Month: July 2024
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Butterflies at last
Only a few, and only one or at most two of each species to visit the garden this year, but it is something I suppose. The Comma above (love the name), readily identifiable by its somewhat raggedy appearance has been the only one to begin to stay still long enough to be photographed, but I…
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Charlotte Dujardin, the story that keeps on giving
Update 2. Details have emerged of another incident in 2016 recorded by an allegedly shocked steward. For daring to raise her head, Dujardin shouted at the horse she was riding “you bitch”. So not exact the perfectly harmonious relationship between horse and rider she and her i lk would have us believe. It has also…
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Protect the Wild and the Hunt Saboteurs
Monday was a big day for both. Protect the Wild launched bloodbusiness.info – “A searchable database to help us all make informed choices about our spending” which I have been excited about for a while. It is in its infancy but will grow I am sure and I hope they will include a suggestion of…
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British Wildlife magazine June 2024
Volume 35, Number 7 The striking cover this month shows a plankton, the polycheate Tomopteris, one of many superb photographs illustrating the article about marine plankton in Milford Haven. The issue opens with an excellent but thoroughly depressing article by Tommy Greene about Lough Neagh. The plight of Lake Windermere has been well publicised, but…
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Jackdaw update
Seagulls, Jackdaws and a House Martin – Animal Wild In this earlier post I wrote: I was rather worried about this young Jackdaw in the garden (the juveniles have blue eyes, which turn yellow in adulthood). I had seen it around for several days, always on the ground. He seemed fine on his feet, moving…
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Charlotte Dujardin, update
Janice Turner writing in The Times today about this and the ‘Strictly’ scandals, confirms as I said that “Deploying a long whip to train a horse to raise its feet in a stationary trot called the piaffe is not unusual. Dujardin just overdid it. Dressage has other controversies. That elegant bowed stance known as “rollkur”…
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Moths and elephants
Firstly, five “super-tusker” male elephants have recently been slaughtered for sport by the super rich in Tanazania under government licence. What is wrong with us as a species? Less dramatically, I have just turned down an invitation to take part in a wildlife survey involving moth and mammal trapping. I do understand the need for…
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Dressage and the whip – Charlotte Dujardin
Charlotte Dujardin is an Olympic level equestrian. A video has been leaked showing her viciously whipping a horse in training at least 24 times in under a minute. This appallingly cruel woman’s apology and that from British Dressage are self-serving and mealy-mouthed, the latter saying that “equine welfare must always be paramount” – that word…
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Birdwatch August 2024
This beautiful Collared Dove enjoyed a drink with perfect timing, just as I finished writing this post and was wondering what to use as the headline image. I recently wrote that I tend to avoid blogging about birds in other parts of the world because it stretched the limits of what my brain could absorb.…
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Blacknest Fields
After a delicious lunch at the nearby Anchor inn (the chef really knows what he is doing, creating a chocolate mint ice cream which tastes exactly like an After Eight and seafood arancini with saffron aioli), I joined a small group for a tour of this gorgeous eight-acre site in Hampshire on Sunday. BLACKNEST FIELDS…
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PETA calls for Levi’s boycott and Compassion in world farming
Other leading brands are moving with the times, but Levi’s is still using leather patches to carry their logo on the back of their jeans. Their welfare policy claims that animals’ health and welfare are protected. But the leather comes from filthy factory farms in countries where if legislation exists at all it is rarely…
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Gardening for wildlife
I have written a lot about this, in Animal Wild and elsewhere in this blog. I think it is hugely important, more so now than ever before, and it really isn’t difficult. I am astounded that it can still be such an uphill struggle. I look after two gardens, our own and the adjacent plot…
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HOWL, the Magazine of the Hunt Saboteurs Association
Summer 2024 In a nice nod to the film Apocalypse Now, the Chair’s introduction begins, “I love the smell of citronella in the morning; it smells like victory.” Chris Packham is pictured in conversation with a sab on the front cover and the editor refers to him as “the real leader of the opposition, the…
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Seagulls, Jackdaws and a House Martin
Having attended the BTO’s online seabird ecology course Seabird ecology, seabird decline – and a Wren and a House Martin – Animal Wild during which we learnt of the dire state of play, that Kittiwakes and Herring Gulls are red listed and a further five species of gull are amber listed, it made my blood…
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The RPSB Magazine Summer/Autumn 2024
This magazine keeps getting better. I am especially taken with the fact that it isn’t all only about birds – there are pieces about photographing wild boar, three of our native reptiles, dolphins, moths, seagrass, beavers, natterjack toads and wood ant nests. There is a superb photo of a Black-necked grebe doing well at the…
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HART Wildlife Rescue
Another Monday, another morning at this wonderful place which does so much for wildlife. We are phenomenally busy at this time of year, the phone rings non-stop, people turn up with animals (including, yesterday, a young Kestrel) in cardboard boxes in a steady stream, and we were very short of volunteers. So it was that…
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Birdwatch July 2024
The issue opens with a celebration of the success story of the Avocet (the symbol of the RSPB), pictured above. There’s news of unusual sightings of a Booted Eagle in Cornwall, Ireland’s first Yellow-crowned Night Heron (featured on the cover of the magazine), Britain’s first Indian Golden Oriole in Northumberland, an Indigo Bunting in Whitburn…
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Royal Pigeons Part II
It is only fair, following my earlier post Royal Pigeons – Animal Wild to report that our king, Charles, following a request from PETA, has withdrawn patronage and severed all ties with the ‘sport’ of pigeon racing. Previously he banned foie gras from all royal events and residences. He is to be applauded for both.…
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Silent Spring
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson, Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1962 In the course of the few days in which I read this book, I took time out to take part again in the annual Big Butterfly Count for the Butterfly Conservation Trust. The requirement is to sit outside for fifteen minutes and count butterflies and…
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Rural vandalism near me
Having read about it in the parish newsletter, I went to have a look for myself (a detour on my way to the polling station on July 4th) at an extraordinary, unbelievably arrogant act of despoilation. We are very fortunate to live in a rural and fairly tranquil area which is in a designated Area…
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Seabird ecology, seabird decline – and a Wren and a House Martin
This was an online course run by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO). I have hugely enjoyed all of their bird ID courses and this one had the advantage of being entirely free. It was a serious and sobering couple of hours. Firstly though, in the garden two days ago I saw, for the first…
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British Wildlife magazine May 2024
Volume 35, number 6 My buddleias, a butterfly favourite, are now in flower, see above. The yellow flowers in the background are from headily-scented curry plants. This May issue, featuring a Swallowtail caterpillar on the front cover, opens with a terrifying piece by Patrick Barkham, author of Badgerlands and other books, on the threat to…
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A Blackbird in the house, more lilies and some very pretty notebooks
My son Zak came in to the room at the weekend: “Dad, I need your help, there’s a bird in the house.” He had, incidentally, made me this charming card for Father’s Day. This female Blackbird had flown inside, through the house and then upstairs with our cat and Zak in hot pursuit. Zak managed…
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Restore Nature Now and my local Lib Dem candidate follow-up
I remain an undecided voter, as apparently do many. No reply from Mr Dillon. Hmm. Not long to go now. I am sure he has plenty else to be doing, but if he doesn’t have a highly efficient team in place to deal with these things, that’s a worry. A local group, the Hungerford Environmental…