Many parts of society are filled with activists. The Oxford English Dictionary defines activism as ‘the policy or practice of using vigorous, direct action to achieve a political or social goal’. It involves active engagement, campaigning, or direct participation to bring about change. I’m a great believer in peaceful campaigning, or protest, but as soon as a window is broken, you’ve lost my interest.
I believe education is a much better tool for change. Whilst shouting and making a racket is some peoples cup of tea, I prefer to work quietly, educating the people that matter.
Earlier this year, Channel 4 News reported on the River Roding Trust, an organisation of volunteer trespassers, who believe it is their duty to clean up a river. Fair enough you might say, as the authorities haven’t carried out what they think is correct. Recently they cleared a section up, but with little Health and Safety, and also dropped Himalayan Balsam with a slashing saw.
The RHS states that Himalayan Balsam is classed as a ‘non-native invasive plant. It appears on the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, Schedule 9 list and the Non-native Species Secretariat (NNSS) list of Species of Special Concern, meaning there are restrictions on growing, cultivating, selling and transporting it. If Himalayan balsam is already growing in your garden, this is not considered an offence, though it is recommended that you control or remove it. However, you must not intentionally introduce it or cause it to spread‘.
I don’t think slashing is helping the cause, however noble it might seem to be, but they’re loud and grab headlines.
The Derbyshire Wildlife Trust recently posted that ‘Eurasian elk could shape Derbyshire’s wetlands once again 🫎’
‘This keystone species roamed Britain for thousands of years – engineering wetlands and woodlands that allowed countless other species to thrive. Sadly, hunting and habitat loss erased them from our landscapes. Now, we have the chance to bring them home 💚’.
Now I don’t want to seem a killjoy, but have you seen the size of an Elk..? I have, and I describe them as a Shire Horse with handlebars. They are huge. Whilst I celebrate many of the trust’s work, should we really be bringing a tank to the countryside, which the trust states would be fenced in (so it’s a zoo). When I questioned them about the reintroduction, I asked what they were doing to protect the species we already have, before bringing something as huge as Elk into Derbyshire. We already have a major Deer problem which needs addressing first. We should also be eradicating Grey Squirrels and American Crayfish etc, before spending huge amounts of funding on passion projects. I sill await a reply. Big headlines raise funds, but where is the science..?
They have also reintroduced White Storks to Derbyshire, with the headline ‘White storks have returned to the Midlands for the first time in more than 600 years, marking a major milestone in an ambitious species recovery project at Willington Wetlands’. A ‘predator proof enclosure’ has been created (it’s a cage), with the project costing £300,000. More headline grabbling…
On the subject of wildlife trusts, because I’m a field sporting man, I’m often accused of being ‘one of those people’. Well, those people pump a huge amount of money and time into the outdoors for free, carrying out immense work for the benefit of wildlife, but ask for little recognition. Over the spring and summer ‘those people’ have fought immense wildfires on the moors set off either deliberately or accidentally by members of the public. They ask for no money, they supply their own equipment and they risk their lives, quietly and without complaint, whilst major government and publicly funded organisations deny the issue and scream headlines of propaganda and regret. They sound more like cults than responsible people). I remember fighting a fire on the moors above Glossop in 2000 – the first time we’d seen a disposable BBQ used. A school visit burned down a huge area of moorland, had footpaths closed due to rockfall, and caused immense damage to wildlife. We thought it was a one off – how wrong we were.
Particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic, people have headed into the hills for fresh air and exercise. This is truly wonderful news. Lighting multiple campfires in tinder dry woodland however is not my idea of responsible stewardship. Earlier this year, a keeper visited the Snake Woodland during a weekend evening, and noted 47 campfires. This not only baffles me, but it scares me too. How can we think this responsible..? If we think nothing can go wrong and we’re ok, we are deluding ourselves. As one spark from a firework has shown, it doesn’t take much to destroy a moorland, a woodland, the wildlife and everything in it. Many of the areas which have burned and been badly damaged or destroyed are run by the National Trust, the RSPB and rewilding charities, who can (apparently) do no wrong in the public eye.
We’re not activists. We don’t seek headlines. Talking of which…
The RSPB are a well respected charity, and have done sterling work in many places, educating people and protecting birds. What you don’t often see are the methods that people don’t like, namely killing to control predator numbers in an effort protect ground nesting birds. Why cant they be open and upfront about this, because this work needs to be done. Its probably to do with funding more than protection…
This is a subject moorland managers and keepers speak openly about, and are shot down (if you’ll excuse the pun), due to so called cruelty etc. Education again is the reality of conservation, not pretty headlines, fundraisers and selective ignorance. Just look at the case of Herring Gulls in Ipswich. The headlines read like a murder case, and yet the work was licensed and lawful.
An organisation called Earth First recently set up camp (they call everyone squatters, so its a squat) on a tinder dry moor to carry out a 5 day festival including green anarchism to “action climbing” (i’m not even sure what that is, and I’m a climber). They did insist on no camp fires, or sources of ignition, but fire fighters had to monitor the situation on a 24hr schedule, because of the risks. This is not a good use of firefighter time, but they had little choice.
We all need to work together, and I’m sure some folk want to shout at me in their best activism voice. Well, let them. I’ll keep working with science based groups like the GWCT and use something that many people find impossible to understand – common sense.
As my now departed mother called them ‘the shouty people’ stamp their feet like children and cry like them too.
It’s about time people listened to reason and learned…