• When does a hamper become a help?

    When it's a hamper created by many of the wildlife-friendly farmers we work with across the country to help demonstrate the importance of supporting farmland wildlife.

    You may have seen our blog posts before Christmas highlighting the hamper we handed in to Defra, created by many of the wildlife-friendly farmers we work with across the country. What you didn’t see was that we actually produced two hampers and last…

  • Farming to save the "fat man"

    Or the corn bunting to give him his proper name! The nickname 'fat bird of the barley’ comes from their rotund appearance and their association with cereal cultivation.

    Corn bunting by Andy Hay (rspb-images.com)

    Corn buntings used to be widespread throughout Europe, but are now one of the fastest declining farmland birds. There are just 800 singing males left in Scotland, mostly in the eastern lowlands. Now…

  • The Isle of Axholme: great for farmers, great for birds

    “Look, that lapwing’s banana-ing!” was the exclamation from my colleague.
    “It’s what?” I asked. “Banana-ing?”
    “Yes,” he replied. “When they’re displaying to potential mates, they often throw their heads back and stick their tails up in the air. They make themselves into a banana shape.”
    Everywhere I looked there were lapwings tumbling out of the…