In his critique of this site at www.spaceforum.co.uk/killing, Angus Macmillan reproduces yet again the letter I dealt with on the "Response to a response" page. It has also been featured on the Animal Aid website; so I sent them this email in response (based on the web page you have just read):
Until the autumn of 2001, I was librarian at the Woodland Trust, and
although I am no longer connected with the organisation, I remain resentful
of Angus Macmillan's campaign against it (as exemplified in the letter you
reproduce on your website at
You have actually compounded the problem by your introduction to the letter:
"do 'conservation' and 'deer management' interests keep their numbers
artificially high...?" This implies that conservation bodies such as the
Woodland Trust keep deer numbers artificially high, which they do not,
although many deer managers, who probably are to an extent guilty as
charged, will no doubt claim that they too are "conservationists" for this
very reason.
Within the letter there are numerous inaccuracies and important omissions.
For example, it is pertinent to know that one reason why wolves were hunted
to extinction in Britain (a process mostly complete far more than 350 years
ago) is because they interfered with royal and aristocratic hunting
interests in the Middle Ages- i.e. deer populations were subsequently kept
down by human beings; not, for the most part, by nature (and certainly not
by any "balance of nature"). In England, populations of deer species which
are not commercially hunted, such as Muntjac [see below], are rising very fast- and in
Scotland the hunters' nanny the Deer Commission wants a drastic reduction in
the deer population. The UK-wide population rise of the past 50-60 years
(unlike the equally dramatic rise in Scotland in the 19th century after new
breeding stock was imported by hunting interests) is indeed partly due to
the work of conservationists in providing improved habitats- but probably
the biggest single factor is a natural one- climate change. Milder, shorter
winters mean more food and less cold for the deer, so more survive.
Mr Macmillan is good at turning co-operation into conspiracy (ironic as he
has allied himself, for purposes unconnected with the anti-culling campaign,
with "People Too", the Scottish equivalent of the Countryside Alliance [see below]). In
this letter, the suggestion that there's a financial link via the Government
assumes that all deer culling by conservation landowners is done to protect
tree planting- in reality, of course, overgrazing by any animal is bad news
for most plants, not just trees, and culls can happen in any sort of habitat
that's under such a threat.
Similarly, he takes the fact that deer population control has to be done on
a co-operative basis (because they "know no boundaries") and turns it into
"covert allegiances". Yes the conservation landowners have to co-operate
with the hunting/stalking landowners, but they're in a lose/lose situation,
because the deer are also active participants in this situation, and they
just won't co-operate at all. Individual deer may be losers, but deer
populations, at the moment, are very clear winners, at considerable cost to
plants and other less assertive creatures.
[Mr Macmillan, to whom Animal Aid forwarded my email despite not replying to me, has pointed out that People Too is quite separate from the Countryside Alliance. The Countryside Alliance has its own Scottish organisation, which he vehemently opposes as its campaigns specifically include the preservation of activities like fox-hunting. People Too, although it has hunters and deer-estate owners among its members, merely campaigns for "the people of rural Scotland to enjoy the freedom to live, develop and change as they, not the central authorities, see fit", which does not necessarily include hunting or deer stalking at all, despite the views of its founder as quoted in my "response to a response".
He also corrected my claim that Muntjac are not hunted. Some shooting centres now offer the opportunity to kill muntjac, possibly because they are not subject to a "close season". It should still be borne in mind, though, that shooting is much more localised in England (particularly the Muntjac stronghold of south-east England) than in Scotland.]
Mr Macmillan also repeats his claim that the co-operative Deer Management Groups in Scotland are covert because their membership is not known to outsiders. Nor, as I have already pointed out, are the memberships of most other bodies except those elected by the public. The Deer Management Groups are co-operative arrangements between landowners for the control of deer on their own land, not public bodies like the local Council.
His summing-up, logically enough, re-iterates many of his basic points- all directed at the Woodland Trust. No mention of the fact that the acivities he criticises are a tiny part of what the W.T. has done over the years of his campaign (as a visit to your nearest Trust woodland will show). No mention of the fact that the Woodland Trust is not alone in such activities, even among conservation landowners, because they are all part of the reality of large-scale land management (and probably a smaller part for the W.T. than for most others). No mention even of the fact that the Trust's patron, Lord Lichfield, firmly associated with the shooting lifestyle, is also a committed countryside conservationist, to whom many animals probably owe their very existence.
So much negativity about one organisation from Mr Macmillan- but apparently not the slightest willingness to use his considerable resources to find alternative ways of achieving equivalent conservation gains...
Finally- Mr Macmillan has described what I have written on the "response to a response" page as "pedantry" (and again as "ramblings"). He's entitled to his opinion, but I would suggest (for the umpteenth time) that when confronted by attempts to present unbiased truth he is rather at a loss, and has to resort to cheap jibes.