Since it’s Christmas, nearly, here are two cartoons for the price of one for today.
BLOG POSTS
Guest Blog – A Christmas Greeting for a Climate Sceptic Council Leader by Sarah Whitebread
Sarah Whitebread is an environmental campaigner and Lib Dem councillor from Cambridge. She has an Mphil in Environmental Policy and works for an MP in Westminster. Cambridgeshire is currently being run by a climate sceptic. Councillor Nick Clarke, leader of the County Council, declared on his blog a few months ago that “it is now clear…
Pheasants in the balance
State of the UK’s Birds 2012 is full of interesting information. I was struck by the analysis of the number and weight of birds in the UK as a whole. In the early 1970s there were about 105 million pairs of birds in the UK – now there are around 83 million. More than a…
Book review – Britain’s Sea Mammals by Jon Dunn, Robert Still and Hugh Harrop
The first cetacean I ever saw was probably a harbour porpoise off the coast of Argyll – although I thought it was a dolphin. And the first whale I saw, which surfaced in a raft of Manx shearwaters off the north coast of Rhum, was probably a minke whale – although I thought it was…
Some bits and pieces
Give as you live. This is a good idea: if you sign up to this scheme, and do a bit of easy ‘mouse clicking’ when you spend money on the internet then your chosen charity (mine is…. wait for it…..the RSPB) gets some money from the people to whom you are giving your money. So…
Struan Stevenson, do your maximum to yield sustainable fisheries
Tomorrow there is an important vote on the future of the Common Fisheries Policy. It seems likely that a UK (Scottish) MEP may hold the balance of power over whether overfishing continues or begins to diminish. That MEP is Struan Stevenson. When I wrote to Richard Benyon on this subject in the early part of…
Waxwings are here again
I caught up with some waxwings near my home on Thursday. Huntingdon races were abandoned because of the freezing ground and my central heating had chosen to pack up a couple of days earlier. In addition the car’s battery couldn’t cope with the cold and the AA had had to come out and get me…
Ralph Underhill cartoon
The bluffer’s guide to fracking: Hydraulic fracturing -Wikipedia Daily Telegraph Guardian BBC
Bitterly disappointed, hugely disappointed, shameful, pitiful, appalling, lamentable…
Bitterly disappointed, hugely disappointed, shameful, pitiful, appalling, lamentable… That’s how the Wildlife Trusts, Marine Conservation Society and RSPB described Defra’s announcement that it was consulting on designating just 31 of 127 marine sites selected by a lengthy, inclusive and costly process involving hundreds of people. Further progress might be made next year. Defra described this…
Who you are, or at least, who you say you are.
The Readers’ Poll was filled in by just over 400 of you – thank you. You seem to be like me: 82% living in England, 75% male, middle-aged, Guardian reading, wildlife-magazine reading, potential Labour voting, RSPB members. Well – there’s a surprise! This blog now gets c8000 unique visitors each month. I would guess, and…