On Wednesday, Defra announced their next slow pace towards a large amount of badger-bothering. What they said wasn’t very much and wasn’t very clear. It seems that some time in the autumn, that’s autumn 2012, there will be a six-week trial of farmer-led badger killing in two ‘pilot’ areas of southwest England which are yet…
BLOG POSTS
Gonshaw, gone for sure.
Matthew Gonshaw is in prison again for stealing birds’ eggs. On Tuesday he was convicted of stealing and possessing eggs which included those of golden eagles, ospreys and avocets. Over 700 eggs were found in his east London home in Bow. This is the fourth time that Gonshaw has been jailed for similar offences. Rather…
Jim Paice doesn’t make stewardship pledge to taxpayers
The Defra Agriculture Minister James Paice told his fellow farmers that he wanted them to be able to opt out of their current agri-environment agreements if CAP reform changed the rules. This seems fair enough to me. I can’t quickly find his words on the Defra website but the Farmers Weekly report them here. Mr…
The third warming
It’s an old saying that wood warms you twice – once when you chop it up and again when you burn it. But the evidence is strong now that it warms you three times. We had a load of seasoned timber delivered the other day and moving it in a wheel barrow to a dry…
Burgundy? Glass half empty
It has been a cold weekend, although mine has been warmed by a rather lucky profit at Cheltenham racecourse (my winning bet came as a result of the leader falling at the last hurdle – but there is just as little point in apologising for fortuitous wins as railing against ‘unlucky’ losses) and by the…
Talking naturally
Comments Off on Talking naturally
You might like to listen to this podcast of a chat between Charlie Moores, Tristan Reid, Nick Moran and myself. It’s about 50 minutes long and it was great fun to record last Tuesday. How the CLA saved the bittern (Ha Ha!), what you should remember when out birdwatching, where you should put your casual…
British Birds review of Blogging for Nature, or, Adrian Pitches is a very nice man.
Adrian Pitches is a very nice man – I’ve always thought that, even when he was sticking a microphone under my nose and asking me questions for the BBC in the north of England. But now he has given Blogging for Nature a very kind review in British Birds. Adrian, what a fine man he…
Lots of stuff!
I was pleased to see that in Martin Harper’s blog yesterday (which is always worth reading after you’ve read this one) that Martin encouraged RSPB members to sign up to the epetition on vicarious liability. I expect that the RSPB will give this a bigger push in the New Year and I will let you…
Four marks out of 320 for grouse moor managers
The RSPB report today that 2011 saw only four successful pairs of hen harriers in England. There should be around 320 pairs of hen harriers in the English uplands. This is a clear failure of the UK (predominantly English) government to implement the EU Birds Directive. Article 1.1 of the Directive makes clear that it…
A butterfly’s wing
December isn’t a great month for butterflies (but then November wasn’t a great month for nature as a whole), although, of course, they are all (apart from the painted ladies and red admirals) still out there as eggs or pupae or some other clever way of getting through the winter if you really want to…