Polar Ice melt is Man made OFFICAL

While it is well known that the ice at the poles is melting, the reports in the media have been contradictory. In Britain one right wing paper reported that the Sea Ice in the Arctic still covered more of the sea this summer and was not disappearing as fast as us environmentalist have been claiming. Then three days latter the same newspaper were reporting that the Arctic Sea Ice was significantly thinner.

While both articles were factually true, there was a spin being placed on both pieces.
The problem is that just relying on the area of sea covered by Sea Ice as the measure for climate change, will not give the whole picture. With the Arctic we are fortunate in that there are measurements going back to the 1950s made by the US Navy of the depth of the ice. Therefore, there is a clear data set that shows the effects of climate change.

However, there is still a significant part of the world population that refuse to believe that Climate Change is man made. So while the current study, published in Nature Geoscience, is welcome as it proves that man's activity is responsible for the melting of the polar ice, I feel that we should have moved on to finding solutions to the problem.

While there is nothing we can do to stop the loss of Sea Ice in the Arctic, and I still hold to my prediction that by 2012 there will be little or no Summer Sea Ice, it is in the choices we all make now that will determine how much damage climate change will bring.

Just as all the other studies show, the science is clear and human activity is the cause of climate change. It is not the Sun, nor is it part of gods plan, it is human activity that is responsible for the damage that is occurring. While I personally don't believe in god, any god, I fully respect that the majority of people do. However, one of the aspects of religion that has always perplexed me has been that in all religious texts, humans are supposed to be custodians of the planet, the environment, yet so often sacred texts are used to justify our destruction of the environment.

Well as I risk of getting hung, I may as well get hung for a sheep as a lamb, I have long thought that a major obstacle to tackling the problem of Climate Change, is fundamental Christianity Well not just fundamental Christianity but all fundamental religions. However it is in America where fundamental Christianity has had the greatest influence upon the governmental policies that have prevented action for tackling Climate Change. When you have people that don't believe in Evolution, and believe that the Earth is only six thousand years old, even though science proves that they are wrong, then no amount of science will change their belief that science is bunkum.

Genetics proves that Evolution is true, just as Geology proves that the Earth is billions of years old. But when we have fundamental Christians in power, and influencing governments that Climate change is part of gods plan then we really are screwed.

While I wanted to avoid making any further comment here on the US elections, there was comments that Sarah Palin made that shows just how dangerous these beliefs are. In a rally she told her supporters that she would stop funding scientific funding of Fruit Fly research. Citing research that is going on in France. Well from my perspective over here that is just another ill-informed comment by a woman that could be the president of the most powerful nation on the planet. As the research in question is looking at controlling pests and diseases of Olives, a very important crop.

Also scientific research into Fruit Flies has generated many benefits already. While I don't believe that the solutions to Climate Change will come from a technological fix, having leaders that are so ignorant as Palin is dangerous. When it comes to politicians I personally mistrust all of them, however I would rather choose one that has the intellectual capacity to at least attempt to find solutions. From my prospective here, that looks like Barack Obama.

This will not stop Climate Change happening, but once Bush has gone, and good riddance, the real choice is weather the hold of that the oil companies is broken. With Palin/McCain, (or is that John McCain and Tina Fey) that hold by the oil companies will remain. As will the old style failed economic thinking that has done its best to destroy the planet.

I remain quite sanguine about the future. While there are many aspects of Climate Change that will be disastrous, drought, sea level rise, famine, storms, flooding, species loss, I could go on, I really do think that the changes Climate Change will enforce will benefit us all. The trouble is that its only when we are on the brink that humans seem to stop and think.

Also the economic problems across the world should provide the impetus to develop the new Green technologies that are needed. Had Bush had the intelligence and intellect to understand the problem, he would have seen the opportunities there too. As in developing the new Green Technologies the nations that do this will then be able to sell the solutions to the world. All bush could do was say we are not going to do anything until China does, just like a petulant three year old.

Germany is building and testing Carbon Capture, not a total solution but one proved to work, Germany will earn billions selling the units across the world. In Britain a prototype Hydrogen generator has been produced that could be sold for two thousand pounds a time. Its about the size of a Refrigerator and could fuel Hydrogen powered vehicles. Just think of the jobs created building all these cars. Also think of the lower costs to business and industry if we were not using oil but Hydrogen instead.

