Before I headed north on leave for a couple of weeks, I helped celebrate Hen Harrier Day at RSPB Rainham Marshes today.  It was a fabulous event and I was delighted to join a great line of speakers (Ruth Tingay, Natalie Bennett, Barry Gardiner, Mark Avery and Chris Packham).  This is (roughly) what I said...

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I want to start by saying thank you.

Thank you to the founders of Hen Harrier Day for…

A guest blog from Chris Corrigan - the RSPB's Director of England.

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Last summer we reported that many young lesser black-backed gulls had been killed at a breeding colony in Lancashire’s Forest of Bowland. Because the gulls were part of a nationally (and indeed internationally) important population, any such actions would have required special consent from Natural…

Origins are important.  Knowing where you come from helps explain who you are today and can offer clues as to where need to get to in the future. 

My backstory explains why I do what I do. As a child, I was encouraged to look at the natural world differently by my Mum (a biology teacher) and was injected with a puritanical zeal thanks to my father (a vicar). It was probably inevitable that I would end up working in nature…

This August, the spotlight once again falls on the state of our hills and its wildlife: the first Hen Harrier Day event of the year took place in the Sheffield sunshine on Saturday and more events are planned this weekend (including at Rainham which is where I'll be on Saturday).  

The anger over the plight of the hen harrier, the state of our peatlands and the desire to reform grouse shooting may seem far away from…

Next Saturday I’ll be speaking at Hen Harrier Day London and South East at Rainham Marshes, and for once, it seems we’ve actually got something to celebrate at this annual event, which was set up to highlight the plight of this magnificent bird of prey.

Photo of female hen harrier by my colleague Mark Thomas (rspb-images.com)

Normally, any news relating to hen harriers is bad news. For the past few years…

Several weeks ago, I highlighted here the concerns the RSPB and our partner organisations have about the ‘governance gap’ that will be created when the UK leaves the EU and leaves all of the governance mechanisms that have enforced our environmental laws during our time in the EU.

In January, the UK Government promised us a ‘world-leading environmental watchdog’ to help tackle this gap, but then proposed…

The group that has challenged our predator control practices have made some sweeping statements on social media which are misleading.

For example, following a first meeting when we discussed predator control at length, we did offer to meet again to discuss some of their concerns in more detail. They refused to do so.

They also have made highly subjective statements about the contractors we employ to undertake the predator…

We’ve had a challenge today about some of our practices. Some of the claims we don’t believe to be true.  This blog is our response and explains our approach where predator management is concerned.

Making the decision to employ legal, lethal methods of predator control is never easy. In fact, it’s a practise we go to great lengths to avoid until we can see no other viable conservation alternatives and when…

This summer, I have visited different parts of the organisation hearing about and seeing some of the great work that we are doing: from seabird protection through to moorland restoration.   And this week, I am with my colleagues in the South West of England who recently reported the fabulous news about how we have boosted the population of the little tern colony at Chesil Beach in Dorset in partnership with Chesil Bank…

I am sorry to have been so quiet over the past week or so – the hot weather has slowed me down – which is why I am little late commenting on the fact that the Prime Minister has now promised an Environment Bill.

This news arrived after some knife-edge Brexit votes and as Westminster was beginning to wind down business for the summer break. The Prime Minister was in front of the Liaison Committee (the committee…

If, for whatever reason, you are still in need of a dose optimism, here is an update by my colleague, Jake di Paolo (Project Research Officer, Gola Cocoa), on work we are doing in West Africa helping to develop livelihoods from cocoa production to support the protection of Liberia’s globally important forests.  

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As I sit in a conference room, at the Green Liberia…

My evening of sadness watching England bow out of the World Cup last night was flanked by two very uplifting days.

