This amazingly aggressive article has been published in the Angling Times. It describes a violent attack by an unknown person on someone culling cormorants under licence. Let us hope that the police catch the person involved. The RSPB certainly does not condone or encourage such behaviour.
But the author of this article, Mr Partner, uses it as an opportunity to attack birdwatchers, attack birdwatching as a pastime and misrepresent the RSPB's policies and outlook on life. The million and sixty thousand RSPB members can all feel maligned by Mr Partner's article.
Let me put on the record that the RSPB did oppose the extension of licences to kill more cormorants - but government saw fit to go ahead and that's that.
The Minister who approved the increase in licences, now a Cabinet Minister, Mr Ben Bradshaw, was quoted as saying that he was once harassed in the street by a cormorant - a very fishy story!
But since then we have worked closely with fishermen and their representative bodies on subjects such as the Water Framework Directive, cleaner rivers and the Severn Barrage. I am sure that there are many fishermen who will be highly embarassed by Mr Partner's ill-informed and provocative article.
We won't let Mr Partner's words deflect us from working with responsible fishermen on a wide range of environmental issues. And we hope that this article doesn't signal the start of a new round of anti-cormorant, anti-bird, anti-birdwatcher, anti-conservationist articles in the angling papers.
A love of the natural world demonstrates that a person is a cultured inhabitant of planet Earth.
Yes Nightjar, it's only human to fail to see others' points of view, and I'm sure I'm as guilty as anyone.
One of the factors here is that landowners are still getting used to the idea that the (predominantly urban) public tells them how to run their own patch. It wasn't so long ago that a farmer or smallholder did more or less as he/she liked; now they're swamped with regulations driven by that urban majority, many of which appear unnecessary or even counterproductive, and which stomp on the independent spirit that's been characteristic of Britain's rural population. It's not surprising some of them kick against it.
I've been impressed with how far shooters and landowners have moved on raptors in a relatively short time. The vast majority accept that killing raptors would be madness, even if they personally think there's a case for a degree of control. I think it rankles when, rather than receive praise for moving with the times, they continue to be maligned as a group.
There are still a few dinosaurs who view birds of prey as just another type of vermin. And there are still a few landowners who think they can do what the hell they like on their land in pursuit of profit. The majority of shooters and keepers I meet consider such people to be a liability.