I am not underestimating the problems we are facing, nor will the actions taken now stop the sea ice melting, but we really are on the brink of a vital choice. We either chose to save humanity or destroy it.

Vaquita

I guess that like me you probably have never heard of this the world's most endangered cetacean, the vaquita. Only about 150 animals remain in their home off Mexico home, and are being caught as bi catch in the fishing nets of local boats and may bring them to extinction in less than a decade

The picture is Copyright of Earth Ocean

Muntjac Deer

Tonight on the Autumn watch programme, they were talking about Muntjac Deer. Also know as Chinese Water Deer.

Now earlier in the year I was told of a sighting of one in my local wood, while I did not dismiss this out of hand, I was very sceptical, as it was more likely to have been a Roe Deer Kid and thus far I personally have seen no evidence of them. However, on more than one occasion I have heard a rather strange Deer bark. Not typical of the Roe Deer, but that is what I had assumed it was. I even went looking one time and found what I assumed to be the foot prints of a baby Roe Deer.

But after tonight's show where they showed the difference in the prints and played a recording of a Muntjac and a Roe Deer, I think it is possible that there could be Muntjac in my local woods. I personally have not seen one, but I hope if they are there I will see one. Add to this the details of how they are spreading across Britain. They are using the railway network as green corridors, and that Chopwell wood has a disused rail line running through it, then it looks likely that there is a population here.

I will have to keep my eyes and ears open. Now this brings me to another bit of news. As my regular reader will know, last year I experienced my first time on the back of a horse. I did have a previous experience on the back of a pony, but I was only three, and it was London Zoo. Anyway I have long thought that I would like to learn to ride. As I have long wanted to see the countryside from horseback. Also I have thought that it would be a great way of seeing and getting closer to wildlife.

Well, last week when in Consett I spotted a flyer in the window of one shop about pony trekking trips and that they could take novices. So I went back with a pen and paper to get the details and I will be contacting them soon. Now it may well be that it leads to nothing, and I can already hear my experienced horse riding reader rolling around on the floor laughing her head off, but I want to give it a try at least. So I will keep you posted on that. At the very least I am sure that my (mis)adventures will keep you folks laughing at me.

However, I suspect that if I can learn how to drive a horse, at least the right peddles to push, then it could be a good way of getting closer to the Deer be they Roe or Muntjac.
Finally, on a previous posting I was talking about doing something regarding food and cooking. While I had a reasonable idea of what I wanted to do, I also wanted to try and create an amusing way of doing this so that it did not come across as preachy or condescending. Well I think that I have found the right format to do this. I don't want to reveal all just yet, but I will be making a video podcast and I hope that I can put it out via I-Tunes. While I will also put them on You Tube too, I am looking at creating a web site too.

I have already started filming some bits for it, and it is exciting my creative juices, but I do feel rather foolish talking to myself (well the Camera) while trying to cook. And it is taking me longer to prepare meals as I am now also thinking about how it looks on camera. Well at least I am not leaving the dishes to pile up as I normally do.

Courting Red Admirals

Climate Change and Migration

This morning I went out very early as I wanted to get down to the river bank. There is a secret location, on private land where I have permission to go, where I stand a good chance of seeing the Otters. But this morning it was very cold, frost flecked the ground in places, so I was extra careful as I approached the river. By being extra careful meant that I spotted faint marks in the frosted leaves that upon closer inspection looked like an otter had passed that way recently.

Therefore I was quite hopeful of a sighting if the otter was still around. I set up the camera but even changing the battery the video would not power up. When I got home I found what the problem was and it is now working fine, but I was disappointed at the time. I had fully recharged the batteries so I assumed the problem was with the camera. So I just sat back and enjoyed the delights that came my way.

First was a dipper, then there was a kingfisher that was flying up and down the river, looking for a good spot to fish from. One of the two spots that it was fishing from looks accessible to film from latter. Then there was a group of Grey Wagtails. A couple of times I heard slashes and while looking to see if it was the otter or otters, I saw a water vole, Ratty from Wind in the Willows. Always a delight to see, but more so since I discovered it is the fastest declining mammal in Britain.

As I scanned the banks and the river with binoculars, I spotted what I thought was a dead Emperor Dragonfly, while I had seen a slight movement I thought it was just the wind. But as I kept on scanning I realised that it was still alive, moribund but still clinging to life and the rock it was on. While the sun was illuminating its perch the air temperature was far to cold to enable it to fly. I suspect that it will have died today.

