Quote Originally Posted by thanmuwa View Post
I agree that once introduced (which I too am in favour of), they are likely to be tenacious. Which leads me to wonder how on earth our allegedly more primitive ancestors managed to destroy whole populations of indigenous species? Scotland used to have the European Elk, wolf, brown bear, wild boar, beaver and lynx, birds of prey like the sea eagle and red kite and so on. Most of these were made extinct before guns even existed. I realise that landscape change was the main driver but even so it is an impressive feat to make so much extinct when we with our better technology and an even greater paucity of natural habitat can't even control grey squirrels!
Do you know I was thinking the very same thing! The thoughts I came up with are these.The rural population of Scotland were far closer to nature than today therefore they were more effective food gatherers; the methods used by our ancestors would make the modern day animal welfare crowd cringe; time, in the past, was not so much of an issue so waiting for your prey to come into range was not an issue; it comes as a surprise to the modern sportsman in the UK (the use of bow and arrow is illegal to take game with in the UK)that the bow and arrow is surprisingly effective; the modern day man made forests are far more dense than forests of old;health and safety was not an issue; and last but not least, hunger and clothing to keep warm and dry does concentrate the mind.Any other ideas?