One quarter of native mammals now at risk of extinction in Britain The first official Red List for British Mammals highlights species most at risk of national extinction in the near future, with researchers calling for urgent action to prevent their loss. The first official Red List for British Mammals, produced by the Mammal Society…
Tag: Natural England
Where is the review of gamebird impacts?
DEFRA announced on 21 February 2020 that a review of numbers of gamebirds released and their impacts on protected sites was ‘expected to conclude in March 2020’ and yet we are now near the end of the first week in August. Just saying… Wild Justice will be in court as the Claimant in this matter…
GWCT fact-checking website – does it measure up?
The release of the GWCT fact-checking website is interesting. I wonder whether this marks a significant change in direction of GWCT or just a spasm. We’ll see as time passes. But I would give it a cautiously warm welcome at this stage and hope that it might represent a wish of GWCT to retrace their…
Dear First Minister – what you told Nicola Sturgeon (2)
Yes, back to that poisoned White-tailed Eagle found on a grouse moor in a National Park. Why? Because it’s just as shocking and awful this week as it was last week. Nicola Sturgeon and Roseanna Cunningham may feel that they had a bit of a torrid time on this subject last week but, after the…
After…things I’d like to be different (8)
After coronavirus (which might be quite a long way away), or at least when the world settles down to a new normal, there are some things that I’d like to be different. So over the next days and weeks I’m going to write them down. They will mostly be to do with our relationship with…
Update on 2020 Hen Harrier brood meddling (2)
This is information that I was sent last week by Natural England about this year’s activities in Hen Harrier brood-meddling. I have disclosed here less detailed information about the nest and release localities than I was given, as that seems wise. Intervention nest 1 Four chicks were taken from a nest in North Yorkshire on…
Updates and news
The National Trust is making up to 1,200 staff redundant as part of £100m/yr savings plans Nidderdale Cocktail of bendiocarb, chloralose, isofenphos and carbofuran kills dog. Same local cocktail responsible for raptor deaths. Insp Matt Hagen, from North Yorkshire Police, said: “The fact we have seen this same combination of chemicals, the ‘Nidderdale cocktail‘ as…
Dear First Minister – what you told Nicola Sturgeon
Many readers of this blog and of my newsletter have written to Nicola Sturgeon and/or Roseanna Cunningham about the finding of a poisoned White-tailed Eagle on a grouse moor in the Cairngorms National Park. Here are just some examples of ones that I have been sent. You notice they are all polite, personal and well-written….
Dear First Minister – from Chris Gomersall
Dear First Minister and Cabinet SecretaryMay I ask, respectfully, which image of a white-tailed eagle do you prefer? And which best represents the aspirations of the Scottish government and its attitude to Scotland’s native wildlife and the environment? I am writing to you because of the latest in a long line of sickening and illegal…
Press release – Ban Bloodsports on Yorkshire Moors
Doncaster Council has backed a ban on heather burning to save the region’s peat moors from being damaged for grouse shooting. In a letter sent to the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, Mayor Ros Jones said that the environmentally-damaging practice, which is performed by shoot operators to engineer breeding habitat for red grouse,…