Standing up for Nature
The Green Party of England and Wales is the only UK political party, as far as I am aware, which supports a ban of driven grouse shooting. And this has not just been through passive support, the party leader, Natalie Bennett, has added her name to the #justiceforannie thunderclap and has spoken out in social…
Sometimes I have a book for a while and I keep putting it down and the voice in my head says ‘I’ll settle down and read it a bit later’ and when that happens it’s a pretty good bet that I’m not going to be gripped by the book. This was one of those books…
I have blogged before about the fact that one of Tim Bonner’s and the Countryside Alliance’s errors (we are making quite a long list) is that those that oppose driven grouse shooting are a bunch of left-wing townies, whereas actually we know that it is in Conservative rural constituencies, like that of the Defra Minister…
I hope I might see a few readers of this blog on the streets of London tomorrow. Politician work for us – but as with everything, they must be made to listen. We live in a democracy – take to the streets to make your voice heard…
The estimate of c73,000 waterfowl being poisoned each winter in the UK by ingesting lead ammunition means that c400 will die from poisoning today. And tomorrow. And Sunday. And Monday. Poisoned – hardly a clean kill. See these videos about lead poisoning (here and here and here and here) and then realise that you can…
In a muffled statement, because it’s very difficult to hear the words of those whose heads are stuck in the sand, BASC say that: ‘there is no risk to those who do not eat shot game meat more than once a week throughout the year’. This simply isn’t true. There is no level at which…
Yesterday the RSPB and WWT started to mobilise their memberships to support Rob Sheldon’s e-petition to ban lead ammunition. This is good to see. The main RSPB Twitter account, @natures_voice tweeted once yesterday (and again this morning) and this was backed up by rather more active support from @rspbcymru and @jazzyjeff, and @wwtconservation and @wwtworldwide…
This made me smile: Dear Dr Avery, I have just finished reading your book, Inglorious, having picked it up just 24 hours ago. A fascinating and spirited read. Actually it’s two books; one rather silly one about toffs, acres of tweed, wealth, land, haves & have-nots, aristocracy, Conservative Party bashing, and, one about upland…
As well as the Today programme, there was coverage of the Oxford Lead Symposium publication on BBC TV at breakfast time. This online piece with interviews with WWT staff, Danish hunters (‘I’m a conservationist,’ said Niels Kanstrup, ‘I’m a hunter, too. I think it’s a fair and sustainable way to use natural resources, but we…
Will you join the climate march in London on Sunday? I will. See you there!