I stayed for many hours, but I did not see any otters. Had the weather been warmer, I would have stayed longer, but even though I was well wrapped up, I was getting very cold. So I headed off home. When I got home, I looked at the camera and quickly discovered why the camera was not powering up. A bit of leaf had got on to one of the contacts thus when I fitted the battery it was effectively insulating the contact stopping the power from battery. Contact cleaned the camera worked. It was to dark for me to see the problem first thing but, at least I know to look for something like that should it ever happen again.

While it had not been my plan, my plans are superbly adaptable, I was back in time to hear most of the BBC radio programme The World on the Move. I do get the podcast of this from I tunes every week, it is nice to hear this when its broadcast. For all my overseas reader (that's deliberately singular) it is worth visiting the website and listening to the podcast as this is very much a project that is about the migrations of species across the planet not just Britain.

Anyway, there was two items on today's programme that caught my ear. The first was about Red Admiral butterflies. Because of the changes that have already occurred, there are now some that no longer migrating into continental Europe, but are staying here in Britain. Before, I go on last year I heard that someone at the BBC filmed Red Admiral butterflies courting in the autumn. Now I can beat that as in October 2006, a year before the BBC did it, I filmed the same behaviour. See the film below.

Anyway, the other item was about lesser Black Backed Gulls. Because of climate change these birds are not leaving Britain either but are now just moving in land. This has the effect of enabling them to breed earlier. This will also impact the breeding success of other birds. In addition to this, in the news on Monday was a report that the Waterfowl and Wetland Trust are growing increasingly concerned that Whoppers Swans are delaying their migration to the UK by a week because of the changes in the climate. As climate it not the same as weather, should there be a cold snap it could kill the birds before they can get to their wintering grounds. And there is evidence that this is happening.

There is evidence that other birds are being effected by Climate change, many birds are starting to breed earlier in Britain as the warmer weather triggers their breeding. But as the insects that most of them rely upon start their breeding based upon day length, that difference has the effect of reducing the numbers of birds that survive to breeding age.

While I know that sounds like a disaster, I hope that people help the birds by feeding them all year round.

Starling Flock

Yesterday the clocks went back, that now means that the sun sets now at five in the evening here. I went to close the curtains and spotted a flock of starlings grouping together in the amorphous ball that they form. There was about one hundred plus in this group, and while they were not yet ready to drop on their roost, it was interesting to see.

Now as some of you folks will know, starlings form this wonderful aerial dance, grouping together for protection before descending onto a reed bed to roost. As I am only a mile from the river, I am guessing that there will be a reed bed close by and the flock I saw will be only a small part of what will be a much larger flock. Therefore I will try and see if I can work out where the roost is as the sight will be worth filming.

Also these roosting flocks are a great place to see raptors. When I have watched these events before, I have seen Sparrow Hawks in numbers at these roosts trying to grab a late supper. This is why the starlings gather in such numbers, to avoid predators. As the shear numbers mean that it is almost impossible for a predator to focus on a single bird.

While the local roost will not be as large as others, I visited one where there was an estimated half a million birds, it will still be worth seeing as seeing a thousand plus birds in one single flock overhead will still be something worth experiencing.

With this in mind I went out looking to see if I could locate the reed or sedge bed where the starlings could be roosting. While I did not find the location or see the gathering flock of starlings, I did spot one of the Red Kites at a distance. What was amusing was the five corvidaes that were trying to chase it off. They were expending a lot of energy just to keep up, while the Kite was gracefully gliding, with only the occasional wing beat.

I may have to look further up the river for the starling roost. While coming home, I was told that it looks like the otters have started to return. As my regular reader knows they move to a different part of their range during the summer to avoid people and particularly people with dogs. So I will try and find a quiet spot on their range so I can film them. It looks as though I will be busy this coming winter.

Well you have a tree to blame for this.

Well you have a tree to blame for this.

