Rob Yorke is a countryman with two hats: one as a chartered surveyor paying his mortgage, the other as a rural commentator passionate about an informed countryside debate. He has lived in west Scotland, north England, London and now permanently in south Wales. He stalks The Times’ letter pages but it’s cheaper to follow him…
Category: THE WILDLIFE NGOs – RSPB, Wildlife Trusts Wild Justice, BSBI etc
National Trust worryingly quiet
This blog praised the National Trust for its consultation on land management in the High Peak. Time is ticking away and there is a worrying silence. No doubt the Trust has come under pressure from the shooting community, but those of us who are ordinary paying members of NT are also waiting to see whether…
Tilting at the RSPB
That James Delingpole – he’s a bit of a card isn’t he? His latest rant, which resembles quite a few of his previous rants, is about the RSPB supporting carefully-sited wind turbines. It’s well worth a read to see how thin the arguments are. The RSPB is making ‘hundreds of thousands of pounds a year’…
– quite some time ago I mentioned a joint statement by the GWCT and the RSPB on the results of the study of raptors gobbling up red grouse which took place at Langholm. I’m grateful to GWCT for putting this report on their website where anyone can now refresh their memories of the results…
Vote for Abernethy, please
Sometimes opportunities come along when you may make a difference that is far in excess of the effort that you expend. An example of such an opportunity is the public poll organised by the European Outdoor Conservation Association (of whom I had never heard before this week – so they have gained some good publicity)…
Much-needed patronage
When Prince Charles is having an evening in with the Princess Royal, HM The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh, I wonder whether they ever, as keen Patrons of most of the UK’s wildlife conservation organisations, discuss the state of nature and the state of nature conservation. Would they ever think of writing a letter…
Who is patronising your NGO?
If you put ‘Prince Charles’ into the search engine of the Wildlife Trusts it asks you whether you mean ‘price charge’ – you have to laugh don’t you? However, if you put ‘HRH The Prince of Wales’ into the search engine then you do find that Prince Charles is the Patron of the Wildlife Trusts….
Who runs your NGOs?
This blog follows on from yesterday’s. If there are too many wildlife NGOs (as I believe, and as some of you believe) then how will mergers or closer working come about? There are four major stakeholders involved: the senior staff in the NGOs, their trustees and their members – oh yes, and the Nature whose…
Guest blog – The flight of the neonicotinoids by Matt Shardlow
Matt Shardlow is the Chief Executive of the Invertebrate Conservation Trust Buglife. Buglife is the only organisation in Europe committed to saving all invertebrates; the charity has twenty four members of staff and a growing portfolio of conservation projects. The charity’s priorities include the sustainable management of brownfield sites; saving endangered Biodiversity Action Plan Priority…
Moths – a bit more than just bird food?
I always look forward to reports from Butterfly Conservation – not because they are always full of good news but because they are always very professionally produced, always teach me something I didn’t know and always have the mixture of graphs, images and words that does it for me. Their latest report ‘The State of…