Who doodles through meetings like this? Answer tomorrow.
BLOG POSTS
The curious case of Simon Barnes’s departure from The Times
Simon Barnes is a very good writer. I was at an event, organised by the excellent World Land Trust, where I saw Simon last week. Although I have met him a few times before, I don’t know him well, but I plucked up the courage to go and talk to the great man and we…
Another meadow
I thought you might be interested to see how the uncut strip of grass in my garden is getting on. It’s a meadow! It must be a meadow because a Meadow Brown was flying over it. It’s not quite in the Seaton Meadows class yet, but there were some attractive damselflies in it yesterday –…
Butterflies are so easy
On Saturday I had another visit to Duncan Farrington’s excellent farm. I was on the look-out for Turtle Doves as they used to be here but I haven’t seen, or heard, one for years in this spot. Duncan’s farm looks good for Turtle Doves to me – plenty of thick nesting cover on the old…
Hen Harrier Day in the Peak District – 10 August 2014
I can provisionally announce that our Hen Harrier Day rally will take place in the Upper Derwent Valley based at the Fairholmes Visitor Centre. Having consulted local people and the Peak District National Park itself, and having been advised by them, the Fairholmes Visitor Centre car park seems the best bet for us to gather…
Being broad-minded about plants again.
The clue was really in the names. I saw Meadow Pipits (which I could identify but were nice to see), my first Meadow Browns of the year (which I also could identify) but also Meadowsweet (I know that one), Meadow Buttercup (there are an awful lot of buttercups), Meadow Cranesbill (I can do that…
Oscar Dewhurst – Hobby
Oscar writes: While I was at Minsmere I spent a lot of time in the Bittern hide trying to photograph Hobbies. They spent a large part of the middle of the day hunting for dragonflies over the reedbeds, and so I was delighted to catch one as it stalled slightly, with the light around its…
Banning driven grouse shooting – a message to wishy-washy liberals
Our e-petition to ban driven grouse shooting in England is going really well – yesterday (we are still in Week Four) it passed 4600 and 4700 signatures. One of the reasons why some of you will hesitate to sign it, as I hesitated to launch it, is because you don’t like banning things (or at…
Sunday book review – Forest Vision by Roderick Leslie
This is a book about the politics of forestry by someone who knows them better than just about anyone else in the UK. Roderick Leslie went into the Forestry Commission straight from Oxford University in the 1970s and occupied a variety of senior roles in forest policy and practice including a spell as Chief Executive…
Banning driven grouse shooting – a case example (or two?)
Today our e-petition passed 4600 signatures – thank you! On Friday the RSPB in Scotland issued this to the media: RSPB Scotland is calling for more sporting estates to take action to protect the country’s hen harriers during the breeding season. The conservation charity says grouse moor managers and gamekeepers must do more to prevent…