Losing what we love: England’s planning system is destroying nature piece by piece Between 2009 and 2020, local authorities in England published an average of 422,000 planning decisions per year, of which about 85% granted planning approval. Of the 98 Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects applications, only four have been refused and one partially refused. A…
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
A good reply from my MP
I wrote a very short letter to my MP last week: it simply said Dear Mr Pursglove, I’m ashamed of the man who is our Prime Minister. Are you? And if not, why not, please? I had a 2-page response from Mr Pursglove yesterday, and fair enough, it’s a good response. It doesn’t actually answer…
Disease risk and Beaver reintroductions
It has been brought to my attention that there is a report, commissioned by Natural England, entitled Revised Disease Risk Analysis for the Conservation Translocation of the Eurasian Beaver (Castor fiber) to England, 2021. This report discusses, I gather, the potential for introduced Beavers to spread diseases to other Beavers, other widlife, domestic stock and…
Sunday book review – Wildlife of Maldon by John Buchanan
If you live in or around Maldon in Essex, or you visit regularly, then you should have this book. It is well-written, well-produced and will tell you much about your local environment. You get a lot about birds in these pages but also interesting information on the changing status of mammals, invertebrates and plants (though…
Sunday book review – The Wryneck by Gerard Gorman
I haven’t seen as many Wrynecks as I wish I had and most of my sightings have been in southern Europe where they are much commoner than here, but even so they are quite difficult to encounter. My first UK record was on the beach at Minsmere in the early 1970s and as a schoolboy…