Yesterday (Thursday) saw the untimely death of Bob Dearnley. (See News "Farmer Kills Himself" )
It seems he had become obsessed in a battle with his landlords, the council, The National Trust and The Environment Agency over is land being flooded. I didn't know the the man but from what I heard he just wanted to care for his rare breed animals and show them off to the public.
We all like the David & Golliath story, but It can be difficult to know when Goliath is going to win and when it is just best to give up something that you truely love. I'm not saying that anybody could or should have done anything different in this case as I don't know all the facts. On the surface it does appear that Goliath has one this time with some terrible consequences. It will be interesting to see the outcome of the coroners report.
What we should do in these difficult times is to keep that spirit that I've always known in farmers, to help each other out. That may be a difficult one at times because it takes a true friend to spot when someone truely needs help and to find the strength to tell them so. Even so some people find it difficult to accept help but at least you have tried.
Farmers may be bucking the recession trend but there is still plenty who are on the brink. Keep a look out for each other because farming can be a lonely business these days.
Yet again the spread of TB is progressing through the different species, it won't be long before it comes into Human population as Swine Flu is now. It's only a generation since it was eradicated from humans in this country.
I was reading last weeks FW (8th May) and the article about the pig herd infected. Now this weeks has 14 (yes Fourteen) different species infected with TB. Bovine TB Blog has some good points about the fact that the so called Badger Trust burrying it's head in the sand about this disease. It is a awful disease. No farmer would allow an animal to suffer in the way badgers must suffer with TB.
It is quite simple really, if there is not a cull of badgers soon then within ten years there will be no badgers for the badger trust to protect let alone the damage done to many other species of wildlife. It's not about cute stripy animals, I don't want to see a widespread cull, but it is too late. To little has been done for too long. Mass cull is the only way to control this now otherwise TB will become to badgers what Myxomatosis was to rabbits.