnal habit. Otter surveys are therefore based simply on presence and absence of otters as shown by field signs such as spraints (faeces) and footprints. It is not possible to use these data to estimate numbers, given the flexibility in the size of otter territories and the inability to distinguish between individuals using field signs. While the distribution and frequency of field signs is used as an indicator of the health of the population locally, any estimate of numbers would be highly speculative. Nevertheless, it is likely that there are several thousand otters present in England today.
For the first try this: http://www.theriverstrust.org/seminars/archive/coarse_fish/RT - Speaker 11 - Karen Twine.pdf
As for the second one no chance!
Darryl, thanks for the link, but, unfortunately the link does not give the full report, which I believe from other posts may not have been produced yet anyway.
It seems that there is further information in the Anglers Mail but I no longer subscribe as I found it a bit facile.
As for the barbel. I have only been barbel fishing for a few years so can only go on hearsay, however most experienced barbel anglers I have spoken to agree that the Loddon barbel are not catchable in the quantities they were seven or eight years ago. Are the Otters an easy scapegoat (if you will excuse the mixed metaphor ) or is the increase in perch numbers, pollution causing physiological changes, the weather, mink or any one of a dozen other reasons, who knows?
From what I have read of Karen's work it seems to be based upon a very small sample and, as this discussion shows, is open to question in a number of areas not least the fact that she hasn't found otters eating barbel and chub, which is a fact that has been seen and recorded innumerable times.
What I want, and I suspect a number of others also want, is not to know what hasn't happened but why there is a marked difference to what was happening in barbel fishing ten years ago. If we get this information and it exonerates the otter, so much the better. But until then we know there is one animal that eats fish that wasn't on our banks in numbers ten years ago so, for me, they stay top of the suspect list until we have proof that the problem lies elsewhere.