To make sense of the figures for 2023 UK Hen Harrier numbers, released today by RSPB, they need to be seen in context.  There are five important contextual considerations. There are pretty good estimates of how many pairs of Hen Harriers could exist in different parts of the UK in the absence of illegal persecution and those suggest that, overall, the UK population is at between a third and a fifth of its potential depending on the year. We have a long run of Hen Harrier surveys, carried out in a comparable way, stretching back over three and a half decades (see Table below). There is li ..read more

Hen Harrier survey results 2023: Numbers improve, but much more to be done Numbers of one of the UK’s rarest birds of prey, the Hen Harrier, are increasing across the UK, but their future still hangs in the balance according to a new survey. Results of the 2023 Hen Harrier survey have been released, which show how populations of Hen Harriers are faring throughout the UK and Isle of Man, but it’s a mixed picture, with some populations doing better than in previous years, while others are in decline. The results give some cause for optimism – the UK and Isle of Man population is estimated to be ..read more

Bob Berzins is a campaigner and activist.  His previous guests blogs here all focus on the management, or mismanagement, of upland areas such as the Peak District, Walshaw Moor and the North York Moors. See also his novel Snared. In 2014 and 2015 two surfaced tracks were constructed on the grouse moors of the north east Peak District, both with approval of Natural England. The purpose of Natural England is to help conserve, enhance and manage the natural environment for the benefit of present and future generations. But the impact of these tracks both visually and on the conservation fea ..read more

Christopher Goddard. Photo: Bruce Coutts Christopher Goddard is a cartographer and writer whose hand-drawn guidebooks and maps cover the West Yorkshire landscape in intimate detail. Born in Sheffield, he has lived in Hebden Bridge for nearly 20 years and explored most corners of the area’s moors and woods. There is more information at christophergoddard.net .   Turbine 34: White Swamp SD 98144 33521 ///wealth.rapid.motor Map of walk to T34 White Swamp. Writing a blog about one of the proposed sites of the turbines on the Calderdale Wind Farm is right up my street, an excuse to explore and ..read more

  Kathleen Jamie is Scotland’s National Poet or Makar, and this book is a collection of personal notes, prose poems, micro-essays and fragments. The idea is that they are arranged here like the stones of a cairn.  I was slightly nervous that this might be too ‘literary’ for me – but it wasn’t. Here are some powerful, clear and perceptive accounts, remembrances and observations with a strong environmental flavour. Accounts of demonstrations and protests attended, bird flu on the Bass Rock, a Raven that croaks at you, a yellow hawkbit, thrift and guano. Bits of covid, family, friends ..read more

Mushrooms are fascinating for so many reasons, but not the least of them is that you can eat many of them with relish but if you eat some of them they may constitute your last meal. And so a book nudging you towards picking and using mushrooms has to be pretty strong on the warnings and clear on the identification features. I’m no expert (which is why foraging for fungi seems an exotic and exciting prospect to me) but it seems to me that this book gets the balance between encouragement and caution right. It is a very attractive book thanks to the inherent weirdness and beauty of the mushrooms ..read more

My latest book, Reflections, proposes that we all consider ourselves as conservation investors. Here, I wonder whether I should invest my money for conservation in The National Trust? Background: I have occasionally been a member of The National Trust but I’ve come and gone – mostly gone – click here. The subscription rate is high and I never feel I am being told much about brilliant conservation or environmental work for my money. That is not to say that I think the NT doesn’t do any good at all – of course it does. If you’re spending £700m per annum –  Charity Commission website – it wo ..read more

The annual examination of the claims made by the shooting industry over their good faith in removing lead shot from their hobby through voluntary means by 2025 are given their annual fact check – click here for paper just published. But it is summed up perfectly by this graph: Lead shot was found in 93% of Pheasant samples on sale for public consumption. What price this figure approaching 0% next year? Longer odds than me playing for England tomorrow against France in Paris, I’d say. The authors estimate that at present rate of little progress the figure might be in the low 80%s next year. Th ..read more

Photo: Lydia MacKinnon Nick MacKinnon is a freelance teacher of Maths, English and Medieval History, and lives above Haworth, in the last inhabited house before Top Withens = Wuthering Heights. In 1992 he founded the successful Campaign to Save Radio 4 Long Wave while in plaster following a rock-climbing accident on Skye. His poem ‘The metric system’ won the 2013 Forward Prize. His topical verse and satire appears in the Spectator, and his puzzles and problems in the Sunday Times and American Mathematical Monthly. Email: nipmackinnon@gmail.com    Guest blog – Walshaw Turbine 35 by Ni ..read more

In my book Reflections I make the point that a revival of wildlife in the UK will require political action: action on farming policy, energy policy, forestry policy as well as investment in the right wildlife conservation policies. You and I, as individuals, can have some influence on those matters but we’ll have most influence when we act together and, although you might not have thought about them in this way before, we already do have such mechanisms available to us – the wildlife organisations of which we are members or supporters. We, the wildlife-motivated public need to influence our (w ..read more