Rob Yorke (@blackgull) is a hunter naturalist and rural commentator based in the Black Mountains of South Wales. He carries, at times, both a gun and binoculars and outlines below a possible scenario set in northern England after a ban on driven grouse shooting has been in force for a number of years. The characters…
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Got the T-shirt
To all green blobs out there
It’s two and a half weeks since Owen Paterson went out with a rant about the Green Blob. It was a fairly remarkable outburst at the time and re-reading it hardly lessens the impact. Paterson’s hatred, for so it seems, for those who devote their lives to the environment is quite shocking. It’s also shocking…
Hen Harrier Day
I apologise for the late posting of this little note but I have been collecting my Hen Harrier Day T-shirt. This time next week it will all be over. We’ll be becalmed in the day between ‘Hen Harrier Day’ and the ‘Inglorious 12th’. I have bought and tested a megaphone – it works! There aren’t…
No difference?
This Guest Blog is rather different. It’s about statistical analysis and written by a respected scientist, Professor Jeremy Greenwood. In his Guest Blog Professor Greenwood criticises the statistical basis of the UK government’s opposition to a ban on neonicotinoid pesticides during the tenure of Owen Paterson as Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural…
The Hen Harrier thunderclap
It may be as recently as a year ago I’d never heard of a social media thunderclap. What it is, is this. If you have an account on social media (eg Twitter) you can send out messages which might be seen by all the people that ‘follow’ you. A social media thunderclap is where lots …
Oscar Dewhurst – Scarlet-bellied Mountain-tanager
Comments Off on Oscar Dewhurst – Scarlet-bellied Mountain-tanager
Oscar writes: Scarlet-bellied Mountain-Tanager: This was taken in the cloud forest of Peru, at Wayqecha Biological Research Station. Mixed species flocks would regularly pass very close by my room, so I spent a couple of hours standing just outside waiting. This Scarlet-bellied Mountain-Tanager perched out in the open for me. Nikon D300s, Nikon 600mm f4…
Hen Harrier Day – one week away
Hen Harrier Day is a week away! Hundreds of people will be gathering in three places across the north of England a week today to express their support for the threatened Hen Harrier. If you can’t make it to any of those events – and the Peak District one is full to capacity – then…
Sunday book review – the Dragonfly Diaries by Ruary Mackenzie Dodds
This is the story of the establishment of Europe’s first dragonfly centre – written by the man who set it up. But it’s more than that because it is a story of a love of dragonflies, and a story of dragonfly lovers too. I liked it a lot. The dragonfly centre in question was established…
What they say 12:
The latest in the series of BAWC podcasts ahead of Hen Harrier Day (it’s difficult to keep up!) is a fascinating interview with Andrew Gilruth of the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust. You should listen to it here. I don’t know Andrew Gilruth, as far as I recall we’ve never met, but I was very…