I’d like to be ‘rurban’ please

The furthest you can get away from the sea in the UK is about 70 miles and it is up a hill in Derbyshire.  I wonder what is the furthest place away from the countryside?  I am guessing that it will be some point in central London – maybe the House of Commons itself? –…

Badgers and newsblast

Since comments were still being added to yesterday’s blog at 1030 last night I won’t post again until tomorrow.  Yesterday’s new visitors took the number of unique visitors to this blog over the last 10 days to well over 1100. Do have a look at the comments on yesterday’s badger post – and thank you…

Badgers

Let’s be clear about one thing right from the start – badgers play an important role in spreading bovine tuberculosis (bTB) to cattle herds. But we’ll come back to that. This week should see an English government announcement on badger culling.  The announcement must come very soon if it is to happen before the Parliamentary…

Bears, condors, kites and foxes – not for cuddling

The recent killing of a male hiker by a grizzly bear is the first such death in Yellowstone National Park for 25 years and seems to be a highly unfortunate case where walkers accidentally disturb a bear with young and the mother bear defends her cubs.  A month ago I had my own close encounter…

The raptor haters – Simon Jenkins

The raptor haters is an occasional series of articles on people who slag off birds of prey. Sir Simon Jenkins is an amazingly gifted writer and obviously a very clever man.  I love the way he writes and I read his articles for pleasure as well as for education. Back in May 2008, when the…