Bye bye National Trust, Hello National Trust for Scotland!

I’ve just cancelled my National Trust membership and have signed up to the National Trust for Scotland. Let me explain why and you might find that it would suit you too. Or maybe it wouldn’t. The National Trust does quite a lot of good things but I’ve never felt very sympathetic to its philosophy. I…

NEWS: National Trust and grouse shooting in the Peak District

The National Trust is moving towards a new future on grouse shooting on their land in the Dark Peak of the Peak District National Park – although it’s a rather complicated one. For new readers, the National Trust, a conservation charity, is parting company with its shooting tenant in the Peak District due to what…

The RSPB and licensing of grouse moors

In Martin Harper’s blog at the beginning of the week were embedded a few words of support for Ed Hutchings’s e-petition on licensing of grouse shooting.  These are the words: ‘For the past four years, we have argued that a system of licensing of driven grouse shooting is essential to help protect our amazing upland…

What will the RSPB do?

  Now that there is an e-petition asking governments to introduce licensing of grouse shooting, which they could do as part of all shooting or just for grouse shooting I guess, the RSPB and others need to think about whether they will promote this matter to their memberships. I think they should but I’m guessing…

World Land Trust Art Auction

As a trustee of the World Land Trust I’d like to point you in the direction of this Christmas art auction. This online auction ends on 11 December (that’s Monday) so you could spend the weekend mooching and choosing and bidding! Or, quite honestly, if you can’t be bothered with that then why not just…

Both Botham and the RSPB are wrong

Ian Botham talks rubbish a lot of the time, it seems to me (see here, here and here) and clearly  I am not alone as Birdwatch readers voted in droves for YFTB, for whom Ian Botham has spoken in public, in last year’s ‘Guano awards’ (see here, and see here for this year’s contenders).  One…