This is a simple idea – where would it be good to be in Europe watching wildlife on each weekend of the year? It’s a good idea. This weekend we should be in Matera, southern Italy with Europe’s largest Lesser Kestrel colony and in next year’s European City of Culture. We got here…
BLOG POSTS
Tim Melling – Goshawk
Tim writes: Goshawks are quite a difficult bird to see and photograph in Britain. The closely related Sparrowhawk also provides an identification pitfall but this is the genuine article. Curiously I have never heard of anyone mistaking a Goshawk for a Sparrowhawk, only the other way round. It is one of those birds that…
Grouse shooting demonstrates lack of public support
The e-petition in support of grouse shooting has now closed – but it actually fizzled our ages ago. It scrabbled together 15 thousand signatures and had the richer parts of London as its most enthusiastic areas of support. We can regard it as having been supported by a network of land agents and their masters…
Guest blog – Evidence, Experts and Effectiveness in Conservation by Claire Wordley
Claire Wordley works on the Conservation Evidence project, with an emphasis on getting people to use the available science in conservation – and to test their own conservation interventions. Say hi at @ConservEvidence Evidence, Experts and Effectiveness in Conservation. Evidence in conservation covers a multitude of possibilities. A beautifully produced map showing species…
Under the Oak in May by Karla Kane
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A new video of a new song by Karla Kane of the Corner Laughers.
Guest blog – Bird Therapy – the book by Joe Harkness
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Joe Harkness writes about the therapeutic benefits of birdwatching on his Bird Therapy blog and Twitter page @BirdTherapy In July, Chris Packham and a team of experts are embarking on a nationwide bioblitz of 50 wildlife sites over ten days. The tagline of the campaign is that nature reserves…
Sunday book review – On the Moor by Richard Carter
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This is a lovely book. I really enjoyed it – partly, I suspect, because I have a similar sense of humour to that of the author and also because I am generally curious about life. The author goes for walks on the moors above Hebden Bridge (yes those moors) and his mind wanders widely,…
Tim Melling – Skylark
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Tim writes: Skylarks inhabit a variety of grasslands from sand dunes to grassy moorlands but they were most characteristic of arable farmland. But from the late 1970s their numbers started to tumble when we switched from spring-sown to autumn-sown crops. This hit Skylarks in several ways, not least by removing their winter stubble feeding habitat. …
Happy nuptials
Three petitions
Hardly anybody wants grouse shooting to continue – or if they do then they can’t be bothered to exert themselves so much as to sign a petition to protect their interests, and hardly anybody wants it to be licensed (even though the RSPB has promoted this idea in its magazine). In contrast, a raggle taggle…