TYPE ONLY ONE WORD. IT'S HARDER THAN YOU THINK!!!
1. Where is your cell phone? Defunct
2. Your significant other? Imagined.
3.Your hair? Long.
4.Your mother? Jewish
5. Your father? Dead
6. Favourite thing? Life
7. Your dream last night? Erotic
8. Your favourite drink? Ale
9. Your dream/goal? Peace.
10.The room you're in? Office
11. Your fear? Unfairness
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Content
13. Where were you last night? Home
14. What you're not? Stupid
15. Muffins? Blueberry
16. One of your wish list items? Hide
17. Where you grew up? London
18. The last thing you did? Cooked
19. What are you wearing? Jumper
20. Your TV? Off
21. PETS? Cat
22. Your computer? Slow
23. Your life? Busy
24. Your mood? Sanguine
25. Dating someone? No
26. Your car? Shanks-Pony
27. Something you're not wearing? Socks
28. Favourite Store? Local
29. Your summer? Moist
30. Your favourite colour? Terracotta
31. When is the last time you laughed? Today
32. Last time you cried? Yesterday

Here's what you're supposed to do...and please don't spoil the fun:cut & paste into YOUR BLOG, delete my answers and type in your answers & keep the fun going!

BBC Programming

The BBC has got out its dressing up box and tonight was the first episode of Charles Dickens Little Dorrit. Now at the risk of committing sacrilege, while I do like some of Charles Dickens cannon, some of it is rather variable. However, Little Dorrit was the last Dickens that I read about four years ago. So I am looking forward to the rest of this dramatisation.

Another programme that the BBC will be running this week will be the Autumn watch. For those readers that are overseas, this is a daily live wildlife watching event. While like its sister programme in the spring called.. well you can guess the title of that, it can be variable in quality. But that said, it has been getting better. Also this year they are at a new location, so I will be looking forward to that, as it really is informative. I have learnt something every year that I have watched it. Also many of the films do inspire me to get out and watch and film wildlife myself. It also makes me realise that there is just so much out there to see. I could and will spend the rest of my life discovering new things about wildlife, the natural world and the beauty of my country.

Also while I am singing the praises of the BBC, they are not paying me, Honest! Although if they want to... During this year there has been two series that the BBC transmitted that were real eye openers for me. The first was one called the Lost Land of the Jaguar It featured one of the few areas of virgin rainforest left in the world. And the scientists on the expedition were discovering species that were new to science. The other show was called Pacific Abyss and again the scientists were discovering new species with every dive. However, the real common factor was just how seriously both these areas are under threat from climate change. In the Pacific Abyss programme in particular, they dived on one reef where because of coral leaching there was only a single species of coral still living. Yet on all the other reefs they had been teeming with life.

When both these programmes were aired I was going to post something on them, but I did not just want to post yet another tirade about why don't we do something about climate change. Then, while watching some of the coverage of the US presidential elections and the Canadian elections I suddenly realised what the problem is. I have always seen climate change as a scientific argument, but it is being treated as a political issue. As though by following another policy will just make the issue go away. When the reality is that the solutions to climate change are political, the reality of the science is indisputable. This is where I would strongly criticise the BBC. The Natural History unit in there programmes show Climate Change as the scientific reality that it is. As it does across its science programmes. But in the News and current affairs programming it treats Climate change as a debate where if you ignore it, global warming will just not be there.

If a normally reliable news organisation like the BBC continues to cast doubt on the science of global warming and continues to treat it like its a matter of opinion they will only add to the damage of inaction.

Well at least the Beeb can redeem themselves by continuing to showing the best Natural History programmes in the world.

Birds Frogs and Dog Walking

Last night as I put out some rubbish, and let the cat in, I spotted the common frog that has moved into my back yard. What was amusing though it was sitting right at the tail end of my cat on the step. Both not bothering each other. My cat will never make a mouser, and that is great as she will never harm the birds that are coming to my yard. This includes a robin that has started to visit the yard early in the morning. He or she even sings there most mornings, what a nice way to start the day.

This morning while sitting in my living room, mug (or gullible person) of tea in hand, I looked out of the window to see what the weather was doing, I could see one of the Red Kites gliding over the village. It is a sight that always lifts my spirits and does make me feel grateful to be alive.

Over the past few days I have been walking the dog for my friend down at Lintzford Mill. As that's a couple of miles away, I get to walk though the woods to her home before even taking the dog out. As she has not been very well, that has meant walking through the wood in the half light of the pre dawn, treating me to glimpses of Tawny Owl or the sound of a Barn Owl. But most delightful has been a regular sighting of the Roe Deer with young. Though it was the regular sightings of the Kites that has been a real treat. Just tens of feet overhead, if anything was designed to take away the stresses of life then it is events like these.

