Blogger: Kim Matthews, Campaigns Intern

Sometimes when I think about the problems we, the human race, are facing I have the urge to run away and live like Tom and Barbara Good.  War, famine, poverty, climate change, habitat destruction, mass species extinctions... it’s enough to make you want to bury your head in the sand.  Perhaps if I had my dream eco-self-sufficient-rare-breed-organic-fairtrade-ethical small-holding in the middle of nowhere, I could forget about everything else! 

However, I had a bit of an epiphany recently.  I was mindlessly searching through the 80 programs stagnating on my digibox when I stumbled upon a Natural World episode about Broken Tail the tiger.  I’d recently written a briefing about the RSPB’s work in Sumatra so I thought a tiger story would go down nicely with my cup of tea and slice of sticky date cake (did you know the RSPB was trying to save the rainforest including its precious, stripy inhabitants? No? Neither did I until I started working for them!).

Needless to say, 50 minutes later the tea was stone cold, the cake untouched and there was a pile of soggy tissues next to me.  Whilst I can definitely be called a soppy moo when it comes to animals, this time my tears were very much out of anger and frustration.  The story is about a young tiger that leaves the relative safety of a reserve in India and travels 100 miles only to be killed by a high-speed train.

Broken Tail was most likely searching for new territory and a mate.  On his year-long solitary journey he passed through several reserves, but all of them were now devoid of tigers. They had become isolated fragments surrounded by a sea of humanity virtually impossible to cross. The fact that he survived so long and travelled so far is an incredible testament to this particular individual. 

The moral of the story is of course the desperate need for wildlife ‘corridors’ to connect up habitat fragments so that species such as the tiger can survive. And of course, by protecting tiger habitat we also protect many other important but less well-loved species.  Aside from the shame attached if we somehow allow the tiger to become extinct, how long would the protection remain in place for those reserves and their other inhabitants?  Sadly, the tiger could have as little as a decade left.

I made a vow to myself right there and then that I couldn’t just sit back and let it happen without a fight.  I don’t want to go to my grave and look back and realise that I could have done more. And it’s not just about large, vibrant mammals on the other side of the world, our very own green and pleasant land is in trouble too.  The very same thing is happening to habitats across the UK.

It dawned on me that life is rather like a giant game of Jenga, with the human race perched on the very top.  We rely on our environment for our very survival so we can push out several blocks without much happening but eventually the whole thing will become unstable and collapse.

So much doom and gloom I hear you say. But no! There is plenty of hope to be had.  There are amazing success stories happening even as we speak and the RSPB, among others, is determined to halt the increasing decline of species and habitats and to secure a sustainable future for us all.  If, like me, you want to shout out about how brilliant and precious our planet really is, why not sign up to be an RSPB campaigner? Your voice really does count....please use it. www.rspb.org.uk/campaignchampions