Farming

Zoë Randle from Butterfly Conservation highlights why butterflies are so important for farming and wildlife on farmland and recommends the RSPB Farmland Butterfly Survey method for monitoring them. This methodology is being used in the Volunteer...

Richard Winspear, Agricultural Advice Manager, cites important issues raised in the recent BoCC review regarding threatened bird species. Birds of Conservation Concern 5 Last December saw the publication of the latest review of the status o...

In this blog, we explain about how RSPB Scotland staff are working with farmers and crofters through the National Lottery Heritage Funded Corncrake Calling project to increase the area that is positively managed for the species. Creating more land well managed for Corncrake has been shown to have wider benefits for a host of other species including plants, bumblebees and beetles.

Just before Christmas, RSPB Scotland released…

Georgie Bray, Hope Farm Manager shares her experiences from the farm.  Trials and Tribulations at Hope Farm – Insecticide-free oilseed rapeIn recent years, we at Hope Farm have been hit by the same problems as most oilseed rape (OSR) growe...

Catherine Jones, from Farm Wildlife highlights why pollinating insects are so important for farming and wildlife on farmland and recommends a quick and simple method for monitoring them. In the UK, wild bees, hoverflies, and other pollinating insects...

Ruairi Brogan, Sustainable Agriculture Policy Officer, brings us up to date on the future agriculture policy in Northern Ireland. Last month RSPB Northern Ireland responded to the Department of Agriculture, Environment, and Rural Affairs (DAERA) Futu...

Steph Morren, Senior Policy Officer reflects on the situation 60 years since the publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring.  We still face many of the same issues with chemical use, however, many farmers are now adopting innovative...

If you wish to join any of these webinars register using the links below

Wednesday 2^nd February, 19.00 to 20.30

• Title: Using cover/trap crops to facilitate IPM
• Registration page https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/using-covertrap-crops-to-facilitate-ipm-the-role-of-beneficial-plants-tickets-245622181557
• Content: The first in a series of events about Integrated Pest Management, this event will focus on the potential of plants…

Last year, to celebrate our 20th Anniversary, we launched a Hope farm webinar series. The aim was to share lessons that we had learnt on the farm over the last 20 years, incorporating our main mantra which is to share wildlife-friendly, sustainable farming practices that make sense for the farm business. It was fantastic to be joined by the experts that we learn from, and have a wonderful audience that seemed to also…

Guest blog by Georgie Bray, Hope Farm Manager Soil is the foundation that helps us to grow crops on the farm and look after so many of the species sitting at the base of the food chain in farmland ecosystems. Without healthy soils, crops suffer in ou...

Ruairi Brogan, Sustainable Agriculture Policy Officer tells us more. Stormont, the Northern Ireland Assembly Building. Image (c) Simon Graham It’s been a busy period for the RSPB NI Policy & Advocacy team with the Department of Agricultur...

RSPB Cymru views the creation of a new Welsh Agriculture Act and Sustainable Farming Scheme as a unique opportunity to use taxpayers’ money to establish sustainable farming that helps tackle the nature and climate emergency. As such we welcome Welsh Government...

Guest blog by Lucy Bjorck, Senior Policy Officer Whatever your views on Brexit there was always one obvious opportunity for radical change for the better and that was to leave the shackles of the behemoth which is the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP...

Guest blog by Andrew Stark, Land Use Policy Officer and Chris Bailey, Advisory Manager Scotland Since the last edition of Farming E-News, there has been several important developments in Scotland’s food and farming policy to update on. Whi...

Guest blog by Alice Groom, Senior Policy Officer In England, Defra is currently reforming agricultural policies, replacing subsidy primarily with environmental payments. This provides a once in a generation opportunity to truly build a nature friendl...

Guest blog by Shelley Abbott, Fair to Nature Technical Facilitator, RSPB

The twin crises of biodiversity loss and climate change are increasingly forefront in the news. Especially here in the UK with COP26 just days away! But are they separate crises? Surely biodiversity and climate are closely intertwined, where changes in one have an impact on the other?! Human activity impacts them both.

Image: Large skipper butterfly…

Guest blog by Jenny Atkins, Agriculture Advice Project Manager

During the last year in Cambridgeshire initially, we have been working on an inspirational scheme that trains participants to monitor a wide range of farm wildlife, provides multi-taxa surveys for farmers, introduces a greater diversity of volunteers to our work and delivers meaningful conservation outcomes yet remains cost-effective to manage. For the farmers…

Guest blog by Sophie Mott, Carbon Farming Project Manager and Georgie Bray, Hope Farm Manager

Why are we interested in Carbon at Hope farm?

Recently, hard to read science underlined the ever-closing gap in our opportunity to halt the increase in temperature beyond 1.5 degrees. A shocking statistic, and that is without the full understanding of what this may mean for nature, where we live, and our ability to farm. Given…

Guest blog by Jonathan Bell, Head of Land and Sea Policy, RSPB NI and Ruairi Brogan, Policy Officer - Sustainable Agriculture, RSPB NI

In Northern Ireland, peatland covers 24.6% of our land area and represent some of our most iconic landscapes. When healthy and well-functioning, these mossy, wetland soils can provide a vast array of benefits to society, from improved water quality, natural flood management, and carbon…

Guest blog by Roisin Beck-Taylor, Project Manager - Policy Climate Change Task and Finish Group and Brittany Mulhearn, Senior Campaigner

From lobbying government for new climate polices to helping our nature reserves cope with the effects of climate change, the RSPB is working hard to make a difference.

We are seeing the impacts of extreme weather events caused by climate change on the people and places we love both here…

Fair to Nature is the only UK farm scheme to deliver the scale of land management wildlife requires to thrive. Find out more about this gold standard for nature-friendly farming and how it is helping farmers to create and manage diverse and successful wildlife habitats and linking them up with like-minded businesses to create Fair to Nature certified products.

Northern Ireland’s Agri-Food Sector can play a pivotal role in addressing the nature and climate nature and climate emergency, at the same time as providing economic opportunities for rural communities and supporting healthier, sustainable diets. An Independent Strategic Review of the NI Agri-Food Sector (ISRAF) will consider the challenges and opportunities facing the agri-food sector in Northern Ireland and will play…

Guest blog by Steph Morren, Senior Policy Officer 

Take the survey here

Increasingly, farmers and other land managers are looking for ways to reduce their reliance on pesticides. This is due to a number of reasons including concern for the environment, concern for their health, concern about their soil health and concern about cost. As we move towards new land management schemes that will pay farmers for delivering public…

Guest blog from Andrew Stark, Land Use Policy Offer RSPB Scotland and Rhys Evans, Policy Officer RSPB Cymru

Scotland

A new Parliament

On May 6th, Scotland voted in a new Parliament and Members of the Scottish Parliament (MSPs). There were 129 seats up for grabs, with the following results: SNP (64), Conservatives (31), Liberal Democrats (4), Scottish Labour (22), and Scottish Green Party (8). Whilst the SNP were 1 short…

Guest blog by Samantha Lee, Senior Project manager, Curlew LIFE project

The UK breeding population of curlews has almost halved since the mid-1990s. This is not just a problem because we don’t want to lose this species from our landscapes, but because the UK is one of the most important countries for curlews, supporting approximately 40% of the European breeding population and about a quarter of the global population…