Illegal bird of prey killing must end, urges RSPB Birdcrime report The Birdcrime report, which reviews the past 15 years, reveals 1,344 birds of prey were illegally killed between 2009-2023, with crimes continuing to emerge. These criminal acts target threatened species including Golden Eagles, Goshawks and Hen Harriers. The majority of incidents are associated with…
Tag: grouse moor
Guest blog – Walshaw Turbine 8 by Nick MacKinnon
Nick MacKinnon is a freelance teacher of Maths, English and Medieval History, and lives above Haworth, in the last inhabited house before Top Withens = Wuthering Heights. In 1992 he founded the successful Campaign to Save Radio 4 Long Wave while in plaster following a rock-climbing accident on Skye. His poem ‘The metric system’ won…
Guest blog – Walshaw Turbine 17 by Nick MacKinnon
Nick MacKinnon is a freelance teacher of Maths, English and Medieval History, and lives above Haworth, in the last inhabited house before Top Withens = Wuthering Heights. In 1992 he founded the successful Campaign to Save Radio 4 Long Wave while in plaster following a rock-climbing accident on Skye. His poem ‘The metric system’ won…
English Hen Harrier numbers slump
Natural England has published, in more detail than in previous years (click here), the numbers of Hen Harriers nesting in England – they are down this year. Numbers in 2024 are lower than in 2023 and 2022 and only slightly higher than in 2021. This year puts an end to a run of years of…
Mid-week book review – Stoats, Weasels, Martens and Polecats by Jenny Macpherson
This is a very interesting book about a very few species and a very good New Naturalist. The New Naturalist series put out some rather unattractive books a while ago with terribly reproduced and somewhat irrelevant images. Those days have certainly passed. This is a well-produced volume with good photographs, graphs and figures. The author…
Mid-week book review – The Last Crow by Bob Berzins
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Another novel about the murky upland world of somewhere near you? Badgers, grouse moors, lords, rich businessmen, snares, machetes, rifles, Hen Harriers, modern slavery and so much more. It’s a good follow-up to Bob’s previous novel Snared (see review here). If you enjoyed Snared then I’m sure you’ll enjoy this too. And, just like Snared,…
Guest blog – Walshaw Turbine 44 by Nick MacKinnon
Nick MacKinnon is a freelance teacher of Maths, English and Medieval History, and lives above Haworth, in the last inhabited house before Top Withens = Wuthering Heights. In 1992 he founded the successful Campaign to Save Radio 4 Long Wave while in plaster following a rock-climbing accident on Skye. His poem ‘The metric system’ won…
General election comments
I’d like to thank the Scottish Labour Party, the Lib Dems and Reform for delivering a massive Labour majority on such a small share of the vote. Voters in Scotland switched from SNP to Labour, voters in the southwest and elsewhere switched from Con to LibDem, voters all over the place switched from Con to…
Moorland Ass
It’s difficult to tell whether the Moorland Association is still alive, it had shown few signs of life during the last years of Amanda Anderson’s reign and the patient still seems to be in intensive care under Andrew Gilruth’s tenure. It appears that the brains of the Moorland Association have decided that a ‘let’s kill…
Guest blog – Walshaw Turbine 27 – by Nick MacKinnon
Nick MacKinnon is a freelance teacher of Maths, English and Medieval History, and lives above Haworth, in the last inhabited house before Top Withens = Wuthering Heights. In 1992 he founded the successful Campaign to Save Radio 4 Long Wave while in plaster following a rock-climbing accident on Skye. His poem ‘The metric system’ won…