A KINGS Pond regular has pointed the finger of blame for the Alton beauty spot’s rat problem at the wooden ducks erected by Alton Town Council to urge people to stop feeding bread to wildfowl.

According to Damond Lock, rather than controlling the feeding of wildfowl, the wood sculptures and notices have had the opposite effect – “increasing the rodent menace as much of the feed-stuff lands up on the surrounding paths and viewpoints”.

In a letter to the editor (see Page 20 of this week’s Herald), he added all feeding of waterfowl at the pond should be forbidden, with those found breaching this order facing a £100 fine.

Mr Lock continued: "This increasing problem highlights the lack of funding and attention given by Alton Town Council to one of its finest assets, that is, apart from the ill-created replacement western pathway."

Alton Town Council has come out in defence of its wooden ducks, however.

At a meeting of the council’s open spaces committee last week, councillors did resolve to appoint a pest controller to deal with the rats, and “re-word” information boards to emphasise to the public the risk of increasing the rat population through excess feeding.

But responding directly to Mr Lock’s comments, Leah Coney, town clerk, said the wooden sculptures have successfully reduced the amount of bread scattered across the site – and instead attributed the overfeeding to a steady increase in visitor numbers at the pond.

She said: "In respect of the wooden ducks – the original intention of the information ducks was to discourage the feeding of bread and indeed educate visitors to the site of the options for more nutritional feed stuffs and in the main this had the desired effect with a reduction in bread scattered across the site and people taking an interest in feeding the birds a variety of foods such as rice, peas, sweetcorn.

"Over the last year or so we have noticed an increase in the number of visitors to the pond; it is a very attractive site for families especially those with young children to see a plentiful variety of birds close up and particularly for local wildlife photographers who have taken many stunning images.

"The feeding of the birds has over this time reduced the natural urge of many of the wildfowl to venture further afield for food as they are being well fed by the visitors, there numbers thus increase not decrease come breeding season and the with more birds and more people there is more feeding which has resulted in the recent rat infestation where people have left excessive amounts of food around the site for the birds to eat later.

"The information ducks have therefore now been removed to be updated with wording more appropriate in the current situation to remind people not to overfeed or leave food on the banks for it encourages rats."

In regard to Mr Lock’s calls for a ban on feeding and fines, the town clerk added: "There are no bylaws in place to prevent feeding and so it would be illegal if we arbitrarily imposed fines on people for doing so."