WHAT is happening to our countryside without the rabbits?
Sixty-odd years living in Tinhead one could see all up over the hills because the rabbits keep the vegetation down. 
On the sides of the roads, the farmers cut their hedges and cleaned their ditches, now with all these environment people about things have been allowed to grow wild and planting trees all over the place, often too close to the roads. 
It’s all right planting little trees, but they grow into big trees and slowly spread and are now making driving dangerous.
Now every thing has started to encroach everywhere, the lanes and footpaths and streams are getting overgrown with bushes and worst of all trailing blackberries, which are now hanging down into the lanes and path. Nobody seems to bother and tidy it up anymore.
Bring back Old Bill Cox and his horse prince and cart, the local roadmen who keep it tidy. 
As time progresses, things are going to get worse; they are nearly out of hand already, someone or children will get caught on the brambles. In the end I hope it does not catch them in the eye.
Winter is coming and soon all the leaves and hedge cuttings plus grass, which is never picked up nowadays; in the past the rabbits never let it grow enough to want cutting. It will wash down now and block the drains and manholes and make another mess, causing flooding. What will it be like in another 10 years?
What is the answer? 
Bring back the rabbits. Should have got rid of the rats instead of rabbits, then save pounds on grass cutters – men and machines.
ERICK STOKES (OLD CROSSEYE)
Lower Road
Bratton