The idea of shifting baselines is an important one. We tend to be trapped in our own memories – our imaginations fail to grasp what we haven’t seen for ourselves further back in time. We all have our baselines and they affect what we feel about everything, what we regard as normal and acceptable. In…
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Marmite
It’s quite fun reading the reviews of Inglorious on Amazon. Now there are 22 of them and they average at 4 stars out of 5 stars. That’s pretty good. But I can’t help noticing that if you only look at the reviews that are from verified purchasers of Inglorious (eight of them) – then they…
#justiceforannie thunderclap
‘Annie‘ was a female Hen Harrier which was found shot on a grouse moor in Scotland. She has become the symbol for attracting people to sign up to a social media thunderclap tagged as #justiceforannie. This was the idea of the Moving Mountains Nature Network (@MMNNActionUK) and it will send out a message about our…
A rather fluffy gauntlet – the report
The Response for Nature report by 26 wildlife organisations in England is unexceptionable and unexceptional. There is nothing wrong with it and nothing very new or exciting either. It is the semolina of wildlife reports – you couldn’t really dislike it but I’d be surprised if it’s your favourite. In fact it’s a bit gruel-like…
A rather fluffy gauntlet – the event
Last Tuesday a bunch of NGOs launched their ‘Response for Nature’ report (or reports actually – one for each UK nation) at an event in London. I’ll comment on the reports later today but the event was a room full of wildlife conservation organisation staff talking to themselves. There were speeches: from Steve Backshall, Josie…
Sunday book review – Natural Histories by Brett Westwood and Stephen Moss
This is the book of the radio programme. Have a look at that cover – very clever! And quite pretty, too. I’m almost totally addicted to Radio 4 and so I have heard bits of several of the radio programmes that make up the subject matter of this book. The basic idea is that each…
Another selection of Ralph Underhill’s cartoons from 2014
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Autumnwatch – looking forward to the Hen Harrier update
When Springwatch ended (in the spring!) we were all trying to assimilate the fact that five male Hen Harriers had ‘disappeared’ from active nests in Lancashire and Cumbria. Since then a highly experienced nest photographer, Gordon Yates, has written a Guest Blog here explaining how unlikely this is to happen (and the photographs on this…
Lord Krebs on Badgers
My old boss, Prof Lord Krebs, was on Farming Today (8 mins in) being interviewed by Anna Hill on Wednesday morning. Lord Krebs provided a masterclass in sticking to the facts, despite some niggling questions from Ms Hill, and getting the message across very clearly. The message was that the ‘too-early-to-tell-really-but-the-figures-are-out-there’ results from the Badger…
Don’t get too attached to Holly and Chance
Members of the public will be able to follow the movements of two female Hen Harriers tracked via satellite tags as part of the RSPB Hen Harrier LIFE+ Project. A new website will enable us all to follow the movements of Holly and Chance as they travel around the country. For security reasons, in other…