Ms Fionnuala Tyrell:

Most of the topics have been very comprehensively covered. I agree with most of what was said. Deputy Fitzmaurice asked how much wire it takes to keep a deer out, and he referred to the three strands in Coillte not working. A five-strand high of high-voltage electric fence is about what will work. That is what is on our farm at the moment and it is the only thing that has worked for the past while.

Regarding the vaccination of badgers, it is hit and miss. You can be lucky and have somebody appointed to deal with the badgers in your area who is very astute and very good at checking earths and that. I am aware of one school of thought which claims if the native badgers are taken out of an earth and it is left empty, other badgers will move in and your animals will have no immunity to any disease they are catching.

Let me refer to an incident on our own farm. There was an empty earth on land next door to us and a forest was being clear-felled but the correct due diligence work was not done. I am not blaming the people cutting the trees but the area with the earth was not marked off. The earths are all mapped and it is known where they are but the person from the wildlife service dealing with the forestry did not keep the recommended perimeter around the earth in question. Consequently, the tracks were seen, the badgers moved to us and we had an outbreak shortly afterwards. That was the last one we had. We are lucky enough that the guys checking on the badgers in our area come around regularly. Prior to that, it was very hit and miss.

All of this needs co-ordination. This is why we keep saying somebody has to co-ordinate all the efforts such that everyone will be working in tandem. There is no point in having one agency dealing with badgers, another dealing with deer and another dealing with something else. They need to come under the one umbrella. The problem affects everybody in the country, either through disease, gardens being dug up or cars being wrecked. Full co-operation is needed from everybody.