Over the past few weeks and more importantly the past few days I have really enjoyed taking my friends dog for these walks. Often I just don't see anyone else. But this has now ended. As my friend has moved down to her daughters as she is now to ill to look after herself. She is in the last stages of cancer. I was asked if I could take the dog, but my home is just a cottage and with my cat who hates all other animals, would not settle with a dog I just could not. I did try for one night, but my cat being a bully, was attacking the dog when my back was turned. Thus it just couldn't work. Also, when I took on “Trouble” my cat, she was a rescue cat, I knew I was taking her on for the rest of her life. And I am a firm believer in providing the best living situation for any animal I have in my care, the only way I could have taken the dog was by providing less for both.

Anyway I will treasure the memory of those walks. Also I will treasure the memory of my friend and our chats. We intend to keep in touch by email as long as she is able to do so. She has inspired me a bit too. One day, when I got back from walking the dog I got back at lunch time. She had just heated a convenience meal in the microwave. But she just could not face eating it as she said that she thought that dog food would taste better. So I suggested that I make her some soup. After her telling me that it was far to much bother, I just got on with making some. It took no time to do so, it was just a vegetable soup.

Anyway after talking over this lunch, the germ of a good idea started to germinate. As my regular reader may remember I have talked about the problem of many people not ever having learnt to cook. That fact has given the supermarkets a lot of control of what people eat. Add to that the fact that so many people working such long hours just to keep their financial heads above water, I am sure that there must be some way of helping people rediscover food. Not just as fuel but as an important part of everyday life.

Anyway I have something in mind, and my friend felt that it was a great idea. As I walked the dog I was able to think about the practicalities and I can see ways of doing this too. So watch this space as I will be doing something with this.

At the end of the day if we cant do things to help our fellow man, then our existence is pretty hollow.

Britain Leads the World

As of yesterday, Britain became the world leader in “Off Shore Wind Power Generation” That does not mean that we can sit back and assume we are doing well in cutting our greenhouse gasses, as this capacity is still only enough to power three hundred thousand homes. But it is a start, and there are plans held up by the planning process that would triple that capacity. The trouble is that the objectors always seem to shout the loudest.

As for on shore wind power, well here the story is different, as most applications to build suffer from even greater objections. As long as the environmental considerations are met, such as not building on peat bogs where it would release more carbon from the soil than would be saved by the power generated, and that the turbines are not sited where they will kill or injure birds or bats, then the assumption should be that turbines should be built.

Also our new secretary of state for the energy and climate chance, Ed Miliband, has announced that Britain will cut its CO2 emissions by eighty percent by 2050. That is an ambitious goal, but one that is achievable and required. As it is only by cutting carbon emissions by that level will it be possible to save the human race.

Additionally the UK government will legislate to force the power companies to pay the feed in tariffs that will encourage the development of small scale energy production. Community projects, wind turbines on peoples homes, solar panels, the list could go on. While this will require a significant investment now, the long term effect will be lower energy bills in the future, greater security of supply and a better environment.

In comparison with other countries in Europe, Britain is playing catch up, but this is better late than never. While I don't want to see my country sit back on its laurels, we can be rightly proud that we are making significant progress already.

Spiders, Birds and Badgers

One of the delights of the enforced work that I had to do was seeing the birds returning to my back yard. My office, spare room really but office sounds better, over looks the yard and one of the first things I did when I first moved in was to put up a couple of bird feeders. This spring the first in this house but not the first in the village, I had a procession of birds visiting and feeding. While the numbers dropped off following the breeding season, in the autumn the birds disappeared completely.

This is not abnormal as when there is an abundance of seeds and berries from the natural larder the avian visitors stock up on that natural harvest. Then as they are eaten the birds will return to the places where they have found food previously. Therefore, by coincidence I was working when the birds started to return. It started with a single sparrow and today at one point I had nine in the yard at the same time. It was amazing to see some rather remarkable behaviour too, as two of the birds sat at the apertures of the feeders and were tossing seeds on the ground to their brethren. As these were all likely to be related as the offspring from this years brood will stay with the parents until the spring, they will support each other through the winter.

