If we continue to cull badgers when we can no longer be certain of the population numbers due to
widespread illegal killing, we are running a serious risk of eradication of the species from large areas of the UK.
To
kill the rats, people have resorted to poison, some of it
illegal, which has led to the
widespread deaths of cats and stoked official fears about soil pollution and the development of a «super rat,» immune to pesticides.