I think I know what will be at least one focus for Hen Harrier Day 2015 so please ‘save the day’ as they say. There is a long way to go before that sunny Sunday before the opening of the grouse shooting season but we have the beginnings of a plan… The full plan will…
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So, what is the Hawk and Owl Trust’s position on brood management?
Yesterday I speculated on what might be going on in Tory ministers’ minds to lead them to consider making a highly contentious move in the highly contentious issue of Hen Harrier persecution. Rather than Ministers being exercised about how they could live up to their pre-election promises on marine protected areas, or recovering farmland bird…
Collaboration or collaborationism?
As I understand it, the non-joint non-plan for ‘managing’ the almost non-existent English breeding Hen Harrier population would have involved fiddling about with one of the nests in Bowland this year (had the landowner requested it). The two nests were ‘too close’ together despite the rather large gap to the next pair of breeding Hen…
Defra probably has one more bad decision left in it
Given the dire (egregious, failing, risible, adrift) performance of the Defra Ministers who take our money to make the environment better it is to be hoped that they simply keep their heads down and fade away once the general election campaign starts in earnest. Though I fear that it’s just possible that Defra has one…
Oscar Dewhurst – Bittern fishing
Oscar writes: The recent 4 or 5 days of cold weather in the UK saw me spend most of that time at my local nature reserve hoping to photograph Bitterns. Unfortunately I didn’t have much success, and one morning spent over 4 hours lying on the frozen ground hoping for this bird to come out…
RSPB, Countryside Alliance and the Charity Commission
You might have wondered what happened with the complaint about the RSPB from Sir Ian Botham and others to the Charity Commission. Or maybe you thought it was so daft that you weren’t wondering at all. Well, I was wondering why we hadn’t heard anything about it and now I know why. Although Beefy’s complaint…
Round up
A few things that caught my eye: next weekend is the RSPB Big Garden Birdwatch gamekeepers all ask for gloves for Christmas statement from OUP on removing nature from their junior dictionary I had my first Reed Bunting of this winter in the garden this week a link to Miles King’s excellent blogs on Rampisham…
Saturday cartoon by Ralph Underhill
The potential extinction of a not so horrid spider
Vanessa Amaral-Rogers is the Campaigns Officer for Buglife. After finishing her Masters in Conservation Biology at the University of Derby on bat ecology, she now works on science communications, legislation, pesticides and pollinators. In a quarry in the South-West of England, a small spider lurks. The Horrid ground weaver (Nothophantes…
Returning to vote?
The days are increasing in length, although there is plenty of winter to come. Last Saturday was the first day since 2 December when the official day length was over eight hours where I live. Our Cuckoos, on which I keep an eye through the excellent BTO study of them, are sitting in central Africa…