While for many folks sparrows are a rather mundane bird, but I love seeing them and other birds seeing them come in to feed too. Another rather overlooked bird is the Jackdaw. On the roofs and in the chimneys of all the houses in this part of the village. Even these stopped visiting my yard during the autumn abundance. Again my enforced reworking over the past few weeks enabled me to witness something I had not observed before. While in the spring and summer they will flock together when looking for food. But this is not really flocking but as soon as one bird finds food others will come and try and grab all or some of it too. However in the autumn they genuinely start to flock together and just as dusk arrives they group together in a genuine wheeling flight. They really seem to be just enjoying flight, taking to the air just because they can. I may be imposing human emotions on to the birds but that is what it looks like. Another moment of interesting behaviour that I have seen from the Jackdaws is them grabbing on to the brick walls to pluck insects and spiders from the brickwork.

I was going to try and film it but it was over before I could as a car turned the corner causing the birds to take to the wing. I do get some odd looks from people when I have the camera out, I am sure that they just don't see what I could be filming. Personally I think that's there loss at not seeing the wonders of nature around us.

Seeing the Jackdaws doing this reminded me of something I saw in the spring. I had put out some meal worms, and I had not even sat back at my desk before a pair of great tits and a pair of blue tits were feeding on them and taking them back to nests. The great tit kept on coming back after the meal worms were gone. It was searching the brick walls for bugs. I was trying to get the camera set up to film this but the point where I knew the bird would get to it found before I could get the camera to power up. There is broken brick where I knew there was a spiders nest the great tit found it and took the spider and web. It was only latter that I realised that there were probably eggs there too.

Talking of spiders, in the top corner of my office window, okay I know its a bedroom window but I'm being pretentious! Because of this, I have stopped the window cleaner from washing the windows at the back of the house. Much to his puzzlement. As while the spider could rebuild the orb, if it were washed off, the spider could move from the location. As I am fascinated by the way the spider shoots out from its hiding place when a tiny fly lands in the web. But also the way the spider maintains the web. After collecting and feeding its prey it returns to the orb and just pulls the threads tight. It is remarkable to see and I will film this soon. With all the work that I had to do I have not had the opportunity to do that.

The only problem is that while I have resolved many of my computer problems, with the help of a cartoonist I should add, I still cant capture or upload the video from one of my cameras. As my regular reader may remember I bought a pre owned a camera that had Inferred abilities. This camera I also discovered is ideal for close up and macro work. But it seems that the problem with transferring the video from this camera lays with the camera. I did buy a new lead but that didn't resolve the problem, I then replaced the fire wire card and that left the camera as the culprit. Its a shame as it is a nice camera to use, and I will continue to use the camera to film but until I can find a solution to transferring to the computer I guess that I will end up with a lot of work to do latter.

One of the other casualties of being forced to rework an environmental report, was various trips out to film all sorts of things. But also I decided that I needed to give myself a break from that work at times. So last week I went to one of the pubs in the village. As my normal local was rather lacking in atmosphere that night I decided to try one of the others.

We have four pubs in the village and when I first moved here one I nicknamed the Youth Club as it was full of young people and another I called the Darby And Joan Club as it was full of older folks. Thus, I did find it difficult to find a place that I could just get a relaxing drink. However, these two main pubs have changed hands and even without visiting them, I noticed that at one the previous trouble there appeared to have ceased, so I went there. I was pleasantly surprised as it is a nice friendly relaxed atmosphere now.

On my first visit to that particular hostelry when I first moved to the village I was being offered drugs. Not the welcome I wanted in the village. Now though that is tolerated and the associated difficulties appear to be gone. Also the couple that are now managing the place I had met before and are wildlife enthusiasts too. Therefore I had a chance to talk with other people who are thrilled by wildlife encounters. However, they were not the only ones who were wildlife enthusiasts and with other village locals we were talking about what is in and around the woods. While I was able to point others to places where they could see the deer and other mammals, I learnt the location of another Badger Sett.

Armed with that new information I headed up there tonight and I have now solved the mystery of where some of the Badgers went following the flooding at the beginning of September.

While there are problems in the local area, and while people do things that get me vexed, there are some wonderful people here too and having the natural world so close is what makes living here so delightful.

All the Worlds A Stage

If in doubt about the origin of a quote then often it can be found either in the Bible or Shakespeare Well over the past three weeks it has felt as though I have been living a quotation.

“All the Worlds a stage and we are but players”

Intelligent lot that you are, as you will know, a quotation from Shakespeare Except that my life on this stage has been a farce in the best of British traditions. The problem was that I had not been given the stage directions or lines, and was cast in the role of a naïve and gullible fool.

