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Defra minister admits Christmas dinners could be hit after millions of turkeys are culled

A Defra minister has admitted that Christmas dinner could be affected as millions of turkeys and other birds are culled amid avian flu outbreak.

Lord Benyon told the House of Lords that he could not guarantee the traditional turkey lunch would not be affected by the epidemic, but insisted there is no need to panic buy.

He sought to reassure the public that the UK has a 'resilient supply chain' that can cope with such an outbreak.

The international environment minister said: 'We are seeing increasing number of turkeys falling prey to this disease, but at the moment, the situation for Christmas turkeys is there or thereabouts OK.

'But I wouldn't like to predict, if it carried on at the current rate, there wouldn't be some impact.'

The UK produces roughly 11million turkeys every year, but almost a third of those have been culled due to the spread of the highly pathogenic H5N1 virus strain in 2022© Provided by Daily Mail

From November 7, all birdkeepers in Britain must follow strict measures by law to protect flocks from bird flu, including keeping free range birds in fenced areas and stringent biosecurity for staff on farms. The map shows the prevention zone (red), where mandatory housing is already in place (purple) and the areas under a 10km surveillance zone (yellow)© Provided by Daily Mail

He admitted that the sheer number of birds that have been culled or died 'can't not have an effect on the supply chain'.

That said, he emphasised: 'It is a resilient supply chain, there are alternatives that can come from elsewhere, but we want to make sure people are eating healthy, British-reared turkeys....

There's no need, there's absolutely no need for people to rush out and panic buy.

'This is a very resilient supply chain and we are talking to retailers and others regularly and keeping them informed as well.'

Baroness Hayman, who served as shadow Defra secretary from 2017 to 2019, also warned of the trouble ahead.

She said: 'We understand the outbreak has spread at a much faster rate this year and that we are six weeks ahead of where we were this time last year.

'Turkey and geese farmers have warned that if the situation is not resolved then we could face severe shortages over Christmas.'

The Government has taken several steps to tackle the UK's largest ever outbreak of avian influenza.

While they have focused on biosecurity, they are also now enforcing a housing order in England, where poultry are to be kept inside, from November 7.

They are also allowing farmers to slaughter their turkeys early, freeze and then defrost and sell as fresh later in the year, and are also offered farmers compensation from the outset of a planned cull instead of the end.

Bird flu outbreak: Everything you need to know

Reference: Daily Mail: Stewart Carr For Mailonline 

Man who filmed himself having sex with his black Labrador spared prison

Man who filmed himself having sex with his black Labrador spared prisonA man who filmed himself committing bestiality with his pet dog has avoided jail. A presiding judge said Peter Edwards, 36, would likely face taunts and violence from other inmates after he filmed himself abusing his dog Max. Courts heard that he had encouraged or allowed another man, Jonathan Barton, to continue the abuse.

Edwards has received a five-year sexual harm prevention order that bans him from staying alone with a dog.

Police found video footage on his phone and computer after receiving a tip-off and launching an investigation.

Bournemouth Crown Court heard that investigators also found photos and videos of child pornography and extreme pornography involving animals.

Officers later discovered some of the images showed him sexually abusing his black Labrador.

Handing down the prevention order, Judge Stephen Climie branded the acts "bizarre and utterly depraved" but stopped short of sending Edwards to prison.

He said his "peculiarities" may have made him a target of other prisoners.

Judge Climie said: "Because of your peculiarities, I don't mean that in an offensive manner, you would be highly vulnerable as a prisoner.

"You would be subjected not just to taunting but also some degree of violence from other inmates and that would achieve very little in rehabilitating you."

"Being dealt with in the community gives a real prospect of you never attending a courtroom again."

Courts heard Edwards, of South Perrott, Dorset, was autistic and highly intelligent but exhibited "bizarre attitudes and behaviours".

Edwards pleaded guilty to two offences of sexual intercourse with an animal, one count of encourage or assist with the commission of an offence, three counts of making indecent image of a child and three counts of possessing extreme pornographic images.

A three-year community order handed down by Judge Climie came with conditions to complete up to 60 rehabilitation activity days and observe a three-month curfew between 8am and 6pm.

And a five-year criminal behaviour order will prohibit Edwards from owning, possessing or looking after a dog while not in the company of its owner.

A sexual harm prevention order will keep Edwards' name on the sex offenders' register for five years.

Judge Climie warned that breaching these orders would land Edwards back in court.

He would face a starting sentence of 21 months in prison. 

Reference: Daily Express: Liam Doyle 

Beagle gives birth to world’s first cloned Arctic wolf

Fluffy and wide-eyed, Maya the Arctic wolf looks like an entirely normal puppy.

Yet she was cloned in a Beijing lab and born from a surrogate Beagle mother, in a scientific first that could help save endangered species across the globe.

It is a similar technique that was used to create Dolly the Sheep, in Scotland in 1996. 

Scientists took skin cells from a 16-year-old female wolf living at Harbin Polarland in north-east China, and inserted them into an egg from the beagle, which had been stripped of its contents. 

