Who I am – Scottish with a fascination for wildlife from childhood – in lieu of formal qualifications (and not being able to flash them about!) – was on the 1990 International Youth Conservation Exchange to Hungary, was the 1993 winner of the BBC Wildlife Magazine ‘Realms of the Russian Bear’ competition and spent nearly…
Tag: grouse moor
RSPB: BirdCrime report
Pole trap on Brewlands Estate, Scotland. RSPB’s Birdcrime report reveals 68 confirmed incidents of bird of prey persecution in the UK during 2017, but many illegal killings are going undetected or unreported. Incidents occurred in all 4 UK countries with England having the highest number of confirmed incidents The RSPB believes the introduction of a…
A Bluffer’s Guide to Agriculture Policy (2)
I’ve explained (in oh so broad terms!) how we got to where we are with European Agriculture Policy (see here). This blog is about what’s wrong with the current position. Public policy tends to evolve through tweaks and reform rather than by massive change, and the pace of reform is bound to be slow when…
Guest blog – It’s Another Petition by Anthony Britner.
Anthony is a 29 year old (at the time of writing) natural history enthusiast, birdwatcher, trainee ringer and graduate zoologist from North Wales. Anthony can be found on Twitter via @AnthonyJBritner This guest blog is about another of those “anti-shooting petitions”. This time, it’s a petition to the Welsh assembly to “Introduce a Licence to…
Some news items
sad news from Malta – the great Joe Sultana passed away on Tuesday, aged 78. Joe was a passionate campaigner and advocate for birds on Malta and in the Mediterranean in general. He led BirdLife Malta for many years and his son, Mark, is now BirdLife Malta’s CEO. Campaigning against bird killing (much of it…
Three more gone – Defra’s plan is wholly inadequate.
Hen Harrier, Hilma. Photo: Steve Downing. Hen Harrier, Octavia. Photo: Steve Downing Hen Harrier, Heulwen. Photo: Guy Anderson. Three more young Hen Harriers have disappeared – all in areas of driven grouse shooting. See the RSPB Skydancer blog for details. Rory Stewart’s Hen Harrier Inaction Plan is working very, very badly – just as many…
An alternative narrative
Natural England’s answers to some questions about the failure of two Hen Harrier nests on a Yorkshire grouse moor this season were published on this blog this morning. To be fair to NE, they only responded to the questions I posed, rather than giving a full account of events on this grouse moor over the…
NE and grouse moor Hen Harriers
I asked NE some questions about their role in protecting two nests of Hen Harriers in Yorkshire last summer (2018). The two nests were on the same estate and one male was paired with two females. Natural England’s account of what happened on this moor does not fully accord with what local raptor workers tell…
A Labour MP writes
I was interested to see this response that a blog reader received from their Labour MP. I long for the day when I have a Labour MP, but as I don’t, I cannot write to check how close this is to the standard letter sent out to constituents by other Labour MPs. But maybe you…
Press release from Leigh Day – brood-meddling judicial review
A legal case to challenge the trial of brood management of endangered hen harriers will be heard in the High Court on 5 and 6 December 2018. Permission was given in July for a judicial review of Natural England’s decision to grant a licence to allow brood management of the birds. The case is being…