My audition for this farce began when I was asked to carrying out some survey work on some private land with the aim of carrying out some environmental improvement work. I did post about this at the time. I was told that this was so that the habitat could be protected and that they were seeking grants from the local authority amongst others. So to ensure that I was formatting the final document in the correct and acceptable manner I sort guidance from the relevant person in the local authority. Very helpful she was, and at her suggestion I filed copies of the finished report with her too. She said as she was only part time, it would help her as she could open a file ahead of the grant application and it would give her more time to read the document. About a week after submitting the documents she called me and complimented me on the quality of it, also saying that it was possible that the council may wish to use my services in the future to carry out other work like environmental impact assessments etc. Great for me as that one I had done as a volunteer and I do need work like that.

I was pleased that everything had gone well and it looked as though more good was going to flow from that too. I waited to hear what was happening, but knowing that these things take time I put that to the back of my mind. Until six weeks ago when another council officer called and told me that not only was the environmental impact assessment but that my assumptions were seriously flawed. While devastating for me as he was asking for the original data and the methodology I had used, I thought at least I can redeem myself by showing that I was using accepted methods and that my original survey was as through as it could be.

I should explain to both my readers that when assessing a habitat the first thing that is done is to look at the species that are there. Then, by looking at county records it is possible to infer what should be there and via that it is then possible to work out what work needs to be done to increase diversity. It can be as simple as planting more of the right food plants or creating log piles to enable roosting and over wintering sites for small mammals, amphibians and insects. Much of it though is about ensuring that the right things are done at the right times so that the existing wildlife is not disturbed.

It was all so straight forward that I could not see where I had made any serious error. So I got all my original work together and burnt the files onto a CD and posted them to this council officer.

This was where I discovered that I had a problem with my computer as some of the files were corrupted, but it was the fact that I was then told by the council to produce paper documents rather than electronic ones. I did argue that it was far from environmentally friendly but I lost that argument. It cost me over sixty pounds in ink jet cartridges to do this too. And it was here that I discovered that I was a bit player in the Farce that was unfolding.

I contacted the people whose land it was that I had done the report for, but I got a frosty reception from them. I had explained what had transpired with the council and it looked as though I was to blame for this all going wrong. If it were not for my rapidly retreating hairline I would have been pulling my hair out. I just could not see where I had made any serious errors. The only factor where I could see that I could have made an error was in the assumptions I was making regarding Climate Change. Even there, I was just including factors that DEFRA and Natural England are recommending such as planting beech. As a shallow rooted tree it will need to planted here in the north as drought will kill them off in the south, and the Beech nuts will become vital as a food source for birds and mammals by 2050. Also I suggested that an additional pond was dug. The site has Great Crested Newt and Smooth Newt, both protected species and that would help ensure that had extended habitat now so that should the change in climate bring some dryer periods the habitat would remain for them. Also by locating the new pond where I had intended it would also provide an overflow for a stream and help avoid flooding.

Well was not ready to just accept that I had made a cock up so I took the document and my data to someone I know and asked her to look it over and see if she could spot where I had made a mistake. She could not find any fault and told me that it was a very good report.

I was then asked to attend a meeting with the council officer, to resolve the matter. This was the Thursday just gone, but to ensure I was well prepared I decided to rewrite the report from scratch. By doing this I thought I would be able to spot where I had made the original error, but also it would enable me to fully aquanaut me with all the details, so that I could answer or try to answer all the questions I could be asked at the meeting with the council officers.

While this gave me some sleepless nights I was fully immersed in the details and was ready to have it as my specialist subject on Mastermind. Also I came to the same conclusions. While you cant think of all the species in a habitat matrix I had covered all the groups and was now in fighting mood as I really felt that the underpinning science was very robust.

While I was quietly confident, I still did not know what the problem was, so I attended the meeting with an open mind, but also a great deal of fear about what it was that I did not know or had not been told. Nor was I being arrogant, as while I was confident that I had done my best, I was fully aware that I would be dealing with professionals who have more knowledge than I and better access to more up to date data.

I had to travel down to the meeting by bus train and bus and I only just made it in time. I was surprised to find that the owners of the land were there too, but they were shocked that I was there. In fact two objected to my presence. But the council officer over ruled their objections and was left even more confused by the proceedings. However, that was soon cleared as I discovered what was really happening.

