Whichever view you take, multicultural and tolerant or disapproving and fearful, the awkward fact is that we have not been breeding fast enough (or young enough) to keep society functioning without outside help, let alone educating ourselves to the levels a post-industrial economy is going to need.
The hen harriers report, written by a group of five ecologists headed by Prof Steve Redpath, studied the expected capacity of upland shooting estates for breeding hen harriers and compared that to the actual number found.
A UK-wide survey in 2008 then found only five breeding pairs had survived - a 1% success rate.
It estimated that between 2003-07 there should have been 499 breeding pairs on the 3,696km2 of grouse moors across Britain which were being "driven", or actively used for shooting, in those years.
The RSPB reckons there are 1,600 breeding pairs in Britain, but that seems a conservative estimate.
They have knowingly been breeding a lot of hybrids and then neutering them".
"A very late and cold winter will have affected breeding patterns.
According to the RSPB, the last two breeding pairs of hen harriers in England failed this year to produce eggs for the first time in 60 years and are now on the point of extinction because gamekeepers working for rogue moorland estate owners have systematically persecuted the bird to protect baby grouse which live on the moors.
Macfarlane says the industries need the next generation of apprentices, including in the areas of mining, beef, cattle production, dairy and irrigation, wool classing and horse breeding.
The charity said it accepted the risk to aircraft but said "this is about how the government can sanction the killing of an additional 1100 lesser black-backed gulls without acknowledging the damaging impact of removing almost a fifth of the breeding population of a species on a protected site".
"The top five camel breeding countries are all African, and Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates are in the top five camel-meat producing countries".
