10 ms·
> and Scotland's ecology isn't obviously in need of them. If you've visited Scotland's countryside, you might have noticed the sweeping vistas of grassy green
by theptip 6y ago
> and Scotland's ecology isn't obviously in need of them.
If you've visited Scotland's countryside, you might have noticed the sweeping vistas of grassy green fields, yellow bushy marshes, and purple heather -- and a conspicuous absence of any trees. It's a very unnatural landscape, historically speaking.
Scotland (along with the rest of the UK) cut down most of their old growth forests in the industrial revolution, and also eliminated all of the large predators. As a result, the wild deer population is out of control, and even with management (read: stalking wild deer) there are so many deer that it's impossible to simply plant trees and have them reforest; deer will eat and destroy the saplings before they can mature.
This arrests the natural reforestation that would occur over time, and makes even managed projects expensive -- for example here's a charity that is working on reforesting a plot of land in Scotland: https://bordersforesttrust.org/places/wild-heart/carrifran-wildwood/ https://bordersforesttrust.org/places/wild-heart/carrifran-w.... They had to hire someone to kill deer on their land to protect the new trees, even after expensive plastic casings.
That's a long-winded bit of context, but the summarized argument for re-introducing large predators is that they would help to control the damaging and out-of-balance wild deer population, reducing the amount of human intervention required, and allowing the countryside to revert back to its natural forested state.
- sandworm101 6y agoDeer, and rabbits. Lynx are designed to eat rabbits.
- pacaro 6y agoLynx are native to Scotland, I don't believe that rabbits are, they are usually considered to have been introduced by the Normans in the 12th century. According to the wikipedia article the lynx appears to have a pretty varied diet
- pvaldes 6y agoIn the case of eurasian lynx replace 'rabbit' by 'hare' and you got it. They eat also a lot of roe deer and maybe a few (very young) red deer.
- Scarblac 6y agoWhy wouldn't rabbits be native? It's not so long ago that Great Britain was connected to mainland Europe, so I'd think that most of the same animals would be present both sides of the North Sea.
- pacaro 6y agoEuropean Rabbits are native to the iberian peninsula and southern France, they were introduced to the British Isles either by the Romans or the Normans. There's more information about this on the Wikipedia article https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_rabbit https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_rabbit
- rozab 6y agoThe Caledonian Forest disappeared long before the Industrial Revolution: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caledonian_Forest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caledonian_Forest >An examination of the earliest maps of Scotland suggests that the extent of the Caledonian Forest remnants has changed little since 1600.
- HarryHirsch 6y agoNo surprise there, the bear became extinct in the British Isles by the 10th century.
- ethbr0 6y agoBe that as it may, the ancient world definitely went through a lot of trees, when they were the principle source of energy. To put that in some perspective, a Roman legion (roughly 5,000 men) in the Late Republic might have carried into battle around 44,000kg (c. 48.5 tons) of iron – not counting pots, fittings, picks, shovels and other tools we know they used. That iron equipment in turn might represent the mining of around 541,200kg (c. 600 tons) of ore, smelted with 642,400kg (c. 710 tons) of charcoal, made from 4,620,000kg (c. 5,100 tons) of wood. Cutting the wood and making the charcoal alone, from our figures above, might represent something like (I am assuming our charcoal-burners are working in teams) 80,000 man-days of labor. For one legion. https://acoup.blog/2020/09/25/collections-iron-how-did-they-make-it-part-ii-trees-for-blooms/ https://acoup.blog/2020/09/25/collections-iron-how-did-they-...
- Leherenn 6y agoI think his point was that in Europe, most deforestation happened much earlier than the industrial revolution, and he wanted to clear the relatively common misconception that everything was green until the industrial revolution.
- rozab 6y agoRight! But as I understand it, most of this wood was from managed forest, which allowed for much more efficient harvesting and also allowed for controlling various qualities of the wood. Lindybeige has a good video on the topic. It doesn't quite go back to Roman times though. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVPUFMwm73Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVPUFMwm73Y
- mNovak 6y agoDeer seem to be a problem everywhere. In the US midwest they're all over the place.
- jessaustin 6y agoCrossbows are easy to use and don't alarm neighbors. Venison is delicious and nutritious. Butchering a deer is a fun and educational project for the whole family, and requires very little equipment: knives and a big table, plus a tree limb and some rope for the initial skinning. This is yet another problem that people could solve for themselves, if enough of them cared to do so.
