Betty evicted from Defra

Hello Betty Fans,  After three years me and my family have been evicted from Defra Marsham Street .  My cubs can no longer frolic on the grass and Mary has nowhere to sit. This is how things used to be just a couple of weeks ago:

And now the Marsham Street lawn is devoid of wildlife. 

Worse is that all the security staff who were my friends have been told not to talk to me so I get quite lonely on my Thursday vigil. 

This is what happened last Thursday.  The nice young security Human who asked me to leave said he thought it was something to do with Covid19, which was clearly silly.  Mary said she wouldn't move until the head of security asked her to move.  The head of Security is called Andy and finally came out and she said the security services wanted me to move.  Mary said that was rubbish because the Chief Constable or Inspector or someone else very important had recently said I could stay .  

Mary asked Andy what the real reason was but he wouldn't say.  Perhaps it is no coincidence that Mary challenged George Eustice, the Secretary of State for Killing Badgers (SSKB) two weeks ago.  If you read my last blog you will know Mary had a word with him and asked him why he was killing Badgers and not just vaccinating Cows?  Clearly he didn't like being challenged over his wicked illogical policy.

Anyway, we have moved away from the entrance and are now on the pavement outside which means we are even more obvious to passing Public and Cars and Buses and they wave at us.  But we do miss our Security Staff friends who look very uncomfortable now.  One of them, who will remain nameless, said he was so sorry because I was never any trouble and always kept out of the way of any other protests.  Last year I was called " A magnet for Trouble" but I am just standing and waving and saying hello.

Since I wrote my last Betty Blog George Eustice has announced the killing of around 70,000 of my Badger friends this autumn.  They have already started killing them.  It is so so wrong.  Here is a sign that was found in one area. 

The cry of despair from animal lovers when the announcement of the Kill-Cull was made could probably be heard throughout the universe.  When Mary heard it on the news when she was in bed she screamed so loudly that her cat Rufus shot off the bed as if jet propelled and hid under a piece of bubble wrap which always helps his anxiety

Mary was so upset and sat up all night writing letters to Farming Today, the BBC Today programme, The Times, and everyone else she could think of. After our initial rage we settled into despair.  I took to my sett and Mary took to her bed with her cats. But we are not easily beaten and we will never give up.  There was a question in the House of Parly Ment this week about when the  Kill-Cull would be phased out and it looks as if Defra intends to kill us Badgers for at least ten more years.  So me and Mary will be standing outside Defra when she is very very old. She will be 66 next week and so a pensioner.  I hope one of my cubs will take over from me because I will not live that long.  I will ask young Boris; he will do it for his sister Bryony who was shot 2 years ago

We saw George Eustice this week and he said hello and gave his sickly triumphant smile.  Mary is looking for ways to stop the cull so she went on the Dark Web to look for a contract killer to deal with the SSKB. I have never heard about the Dark Web and thought it meant the really big spider web in the back of her old shed, but Mary explained that the Dark Web is a place where illegal or immoral stuff happens.  Do you know, it would only cost around £15,000 to kill George Eustice.  Mary said she is planning to set up a Go Fund Me page.  I am not sure if she is joking....

Last week at Defra I had company which was a good thing because Mary was in no state to look after me.  The company was called Neill who came with us on the train the silver tube.  He is a vegan and ate vegan cheesecake from Caffe Nero in Marsham Street.  Mary was pleased to have him along for when she was very upset and I was relieved because in our state there was a distinct possibility that we would leave some of the cubs behind. 

Mary and I went to Somerset on Saturday.  In Somerset they used to have lots of Badgers and even the buses are named after us.  Here is a picture to prove it. 

Sadly a lot of the Badgers in Somerset have been killed in the Kill-Cull. Perhaps one day the only Badgers in Somerset will be the drawings on the buses. I had to hide in Mary's bag in  Weston Super Mare in case the wicked Shooters with flash-bang sticks killed me.

We went to there to see Mary's ancient Mother. She is nearly 90 and lives in a house for Hupeople who have mislaid bits of their brains.  She is more like a Badger now because she takes each day as it comes and doesn't want anything except to have nice food and be warm and comfortable. She doesn't want the things Hupeople often want such as clothes and jewels and handbags and cars and ornaments.  She is very happy and healthy and loves to hear about Badgers and Chickens. She is happy because she has found a reason to get up in the morning.  Lots of Hupeople lost that reason during the Covid  Lock Up and became very depressed.  What saved her was finding  a broom, not to fly on but to sweep with.  All day she is found to be sweeping her community home and the garden.  Mary thinks there is some deep significance in this to do with sweeping away and putting right all the sad and dark things in her life.  I think she just enjoys making everything clean and tidy.  We badgers do that; regularly cleaning out our tunnels so they are lovely and fresh.

Two other bits of news, one sad and one happy.  Last week Buttercup the Chicken had to be put to sleep because she had a big growth in her tummy .  Lots of Chickens get those because of all the eggs they grow inside them. Mary's eyes leaked a bit, but she is getting used to Chickens dying because their little bodies are pretty worn out by the time they get rescued by Mary.  

Mary's good news is that the 2 sick Fox Cubs she rescued are now better and have been released into the wild.  They have been released away from Mary's house so that Nick the evil gamekeeper won't shoot them. He shot sixteen foxes the other year including 11 cubs who used to play in Mary's garden. The rescued cubs  have gone into the countryside where there isn't a shoot. 

Mary has one more sick cub to catch and get treated for mange, but we heard rifle shots last night so Nick might have already killed her.  Mary is very worried about me because some Hupeople are killing Badgers in non Kill-Cull areas and then taking them down to the Kill-Cull areas and getting the money for them. She was out looking for me last night when she heard the shots.  

If you are out and about in the countryside in the dawn and dusk you will probably see lots of Deer now.  They are busy mating.  They get so excited and they even run around in daylight so you need to be very careful because they are too aroused to even notice cars.  Over the summer me and Mary have been watching the male Fallow Deer, called Bucks,  grow trees on their heads.  What a waste of energy, not only all the effort of growing them but then carrying them around for months.  And they they bang them together fighting over Does.  The Does just look on bemused.

I will finish my short and quite sad blog showing a video Mary took of me and my Fallow Deer friend Fred when his antler trees were growing.  You should see Fred's antlers now; they are huge. I will keep well out of his way until he loses his antlers and starts behaving sensibly again

Night Night,

Betty. 🐾🐾🐾