Back in Blighty

Been back in UK for a couple of weeks but most of that was in quarantine so not much wildlife sightings to report on. The weather has been awful too with constant low night temperatures and very wet and windy so not great for moths. Nice to see the Swifts back outside the Beddington obs window. The obs is being refurbished at the moment ready for rent as we mainly close the chapter on Beddington Farmlands (which now has a new warden to take over from where we have left of). We are now making exciting plans to buy our own land and nature reserve in the UK and in meantime will mainly be based at Holly's family home and working on the Bulgaria project and the Azores project. 

The recent big news in the conservation world is Environment Minister's George Eustice's speech on the new ecological and environmental aspirations set out in the new Environment and Agriculture Bills. Hopefully there will be some opportunities in there for our new UK project with various incentives and subsidies for private ecological land management. According to Mark Avery and some other conservation commentators there is some post-Brexit weakening of ecological regulations but Richard Benwell of LINK was overall rather positive about it all (can't help thinking he is being duped though). No doubt companies like Viridor/KKR and corrupt councils like Sutton will find a way round any regulations (they are already not meeting hardly any of existing regulations or conditions which were backed by EU)  and are likely to become empowered even more outside EU accountability so not expecting much to change at Beddington Farmlands unfortunately (decline will almost certainly escalate) and the need for the private and individual conservation initiatives outside the sphere of the corpocracy in concert with deep systemic change has never been greater. In these deeply corrupt times when the Environmental Minister's speech has to be taken in context of the the bed of failed targets, misinformation and unenforced policies it's been built on, our change in direction from public partnerships to privately owned projects certainly feels like the best direction to be heading off in. 

The Beddington obs 'Bugry'- end of an era. Been many local natural history discoveries from this room over the last decade (SEE HERE) 

Visited Rosie's project in the week with Lee. Since lockdown certainly seems like there's been an upsurge in personal get back to nature projects which is great to see 

The lawn at the Old Vic is recovering after the winter Ponies 

The mini-farm is a bit behind this year with the weather but things are getting there and Holly's dad has completed his new barn and Coach House Conversion which is looking great. 

Jacob picking wildflowers from the garden and rescuing a young Great Tit from the dogs (below)