FARMERS opposed to a project to introduce lynx into Kielder fear they have already lost the battle for public support.

A National Sheep Association meeting in Elsdon last Wednesday night heard respect for the industry was at an all-time low.

Many of those present were also angry about the Lynx UK Trust claims that farmers seemed more concerned about the effect of six lynx on the industry when they were losing two million lambs a year due to the lack of shelter, vaccinations and other welfare basics.

While that had been a drastically overstated simplification of a set of circumstances the farming industry had long worked hard to remedy, some said it was symptomatic of the lack of respect for the profession at large.

One woman said: “I follow Lynx UK on their website and they don’t think we are worth anything – but I don’t think public support is there for us either.”

Another farmer said he thought the only way to engage with the public would be to talk about conservation issues instead: “I think we should promote the curlew, the red squirrel and the pine marten, because I think we have to be realistic and realise farmers are not popular – to go on about sheep is probably not going to help us a lot.”

And a third said they would probably engender greater public sympathy if they conveyed the image instead of “lynx attacking a couple of Bambis”.

The game would be lost, said one man, if a farmer actually shot a lynx. That, he said, would create huge amounts of bad publicity.

NSA chief executive Phil Stocker told the meeting: “Conservation and ecology and the environment in general cannot be improved by this (proposed) release, and that’s got to be our focus.”

The expectation was that, post-Brexit, the benchmarks for agricultural performance would be based on high animal performance and environmental welfare.

Having said that, Mr Stocker argued that the public had to be brought to understand the threat lynx would pose to sheep welfare. The stress of being predated alone could cause them to abort their lambs.

“If Lynx UK manages to garner a lot of public support, we have to counter that by presenting the facts about the damage lynx could do to agriculture and highlighting the good farming does for the environment already,” added Mr Stocker.