Michael Gove has asked moorland owners to be good boys (and girls – although all the landowners in the room at the time were actually men) and to stop damaging blanket bogs through burning them. Burning is carried out so that men (and a few women) can shoot lots of Red Grouse for fun as…
Category: BAN DRIVEN GROUSE SHOOTING
Are you sure you’ve identified the right one Crispin?
In The Times I read that Crispin Odey, self-confessed funder of YFTB has decided that Boris Johnson is the person he wants to lead the Conservative Party, and as soon as possible. It’s only a matter of five months ago that Michael Gove was the chosen one for Mr Odey. Blimey! Boris’s principled and reasonable…
Durham dales
Three weeks ago (how time flies) I spent two sunny days in the area of Weardale, Upper Teesdale and surroundings. It was a warm couple of days to be up in the hills. I was there at the invitation of Caroline Beck, a journalist who formerly worked for the BBC in the north of England…
Putting two and two and one together in one small corner of the Bowland Fells
The locations of five Hen Harriers whose satellite tags have mysteriously ceased to transmit in and adjacent to an SPA set up to protect Hen Harriers: SD596621 tag id 94591 tagged by NE 23 June 2010, ceased transmitting 18 Aug 2010 SD617605 ‘Hope’ tagged by RSPB summer 2014, ceased transmitting 13 September 2014 SD624632 Thor…
Thor thunders no more
RSPB press relase. Hen Harrier chick Thor – now ‘disappeared’. Photo: Steve Downing First Bowland hen harrier chick in three years vanishes without trace Thor was one of 13 chicks to fledge from Bowland, Lancashire for the first time in three years. The rare chick is the latest in a number of hen harriers to…
#justice4henharriers
As I’ve said before, my work for our upcoming court case (save the date 5 and 6 December in the Royal Courts of Justice) comes in pulses. I am now in a pulse where I am reading drafts and preparing a witness statement. Our legal team at LeighDay are very clever and a delight to…
May’d for the grouse shooters?
I listened to Theresa May’s conference speech and was quite impressed by it – it was quite clever in many ways (full text here). But I still won’t be voting Conservative. However, there were two sentences that were next to each other that just sum up why the Conservative Party, Michael Gove, Therese Coffey et…
#justice4henharriers next step
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As we head towards our two days in court on 5 and 6 December (when our judicial review of NE’s daft licensing of brood meddling will be heard – do indicate here if you are likely to attend) the latest milestone along the way has just been passed. We’ve received what I believe are called…
Upland Britain – a brighter, fairer future
Let us consider the uplands of the UK. My little essay in the Manifesto for Wildlife set out a list of 10 actions to rejuvenate the uplands and to make our hills better for wildlife and for people. It has attracted a lot of enthusiastic praise as being far-sighted and at the same time a…
A burning question
On Monday the heather burning season opens and the hills will start to be torched. In the Labour Party’s Green Transformation document, launched last week at the Labour Conference in Liverpool, it states ‘End rotational heather burning and launch an independent review into the economic, environmental and wildlife impacts of driven grouse shooting‘. You will…