The R.H.S. has somehow got it into its head that our gardens should be ‘havens for wildlife’. When I saw a fox hopping from the street over the wall into someone’s garden last night I wondered if this is what they mean. I’m not desperate to welcome urban foxes into my garden, and I can’t picture any gardeners who would. The word vermin seems to have been bunny-hugged out of the language.
89.4 percent of England, and 93 percent of Britain, is rural (or at least not urban). In Wales the figure is 96 per cent, and in Scotland, of course, almost everything. The idea that large wild creatures be allowed, let alone encouraged to scavenge in our crowded towns is absurd. We will never get rid of grey squirrels, whatever the evidence against them. It is not easy to see how we will get rid of urban foxes either.
