Defra, as Natural England, say that they need more time to answer my questions. I don’t accept that they do. But it would obviously be rather strange if after all this time, and extra time, I don’t get some very detailed and full answers to my questions.
BLOG POSTS
A song for Guy
Guy Smith, NFU environment spokesperson asked for the details of species I saw on my BBS visit. I wonder why. I’ll do better than that Guy, I’ll list the species seen on my visit last Saturday and compare them with those seen on my first visit to this BBS square almost exactly seven years ago…
Poor things and real things
Did you watch Planet Earth Live on Sunday night? I did and there were some enjoyable moments in it. It seemed to be all about going ‘Awww’ at cute little mammals that were having a tough time of making their way in the world – but enough of the presenters Richard Hammond and Julia Bradbury….
For farmers
On Saturday I woke before the alarm and that was early! It wasn’t because I had gone to sleep before knowing the result of the London Mayoral election and the fate of the several hundred pound bet I had on Boris (that result was never seriously in question) but because I was going out to…
10 ways to make a difference – and some are free
It’s a tough time for NGOs – here are some ideas for worthy causes to help. Good to see that the RSPB has the chance to buy a fantastic site on Loch Lomond. It came up once before and I was sorry that it didn’t work out then. And I haven’t noticed much land…
Wet Wales? I hope not
The Wales Coast Path opens officially today – 870 miles from Chester to Chepstow (and a very similar distance from Chepstow to Chester). That’s quite a stretch isn’t it? And since you can walk Offa’s Dyke too, you could do a 1000+ mile walk around Wales if you really wanted – you could call it…
The same and different
A year ago, yesterday, I flew to the USA for a 6 week trip of a lifetime. Yesterday, I drove to Cambridge. A year ago, yesterday, the sun shone. Yesterday it rained a lot. A year ago, yesterday, I saw lots of starlings in Washington DC. Yesterday a single starling flew across the…
Wuthering Moors 14
My Freedom of Information requests which were posted on this blog on 2 April (for example, this one) should have been answered this week since they were electronically transmitted to Natural England and Defra on that day. I followed up by posting letters to Defra and Natural England. Yesterday, at 1637, I received an email…
Say hello to the cuckoo
It’s May, it’s raining and for the first time for many a year, perhaps ever, I haven’t seen a cuckoo in April. My Birdtrackrecords going back to 2005 show me that I have always seen a cuckoo by now. I went out in a fine spell on Monday thinking that I should hear a cuckoo…
And the winners and losers are…
The two polls for your favourite and least favourite UK wildlife NGOs are now closed. Thank you for voting. Across the two polls, over 2400 votes were cast: 1330 in the poll for the favourite organisation and 1085 in the poll for the least favourite. This seems to show that despite a few voices saying…