Row over potential cull of Dartmoor hill ponies

A 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.

Cutting 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, said opponents.

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch called it "total madness" and has launched a petition.

Natural England said it wanted to maintain numbers of the semi-wild ponies on the moor "for generations to come", while a Downing Street spokeswoman said the 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.