Sunday book review – Cairn by Kathleen Jamie
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
5d ago
  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
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Sunday book review – The Mushroom Guide and Identifier by Peter Jordan and Neville Kilkenny
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1w ago
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
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Being a conservation investor – 2, The National Trust
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1w ago
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
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Shotswitch – not much switching after 4 years
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1w ago
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
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Guest blog – Walshaw Turbine 35 by Nick MacKinnon
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1w ago
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
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Being a conservation investor: 1, Introduction
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
2w ago
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
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Sunday book review – Natural Causes by Stephen Mills
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1M ago
I liked this book very much. It is written by someone about my age (slightly older) who has travelled to many of the same places as I have at similar times of his life but I don’t think you would have to have been in Oxford, the Camargue or the Coto Donana at those times also to enjoy the book. The author writes very engagingly about his life, family, girlfriends, expeditions, conservation work and most of all about film making. He has worked on TV series about Indian wildlife including the species featured on the front of the book but also on The Life of Plants and many other wildlife progra ..read more
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Sunday book review – Wetland Diaries by Ajay Tegala
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1M ago
I’m not a massive supporter of the cult of youth as I feel it’s a stage of life that is best grown out of. But this book, from this young (early 30s) man, is a joy. Really! The author is enthusiastic about his job as a ranger at the National Trust’s site of Wicken Fen and his enthusiasm encompasses his work, his colleagues and the wildlife he is there to nurture.  But this is a tale of what he actually does, day to day, working at the sharp end some might say (though there are sharp ends everywhere) of nature conservation.  He is managing wildlife, looking at poo, castrating calves ..read more
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Guest blog – Biodiversity Net Gain: for good or ill, by Dominic Woodfield
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1M ago
Dominic Woodfield is the Managing Director of Bioscan, a long established and well-respected consultancy specialising in applied ecology. He is a life-long birder, a specialist in botany, habitat restoration and creation and in protected fauna including bats, herpetofauna and other species. He is also a highly experienced practitioner in Environmental Impact Assessment and Habitats Regulations Assessment. Most of his work is for the development sector, but he has also undertaken commissions for Natural England, the RSPB, Wildlife Trusts and campaign groups. He once mounted an independent ..read more
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Guest blog – Times are a changing by Ian Parsons
Mark Avery | Standing up for Nature
by Mark
1M ago
Ian Parsons spent twenty years as a ranger. He now writes books and articles on wildlife. He has contributed many articles to this blog. His book A Vulture Landscape was published by Whittles Publishing in 2020, this was followed by Seasonality in 2022. His new book, Of the Trees and the Birds is now available for pre order direct from the publishers https://www.whittlespublishing.com/Of_the_Trees_and_the_Birds or via the many book selling websites. Ian is also the editor of the forthcoming book Great Misconceptions – Rewilding Myths and Misunderstandings. You can follow Ian on Twitter @Birder ..read more
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