Clutching at the rewetting straw
How can we have arrived at a place where wildfire risk mitigation on our heather moorlands is now being based on a soggy prayer?
Owen Williams
I'm a wildlife artist, writer, countryman, Trustee and Welsh chair of the GWCT, conservationist, and woodcock ringer/researcher with a growing participation in the debate surrounding future land…
Lapwing hopes lie in the lap of the Gods
With species such a lapwing and curlew closer than ever to extinction, why are the growing number of voices telling us to use targeted lethal predator control still being ignored?
Uncovering the Legacy of Welsh Naturalist Thomas Pennant
Unexpected encounters with neighbours whilst dog walking usually result in an exchange of local gossip, but sometimes these impromptu conversations can open up more fascinating and rewarding topics.
When the Tyranny of Virtue threatens to distort policy.
Heated disputes between academics are not new, but when legitimate concerns are voiced within academia regarding flaws in the reviewing and presentation of science for policy making, government must seek an independent review.
Slipping the surly bonds of earth: free flight with the birds
As if flying as free as a bird with a hang glider wasn't enough, sharing the air with birds of prey, the undisputed masters of flight, is a bonus when you venture into their domain of thermals, clouds, and mountain ridges.
Carbon bubbles, wolves, and fairy tales.
Getting all gooey eyed about carbon stored in the biomass of trees growing on upland organic soils whilst ignoring what's going on below ground could be more than an embarrassing blind-spot for rewilding companies. Will their carbon bubble burst?
The war of the little Englishman.
During the 19th century in Wales parcels of common land purchased by wealthy outsiders under the Inclosure Acts denied locals essential access to livestock grazing and peat cutting. In some cases the local backlash was violent and persistent.
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Navigating Complexity: Upland Rewilding Realities
A detailed investigation of the ecology, climate and Holocene history of the Scottish uplands by a growing number of experts challenges the imaginative vision we're being sold by rewilders.
Majestic Tiree: Birds, Bonds, and Barbed Wire
Shooting and sociability have always gone together, but there's nothing more bonding than sharing sporting moments when the variability of Hebridean weather and hunting over rough terrain are thrown into the mix.
The Price of Progress: Upland Farms and Carbon Capitalists
Is Labour's landing an inheritance tax bombshell on farming families at the same time they are being asked to deliver on climate and nature, ineptitude, or is there a cleverer game being played out here?
Escaping Ideological Traps
In the fight over the future of land management it is easy to attribute blinkered perspectives to people who oppose our views when sometimes we need to check that our own positioning isn't being driven by a lack of objectivity or outright tribalism.
"Silver bullets" and silenced science
The space between science and policy making has been invaded by campaigners with no interest in evidence-led conversations. It is never good when scientific evidence is roundly ignored because it contradicts groupthink.