I don’t have a great deal of admiration for the NFU’s grip on science and so when I was sent a link to them advertising a job (but please read to the end of this post) for a scientific adviser and spokesperson I was quite sceptical – you might even say, cynical. When I read…
Tag: badgers
Conservatives in Defra – not doing too well really
I can’t find the Conservative manifesto from the 2010 General Election online but I have my copy to hand. Here are some quotes from pages 95-97 with my assessment of how Defra has performed in nearly three years of being in ‘power’. ‘The most pressing animal health problem in the UK today is bovine tuberculosis…
More on the EU budget
Institute for European Environmental Policy. NFU. Martin Harper’s blog. CAPreform.eu Defra website – nothing at all. I am always shocked by the fact that our government doesn’t think it has any obligation to feed back on the results of major EU decisions – like settling the budget for the next five years. It’s hardly surprising…
Every picture tells a story
I recently reviewed the magnum opus by Tim Sands (Wildlife in Trust) which chronicles the first 100 years of the Wildlife Trusts for BBC Wildlife magazine. I picked the book up again recently (which in itself is something of an achievement as it is very heavy) and made a rough note of the species illustrated…
Cartoon and bits and pieces
Apologies for the non-appearance of yesterday’s blog – I wrote it and then pushed the wrong button (and then spent a lot of time driving on snowy roads). Is it snowy enough for you? Imagine its impact on wildlife. A week tomorrow it is Big Garden Birdwatch – time to get those bird feeders filled…
Raptor round up
It would be perfectly possible to write about birds of prey, how wonderful they are and their troubled and shortened lives, every day on this blog. I try not to do that because there are other sites that do it so well (raptor politics and raptor persecution Scotland) and because there are other big issues…
Ralph Underhill cartoon
It’s about TB
After the decision to delay the badger-cull pilot study it might be that badgers are breathing a sigh of relief. Except they won’t be because we don’t have in place effective measures to limit the spread of bovine TB in badgers and cattle and from one to the other (both ways!). One huge problem with…
Ralph Underhill cartoon
Next week I will blog about badgers again, one day (not sure which day). The definition of a cartoon. Ralph Underhill is a talented cartoonist – more of his work can be found here.
Round up
Defra: are pretty hopeless really aren’t they? I haven’t had a reply to my ex MP’s letter about Andrew Wood’s witness statement. I’m probably on a database as a pleb – but that’s better than being a patrician. (see previous blogs on Wuthering Moors). Autumn: I saw a jay on my walk around Stanwick Lakes…