I’ll always be interested in anything to do with the Passenger Pigeon – the formerly most abundant species on Earth but which was driven to extinction, finally, on 1 September 1914. A new paper in Science suggests that Passenger Pigeons had a very low genetic diversity. the authors describe this as surprising but I’m not…
Author: Mark
Born Bristol, UK
Educated: Cleeve House School Bristol, Bristol Grammar School and Downing College Cambridge
Ph.D. University of Aberdeen, Winter activity of pipistrelle bats.
NERC post-doctoral Research Fellow, Edward Grey Institute, Oxford University
Former Conservation Director of the RSPB, 1989-2011
Whither Gavin Gamble’s e-petition?
Gavin Gamble’s e-petition has already achieved something – it has shown us that Defra gives not a fig about wildlife crime. That may not surprise many people but it is a useful stake in the ground. I know that many people are suffering from petition fatigue (and I have as much cause to feel that…
Blue Planet 2 – programme 4
I thought this episode – about the open ocean – was the best so far. Great footage of boiling seas, sleeping Sperm Whales and a whole lot more. And for once, the message of environmental degradation was very adroitly put over – I thought. The scene was set about the immensity of the…
Everyone’s talking about wildlife crime except Defra
This is the sixth Defra response to an e-petition attempting to press them into action on wildlife crime and unsustainable upland management associated with grouse shooting. And this is the sixth response in Defra which has failed to admit the scale of the problem of wildlife crime and failed to bring forward any sensible response….
The first seven weeks
Gavin Gamble’s e-petition to ban driven grouse shooting now stands at over 13,000 signatures and it has now had a poor government response (see here and here). Here are the leading constituencies so far – many of them are old friends (all with 50+ signatures): Inverness, Badenoch and Strathspey, Drew Hendry MP, 87 signatures Thirsk…
Guest blog – Ireland’s Harrier crisis Ryan Wilson-Parr
Ryan has studied Hen Harrier for over 20 years as a researcher, an accredited ecological consultant and as a contracted Raptor Expert to the National Parks & Wildlife Service. Ryan is Chairman of the Irish Raptor Study Group, Director at the Golden Eagle Trust and Project Scientist for the Hen Harrier Project, a new results-based…
Paul Leyland – Tansy Beetle
The Tansy Beetle Chrysolina graminis is a wonderfully iridescent leaf beetle about 1cm long. It was once widespread in the UK but now has a severely limited range. The main site is along the banks of the River Ouse as it flows through York, with a much smaller, recently discovered, population at Woodwalton Fen. There…
Defra calls this a problem species…I call it wondrous!
‘Targeted control of problem species is only one part of a complex mix of factors that can influence populations’ Defra response to Gavin Gamble’s e-petition to ban driven grouse shooting. This is what targetted control looks like in twentieth century UK: Please sign the e-petition to which Defra was replying to show…
The Defra response – a few comments
The biggest problem with the Defra response is that it still ducks the issue of wildlife crime – and how can a government turn its back on crime? I’ll come back to that tomorrow morning. But for now, let us thank Gavin Gamble (and 9,999 others) for flushing out these comments. It’s always enlightening to…
Tim Melling – Northern Harrier
Tim writes: this is a wild Northern Harrier giving me eye-to-eye contact as it flew right over my head at Reifel Bird Sanctuary near Vancouver. It is a youngster, hatched this year and identifiable by the rufous wash on its underparts. I can also identify this as a juvenile male because it has greenish eyes. …