Working and living in London, it's a joy to visit our reserves or the countryside. Yet I'm all too conscious of the number of fellow Londoners who feel no connection with rural Britain and don't care where the food in our shops comes from.

It's a sad state of affairs and maybe I and other conservationists are partly to blame. Why are farmland birds important to you if you're struggling to keep a roof over…

There's a drumming on my flat roof .. it's raining heavily and I can almost hear the plants and trees sighing with relief.

Yet, newspapers and programmes continue to talk about drought. Now look at the lush green field pictured on the right. That's our Rainham Marsh nature reserve seen from the visitor centre at Purfleet. It looks good doesn't it?

The image is completely wrong. The reeds along the trenches…