Row over potential cull of Dartmoor hill ponies

Row over potential cull of Dartmoor hill ponies20 minutes agoShareSaveAdd as preferred on GoogleBBCDowning Street has said the animals are safe under the Labour GovernmentA row is growing over the potential cull of Dartmoor's hill ponies as campaigners warn Natural England's approach to conserving the landscape could "devastate" the endangered breed.Campaigners said requirements to cut livestock grazing on the moor's commons, under new contracts from the government's conservation agency, could lead to the removal - and likely cull - of up to 90% hill ponies.Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch described it as "total madness".Natural England insisted it wanted to maintain numbers of the semi-wild ponies on the moor "for generations to come", while a Downing Street spokeswoman said the Labour government would not allow a cull and insisted the animals were safe.Dartmoor hill ponies have been on the landscape for 4,500 years but numbers have declined - there were 6,000 on Dartmoor 25 years ago but now there are less than 1,000. Natural England is including the ponies in livestock counts under its new moorland agri-environmental schemes that provide payments for farmers for grazing upland in ways that benefit nature.Campaigners warned the new schemes would cut livestock, including hill ponies, by 56% to 89%.They also said previous cuts – which the ponies were protected from in the past – had not boosted biodiversity on Dartmoor.'Devastating'Dartmoor Hill Pony Association said the move would force commoners, who have rights to put livestock on the commons of the moor, to choose between commercial sheep and cattle, and the ponies for which they have traditionally been guardians.The loss of hill ponies would be damaging for the biodiversity of the landscape, as they are the best grazer of the "monoculture" Molinia grass that has come to dominate the moor, Joss Hibbs, secretary of the DHPA which represents co...