OPINION - OUR CONSERVATION PARTNERS |
How others see us
What do other organisations think of our work? This column offers an opportunity to hear their views and helps offer insight into our relationship with them. Here, Guy Smith, vice president of the National Farmers’ Union, gives his opinion
O
f all the good work and initiatives of the GWCT over the last 10 years I’d highlight the Big Farmland Bird Count. It’s a good example of ‘Citizen science’ that seems an increasingly popular concept. Like a war-time call to arms of yesteryear, it is a way to mobilise massed ranks around a common cause. It makes sense to use it as a way to gather data about the environment. Thousands of eyes and ears surveying the countryside then sending the data back to a central point for compilation.
Interestingly the GWCT can trace some origins in this sort of work when Major Eley (the man behind Eley Cartridges) paid a university researcher called Doug Middleton to research disease in grey partridges in the 1930s. Middleton did this by visiting shooting estates to talk to gamekeepers. Gamekeepers’ records are probably the earliest form of systematic species counting – the irony being that to qualify for inclusion in these records things had to be shot first. Hence we know the great bustard became extinct in the UK in 1832 as someone was quite happy to record he’d shot the last one!
But, as we know, we now live in far more enlightened times, and the GWCT should be congratulated for designing and running the Big Farmland Bird Count. It’s an initiative that ticks so many boxes. 1. It deploys the ethics of citizen science by mobilising hundreds to monitor and report bird species sightings in a systematic way.
2. It recruits the very people who know the terrain being surveyed the best. Most farmers are achingly familiar with every inch of their farm having walked around the place since they were knee high to a grasshopper. So it’s citizen/farmer science undertaken by experts in their field (or fields).
3. It encourages farmers to take an even keener interest in the ecology of their farms.
4. Through the training days’ farmers become more
www.gwct.org.uk
knowledgeable in understanding the birdlife on their farms. No longer are pipits and linnets filed under the ‘Little Brown Jobs’ category.
“
...it shows farmers care
about bird- life on their farms as well as showcas- ing our
conservation efforts”
5. It puts in place a system of repeated empirical observation on individual farms which allows farmers to better understand the effect of their management on the ecology of their farms – both in terms of crop or stock management and in terms of conservation.
6. By bringing diverse farmers together through these multiple observations, it gives the agricultural community holistic purpose – a farming/conservation esprit de corps.
7. It encourages a bit of competition. Who recorded the most or the rarest species? (Modesty does not stop me mentioning the ring ouzel in one of our paddocks that I noted in the 2016 count.)
8. It gives farmers a chance to take some control over the way birdlife is measured and monitored on farms.
9. It’s a clear media opportunity to show how farmers care about birdlife on their farms as well as showcasing our conservation efforts.
10. Finally, it reminds us of the importance of taking time out from our hectic lives by standing still and just taking note in and pleasure from what is around you. So, there are 10 very good reasons why the GWCT should be applauded for what it does and it should be encouraged to build on its many achievements.
The National Farmers’ Union is the only organisation that champions all farmers and growers in England and Wales. Our purpose is to champion British agriculture and horti-
culture, to campaign for a stable and sustainable future for British farmers and to secure the best possible deal for our members.
www.nfuonline.com
GAMEWISE • SUMMER 2017 | 15
© Peter Thompson
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60