The egg and donor cells fused to form an embryo which was then transplanted back into the surrogate.

Maya was born in June, but researchers at Sinogene Biotechnology Co waited 100 days to check she was healthy before revealing her existence to the world. 

The team released video footage of her playing happily with her beagle mother. 

Mi Jidong, Sinogene’s general manager, said the birth was a “breakthrough in the protection and breeding of wild and endangered animals”. 

“It is the first case of its kind in the world,” he said. “After two years of painstaking efforts, the Arctic wolf was cloned successfully.

“From the start of the project in 2020 to the healthy birth of the wolf pup in June of this year, we have overcome many difficulties. Looking back, it's worth it.” 

The Arctic wolf, also known as the white wolf or polar wolf,  is a subspecies of the grey wolf, native to the Arctic tundra of North America and Greenland.

Although Arctic wolves are no longer listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List as an endangered species, the technique could be used to help other animals at risk of extinction, such as Mexican gray wolves and red wolves. 

The team created 85 embryos using dog eggs and skin cells and transferred them into seven beagle surrogates, as there were not enough female wolves in captivity for the trials.

Dogs and wolves share enough common DNA for the pregnancy not to be rejected. 

However, the pregnancies failed in six out of seven of the experiments, with only Maya being born successfully.

The wolf is now living with her surrogate mother at a Sinogene lab in Xuzhou, eastern China, and will soon be transferred to Harbin Polarland to join other Arctic wolves. A second cloned wolf is expected to be born in the coming weeks, the team said.

Chinese researchers said it would be impossible to release her into the wild because of a lack of socialisation with other wolves at an early age. 

However, the team is confident that the technique could be used to restore lost species or boost numbers in endangered animal populations. 

Maya's birth could pave the way for the reintroduction of extinct species - Sinogene Biotechnology© Sinogene Biotechnology

“Cloning technology provides a good entry point for the protection of endangered wild animals, which makes a great contribution to the protection of biodiversity,” said He Zhengming, Director of the Institute of Laboratory Animal Resources, China Academy of Food and Drug Control.

Several mammals have been cloned through a similar process, although researchers usually use surrogates of the same species. 

Many owners choose to ‘bring back’ dead pets through the technique, while several racing stables now clone champion horses to preserve their winning genes.

So far, only the Pyrenean ibex has been brought back from extinction using cloning, although the kid only survived for 10 minutes. 

The team at Sinogene first created 137 Arctic wolf embryos by joining together skin cells from the original Maya with eggs from dogs through the process known as somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT).

The wolf was carried to term by a beagle as a surrogate mother - Sinogene Biotechnology© Provided by The Telegraph

A total of 85 of these embryos were then transferred to seven beagle surrogates, chosen because there were not enough female wolves in captivity for the experiments. 

Fortunately, dogs and wolves share enough common DNA for the pregnancy to succeed. 

Just one of those transplanted embryos fully developed during pregnancy, resulting in the new Maya.

The wolf is now living with her surrogate mother at a Sinogene lab in Xuzhou, eastern China. She will soon be transferred to Harbin Polarland to join other Arctic wolves.

Sinogene announced a new partnership with the Beijing Wildlife Park to potentially clone other species in the near future. 

Gao Wei, the deputy manager of Beijing Wildlife Park, told the Global Times that the venture could provide another option for preserving rare and endangered species when artificial reproduction is not possible.  

Reference: The Telegraph: Sarah Knapton 

Dogs can smell when humans are stressed

A wholesome study has revealed that dogs can sniff out when their human is stressed – findings that will help train service and therapy dogs.

Researchers in Ireland collected breath and sweat samples from 36 participants before and after they were faced with a complex maths problem. They were also asked to share how it impacted their stress levels, according to Study Finds.

Using the samples where the person's blood pressure and heart rate increased, four dogs, Treo, Fingal, Soot, and Winnie, had to scout out the stressed ones.

The results, published in the journal PLoS ONE, revealed that each dog could do so.

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"The findings show that we, as humans, produce different smells through our sweat and breath when we are stressed, and dogs can tell this apart from our smell when relaxed – even if it is someone they do not know," Clara Wilson, a PhD student in the School of Psychology at Queen’s University Belfast, explained.

"The research highlights that dogs do not need visual or audio cues to pick up on human stress. This is the first study of its kind, and it provides evidence that dogs can smell stress from breath and sweat alone, which could be useful when training service dogs and therapy dogs," Wilson added.

he also said the findings helped "shed more light on the human-dog relationship" as it helped in how dogs may interact with the psychological state of humans.

The owner of two-year-old Cocker Spaniel Treo said she was "delighted" he was able to take part in the study.

"We couldn’t wait to hear the results each week when we collected him. He was always so excited to see the researchers at Queen’s and could find his own way to the laboratory," Helen Parks said.

She added: "The study made us more aware of a dog’s ability to use their nose to ‘see’ the world. We believe this study really developed Treo’s ability to sense a change in emotion at home. The study reinforced for us that dogs are highly sensitive and intuitive animals and there is immense value in using what they do best – sniffing!" 

Reference: Indy 100: Becca Monaghan