Ramblings

It was my birthday on Thursday and I was in my car for much of the day so it reminded me of the USA trip to which I was looking forward (rightly) this time last year. Driving through southern England is a bit different from driving on the open roads of much of the USA…

Guest Blog – National Trust Natural Childhood report – by Stephen Moss

Stephen Moss is one of Britain’s leading nature writers, broadcasters and wildlife television producers. He was the founding producer of Springwatch, and his books include A Bumper Book of Nature, a guide that encourages children to explore the great outdoors. A lifelong naturalist, he is passionate about communicating the wonders of the natural world to…

Guest blog – A service-based environment? by Jonathan Baker

Jonathan Baker is a graduate of Bath Spa University and Imperial College London and currently a consultant at Collingwood Environmental Planning where understanding what ecosystem services are and what they mean for environmental and planning policy is a fascination. Thoughts on our evolving consideration of the relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem services and what this…

NPPF

I’ve only had a very quick look at the government’s planning policy that was unveiled yesterday.  It’s not my area of expertise and I would have to be led by others as to its overall impact. But I find it interesting to note that everyone seems to be claiming that they ‘won’ – which is…

Wuthering moors 6

I am very grateful to Natural England (that’s @NaturalEngland for those of you on Twitter, where you can find me as @MarkAvery) for sending me details of the Walshaw Moor management agreement.  They were clearly eager that I read it, so I have, and so can you here.  What do you think of it? I’d…