- eloff 6y ago> Butchering a deer is a fun and educational project for the whole family I would find it gross and traumatic to the point where I might lose my lunch. I eat meat, but if I had to butcher my own meat I'd go vegetarian. I like your solution though, I'm surprised that the market doesn't just solve the problem to the point where we're worried about there being too few deer - is hunting limited or is there not enough demand for venison?
- hkarthik 6y agoI suspect that hunting, field dressing, and butchering lost their mainstream appeal soon after industrialization. It's one thing to do these things once a month on a hunting trip for leisure versus doing it nearly every week in order to maintain your property or community. It's like the difference between gardening as a hobby versus farming as a lifestyle. The amount of hunting needed to control the deer population and the population of able bodied and sufficiently interested hunters simply doesn't scale properly in most communities. Predators who hunt as their main purpose and niche in life seems like a more viable solution if we determine how to keep the livestock predation to an acceptable level.
- NikolaeVarius 6y agoThats a side effect of a life sheltered from nature. I'm a city boy, but I was sent to the countryside every once in a while to learn how to kill and butcher animals so I could respect what nature has given us.
- jfk13 6y agoApparently the covid pandemic has exacerbated this issue, because a lot of wild venison goes to the restaurant trade, and that market pretty much disappeared. Result: more deer overpopulation and damage to ecosystems.
- DonaldFisk 6y ago"Something most be done. This is something. Therefore, this must be done." is a well-known logical fallacy. Introducing non-native species can have unexpected consequences. Though lynxes do prey on deer, they also prey on birds and smaller mammals, which would put them in competition with Scottish wildcats, which are endangered. We can't be sure that introducing lynxes won't drive Scottish wildcats to extinction. There are other solutions to the problem you mention. Deer can be shot and the venison sold in supermarkets and other outlets (restaurants, once COVID-19 is under control). This already happens, albeit on a small scale. Venison could also be exported but there's now a lot of extra paperwork which needs to be done now that we've left the EU.
- eloff 6y agoLynx are native to Scotland. They're simply being reintroduced.
- DonaldFisk 6y agoWere native. About 500 years ago. Ecosystems change. Bears and wolves were also native to Scotland once but we'd think twice about reintroducing them.
- colechristensen 6y agoIn the US several regions have reintroduced or supported nearly extinct populations of wolves.
- pvaldes 6y agoThere are alive trees in UK that are more than 500 years old. Think about it.
- peteretep 6y agoI have thought about it — on your advice — and it is entirely unclear what the actual point you’re making is
- s1artibartfast 6y agoTanks! long winded context is the best context
- brailsafe 6y agoI thought sheep were the culprit here.
- andrewflnr 6y agoLynx are not large predators. I can't see them making a dent in the deer population. Ed: I stand corrected, I guess.
- SllX 6y agoApparently they hunt and kill deer and reindeer in Finland.[1] I would have thought the same but seeing your comment prompted me to do a search. Found a handful of YouTube vids claiming the featured Lynx killed the deer they were recording, but none of the first 5 I checked featured a Lynx performing the kill, only the eating. [1] http://www.largecarnivores.fi/species/lynx/lynxs-diet-and-hunting-behaviour.html http://www.largecarnivores.fi/species/lynx/lynxs-diet-and-hu...
- maxerickson 6y agoHow much of the herd to they kill each year? Google says there are 100,000 deer, 200,000 reindeer and ~1200 lynx. So there's enough that they could make a difference (but it matters a lot how often they would take a deer).
- SllX 6y agoTurns out we suck at engineering ecology: about the best we can do is introduce a wild population into conditions we think they’ll survive and let nature take its course. Prey and predators eventually reach their own sort of equilibrium if we leave them to it, absent factors which are severely detrimental to either. And this isn’t a deer extermination project either: it’s a lynx reintroduction project.
- peanut_merchant 6y agoThere is an excellent documentary that covers a broad range of perspectives on this issue called "The Cull - Scotland's deer dilemma" https://thecullfilm.com/ https://thecullfilm.com/ As someone born and raised in the highlands, I found it well balanced as well as providing a realistic depiction of the Highland winter.
- maxerickson 6y agoNorthern Michigan has lots of trees, but deer browsing has a big impact on what species regenerate (so for instance, there is little young cedar). We have a few cougars and wolves and a pretty robust hunting season and it doesn't make much in the way of a difference.
- canadianfella 6y agoDoes stalking mean hunting?