{"id":2377,"date":"2002-07-03T13:28:38","date_gmt":"2002-07-03T18:28:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=2377"},"modified":"2002-07-03T13:28:38","modified_gmt":"2002-07-03T18:28:38","slug":"beats_being_use","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/07\/03\/beats_being_use.html","title":{"rendered":"Beats being used for croquet balls"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back in 1974, a gardener brought four hedgehogs to the Scottish western isles of South Uist and Benbecula, to try and control pests.<\/p>\n

Since then, lacking any predation (duh), the population of hedgehogs has exploded. And now they’re decimating the native bird populations.<\/p>\n

So Scotish National Heritage has proposed exterminating them<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Animal rights organisations have reacted with horror to SNH’s proposals. “It was humans who disrupted the ecological balance of Uist in the first place. We now have a responsibility to all of the islands’ inhabitants to find an effective, respectful and non-lethal solution,” argues Ross Minett from Advocates for Animals in Edinburgh.<\/p>\n

Um, perhaps if the hedgehogs were respectful toward the other inhabitants of the island, it wouldn’t be a problem.<\/p>\n

And, yes, Mr. Minett is right that this problem was caused by humans. But, unfortunately, it needs to be cleaned up by humans, too. And simply relocating all the hedgehogs somewhere else doesn’t make any sense (and would, of course, be highly traumatic to the animals), since either they would continue to overpopulate, or would fall prey to predators in the location. <\/p>\n

A spot of poison gas (or whatever “humane lethal control” is chosen), or being torn to pieces by a fox? Decisions, decisions.<\/p>\n

(Via Quiddity<\/a>)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back in 1974, a gardener brought four hedgehogs to the Scottish western isles of South Uist and Benbecula, to try and control pests. Since then, lacking any predation (duh), the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-science"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":6957,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/11\/23\/two_by_two.html","url_meta":{"origin":2377,"position":0},"title":"Two by two","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 23-Nov-04 10:48am","format":false,"excerpt":"Katherine so does not need more stuffed animals, and yet ... this site has front-page listings for everything from red pandas to tapirs to hedgehogs to javelinas. Not to mention...","rel":"","context":"In "Parenting"","block_context":{"text":"Parenting","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/personal\/parenting"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":26175,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/02\/08\/considering-that-one-might-be-wrong.html","url_meta":{"origin":2377,"position":1},"title":"Considering that one might be wrong","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 8-Feb-12 9:11am","format":false,"excerpt":"It seems to me that the healthy heart of skepticism is accepting that I might be wrong, and you might be wrong, and while we may have to pragmatically accept things that are told to us (my mechanic, who knows far more about cars than I do, assures me my\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":41869,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/04\/29\/is-it-time-for-a-geopolitical-divorce-with-israel.html","url_meta":{"origin":2377,"position":2},"title":"Is it time for a geopolitical divorce with Israel?","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 29-Apr-14 10:58pm","format":false,"excerpt":"It's not often the case, but I agree with pretty much everything Andrew Sullivan writes here -- the good, the bad, and the ugly. The problem is, there are no pure white hats in the Arab\/Palestinian\/Israeli conflict, and even the lighter-colored hats have gotten pretty dusty and dingy. But it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":19474,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2010\/12\/07\/unblogged-bits-tue-7-dec-10-2230.html","url_meta":{"origin":2377,"position":3},"title":"Unblogged Bits (Tue. 7-Dec-10 2230)","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 7-Dec-10 10:30pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Links (most recent first) that caught my eye, but did not warrant full-blown blog entries .... Report: Wikileaks cables show Texas company \"helped pimp little boys to stoned Afghan cops\" - Boing Boing - But we should, of course, ignore this and obsess instead about Assange's sex life. Cynical-C |\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Big Business"","block_context":{"text":"Big Business","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/big-business"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":132383,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/12\/18\/rogue-ones-that-never-were.html","url_meta":{"origin":2377,"position":4},"title":""Rogue One"s That Never Were","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 18-Dec-16 11:22pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Okay, I would need to rewatch the movie again (please), but ... is it my imagination, or are about half the scenes in the first teaser-trailer below not actually in the finished film?I know they did a lot of reshooting (and I'm not displeased with the result), but a lot\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6731,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2005\/01\/11\/disclaimer_stic.html","url_meta":{"origin":2377,"position":5},"title":"Disclaimer stickers","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 11-Jan-05 11:53am","format":false,"excerpt":"In keeping with the infamously goofball Cobb County, Georgia, disclaimer stickers to be put on science books that mention (gasp) evolution, here's a collection of several more stickers that you...","rel":"","context":"In "Science & Nature"","block_context":{"text":"Science & Nature","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/science"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2377\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}