SandyS. I lost my "townie" image of nature about 25years ago when I took a safari holiday to Tanzania to see the wildebeest migration. Travelling through herds and seeing literally thousands of them, mile after mile it suddenly occurred to me that every single animal I was seeing was going to face a horrendous death. They were either going to be eaten alive by lions, other big cats or crocodiles, or they were going to starve, slowly and painfully. A few lucky (?) ones might drown when crossing the river. I doubt if any die of diseases, when they weaken they are eaten. Then I understood that something similar would affect most wildlife, and that the animals we humanely slaughter for meat actually are saved from much worse.

It would amaze and amuse me that most ecology undergraduates at UEA (and I presume elsewhere) retained a rosy image of their subject. They knew about nature being "red in tooth and claw" but did not understand that aphorism in its full reality.

ACK
Red Deer can jump normal fences without much effort, careless ones sometimes get snagged with a leg caught between the top two wires. Deer fences are a reasonably effective barrier. I'm not sure of the effectiveness of signage, locals become blase and tourists will be unaware that what appears to be a lunar landscape covered in heather, grass, sphagnum moss and water can actually support a population of large wild animals.

Something else you find out when harvesting wild animals for meat all is not sweetness and light in nature. The hides from Red Deer are valueless due to scarring caused by maggot damage, other parasites are pretty common. Liver Fluke were the ones I worried about becoming infected with. Damaged ribs in stags were more common than you might think. So the townie view that wild animals have a wonderful life and farm animals don't is a bit off the mark.

I wasn't knocking your roads, just highlighting A Road diversity in the UK.

In the interest of stirring up old sh!t...The Toronto Star provided some entertainment

Among the environmentally concerned, playing fast and loose with the actualité is seen as a tactic that delivers good results quickly and it's easy to see why: environmental correspondents are almost to a man (or woman) signed up members of the green movement and can be relied upon to repeat even the grossest misrepresentations.

As a good example of truth-telling among the green fraternity, take a look at the column written by Catherine Porter in the Toronto Star, in which she describes a "run-in" her nine-year-old daughter had with sceptic writer Ezra Levant. Then take a look at Levant's video response

Unbelievable.

and let's not ask Dr.Susan Crockford about polar bears. No, let's ask an alarmist.

But the story also included the considerably more definitive opinion of Ian Stirling, an emeritus research scientist with Environment Canada and adjunct professor at the University of Alberta: “I think it’s 99-per-cent sure that it’s going to turn out to be a hybrid,” he said.

Now we know for certain. It’s not a hybrid so Stirling’s speculation was 100 per cent wrong. I don’t think that means that the Star’s initial report requires a correction. But I do believe our responsibility to readers and the public record does call for some means of updating this story to report what the important subsequent genetic tests have found

The Toronto Star is never wrong if the cause is right.

stewgreen 7:24 is all this missing water hiding, with the missing heat, at the bottom of the oceans? In Climate Science, only a lack of imagination limits what could be possible.