Environment, Brexit and the media

You can listen to the one-sided discussion between the NFU and Owen Paterson on the Today programme this morning here (at 0650).  We heard from the industry and from a known strong supporter of the agri-industry model. What was needed was a different perspective or some more pointed questions from John Humphrys. ‘Why should the…

Nature in the media

Did you go back to work yesterday? Or maybe today? One of the aspects of being self-employed is that there is less of a hard line between work and play and so I was working over some of the mid-winter break and did a little bit of ‘work’ on almost every day of the last…

More bird flu cases in wild birds

Defra is being quite cryptic about the details of new cases of H5N8 but the RSPB has disclosed that cases have been found on its nature reserves at Frampton (Lincs) and Marshside (Merseyside).  There is also a confirmed case in Gloucestershire. Updated information from Germany here. Thankfully, so far, there has only been one case…

Guest blog – Food for Thought by Miles King

Lately I have been eating porridge for breakfast. I had forgotten how much I liked it, but there is another reason for having taken it up again. Oats are very good, apparently, at helping to restore gut flora and as I have been recovering from an infection which meant taking an awful lot of antibiotics…

Who says we live in a post-truth era?

I’m worried about this post-truth label. It seems to have gathered a lot of credence in a very short period and I don’t like the picture it paints. First though, as was pointed out to me, we haven’t exactly been living in a present-truth world for the last few decades, have we? Have we all…