Today, colleagues from the Smithsonian Institute were in Cambridge to explore how best to build on the success of Earth Optimism in 2017. These events were underpinned by the belief that the conservation sector should spend more time talking about the work we have done improving the natural world not just…

A lot can happen in a week so I thought it a good idea to get an update from RSPB Senior Land Use Policy Officer Dr Pat Thompson on the recent events at RSPB Dove Stone.

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The recent fire in the northwest Peak District that started on Stalybridge Estate has attracted significant media and public interest. The spectre of smoke-filled streets and people having to leave their homes…

As the UK continues to negotiate its withdrawal from the European Union, it is putting in place building blocks to replace those measures that will lost. As I have discussed previously, this includes maintaining or bolstering existing environmental legal protection, enforcement mechanisms and funding, developing a new farming and land use policy to replace the Common Agriculture Policy, but also new arrangements for fisheries…

There are some environmental debates which seem to be come and go with the same frequency as England taking part in penalty shoot-outs. Some, however, like last night’s drama in Russia, have happy endings or at least give us an opportunity to learn some lessons.

The debate about how to harness the tidal power from the Severn Estuary has raged for decades, most recently after Rt Hon Charles Hendry was commissioned…

Given the fact that a fire has been raging over Saddleworth moor this week, I thought it would be good to host a guest blog from my colleague Pat Thompson (the RSPB's senior upland policy officer) to offer our perspective on what has happened and what our local team has been doing to help.

You will have seen on the news over recent days, catastrophic images of fire sweeping across the hills near Saddleworth moor…

Whatever your views on Brexit, it can be easy to get ground down by the current uncertainty. For farming and wildlife in particular, the future is far from clear. It is at times like this then that we need to top up our reserves of hope and optimism in order to keep our eyes on the end goal of a countryside richer in nature, alongside profitable and productive farming.

After attending the Greener UK and Wildlife & Countryside…

Yesterday, an article in the Sunday Times stated “Michael Gove, the environment secretary, has issued licences for farmers to shoot the birds [ravens] in Derbyshire, Lancashire, Berkshire, Wiltshire and Dorset.” This comes hot on the heels of the concern in Scotland over the research licence granted by Scottish Natural Heritage to local estates to cull over 60 non breeding ravens per annum over 5 years.

This week is the first ever UK Swift Awareness Week, a brilliant initiative which aims to highlight the plight of these amazing birds. 

When I look up at swifts screaming through the skies over my house in Cambridge, it seems that they live in an altogether different world to our own. They have an almost exclusively airborne existence, coming in to land only to nest. Swifts eat, sleep, drink, feed, bathe and mate on the wing…

I have been out and about a bit over the past couple of weeks catching up with colleagues in Scotland and Northern Ireland while seeing the impact of the work we are doing. I visited our Abernethy, Loch of Strathbeg and Fowlsheugh nature reserves last week and I enjoyed my first visit to the Garron Plateau in the Antrim Hills yesterday.

Reflecting on these and other recent visits, I am proud that it is becoming routine…

Our natural environment depends on strong laws, properly enforced. When the UK leaves the EU we also leave all of the governance mechanisms that have enforced our environmental laws during our time in the EU, leaving our natural environment vulnerable to exploitation. This is why we, and our partners, are so concerned about this ‘governance gap’ and how our governments intend to fill it.

Gannet by Danny…

Before chairing our event on curlews at the Hay Festival on Friday, I went to a lecture given by Karin Wahl-Jorgensen about “the emotional politics of Trump and the rise of angry populism”.  It seemed like a good way to warm up for our event and it was a sobering reminder of how anger has infected politics across the world with potentially dangerous consequences.  

During her talk, Karin quoted Immanuel Kant…

Yesterday, a much-needed action plan was launched to save our most rapidly declining migratory bird: the turtle dove.  The RSPB has worked for three years to get wide support for this plan and I am delighted to host this blog from my colleagues, Joscelyn Ashpole, Ian Fisher and Carles Carboneras, to say more.

Turtle doves are a sign of summer for many and iconic farmland birds. They’re also incredible long-distance…