My original report had been rewritten by the land owners so that it appeared to be a positive environmental impact assessment supporting a planning application. My original report had been to support a “Supposed” grant application. Had I not previously submitted that to the council, then they may not have discovered the deception. However, the council using due diligence and checking the survey data on the protected species on the site discovered my original report and that it contradicted the “Forged” report.

Now that in its self was enough to have enabled the council to refuse planing permission, but as the original report that was supposed to support a grant application also contained an element so that I could be paid a fee to oversee the work and to resurvey the site at a latter date, the council became suspicious of a fraud. Quite understandably.

Well I left the meeting having been praised by the council for the high standard of the work I had done. The planning application was rejected, and the owners of the land were warned that if they appealed all the evidence of their attempt at deception would be used against them. I also told the owners that I would be billing them for the work I had done and all my expenses, it had cost me over fifty pounds in fares to attend this meeting for one. When they objected to that, I told them that if the bill was not paid then how were they going to explain all this to a district judge?

The whole matter though left me smarting, it is painful to be deceived in this way. It has however allowed me to rethink all that I am doing. Now that's not such a bad thing, it is a shame that more people don't have that time to make an assessment of their lives. Well I will be making some changes, and in part a letter from the council I was dealing with helps, as they were so impressed with the quality of my work that they are adding my name to a list of approved contractors. So my desire to do more paid work gets a boost. But more importantly for me, I will be concentrating on fewer projects. While I enjoy helping and assisting on much of the local conservation work that goes on, I am finding that I am expected to do more, the more I help.
I also need to make more time to earn a living too, I have various bits and pieces that I am doing already, but I want to explore other ideas too, more of that latter though.

I know that I am lucky as most of the work I do, paid and voluntary, I enjoy. Even as I sit here writing this, I have been treated to a wonderful display of one of the Red Kites as it quarters the field to the north of the village, and I want to ensure that I retain those aspects that make life worth living. I will be doing more writing, while I lost the two publishers that were interested in my scribblings about the Badgers, I want to finish that. Also I want to ensure that I have more time to get out and film more of the wildlife. As I was able to do with the Kite today who has been here for more than three hours. However, what I most want is more time to relax and do some reading.

I think its time I resigned as a bit part actor in other peoples dramas and took centre stage in my own, but as I have no script I guess I will just have to ad lib.

Inflation

When I went to the supermarket this week I noticed something that brought it home to me, just how much my food bill has gone up. As I do have a loyalty card, hey it gives me free money once a quarter, I normally spend enough to get five to five fifty back each quarter. As each penny back represents a pound spent, my normal spend is about five hundred pounds per quarter.

As that equates to thirty eight pounds a week, I noticed that already I will be getting six pounds back and it is still five weeks until the end of this quarter. Apart from half a dozen bottles of wine, I have not been particularly extravagant. Well they were on special offer and I get a five percent discount on buying six at a time. Hiccup. I do keep a good supply of cat food in the house, as well as store cupboard items like pulses and tinned tomatoes, as well as tea and coffee, so it may balance out by the end, but it will be interesting to see what the final total will be.

I am noticing other areas where I am have to pay more, but I was glad that my gas bill for the last quarter was only twelve pounds. As that covers the summer quarter, I am expecting the next one to be much higher.

Also a few months ago the bus fares went up, so I have less money for travel as well. Its just great that I have the wood on my doorstep. As that at least remains free.

These are the factors that are effecting me personally, but while I could see this coming it still hurts me in my pocket. In previous posts I have talked about my thoughts regarding an economic collapse, however I expected it to occur after an environmental incident. While I got the sequence of events wrong the historic events that we have seen unfold were fully predictable. In fact the signs were there nearly ten years ago, but businesses, governments and regulators all put on blinkers and decided as long as the system was making money then the problems could be ignored.

However, while the system was making vast sums of money for International Business, International Banking, and via taxes and tariffs governments, it has left behind the majority of ordinary people. To take one example last year Lehman Brothers in Britain paid out eight billion in bonuses. That enriched a few while the folks that work in the real economy had to make do with the crumbs tossed from the high table. These people have enriched themselves and will not suffer from the collapse of capitalism.

The vast sums of money that governments are pumping in to prop up this failing system will cost us all. I suspect that this will also mean that because of old style thinking that it will slow down the investment in the renewable energy technology that is vital for all of us. However, it will only slow it down, as the lessons we will learn from this will be that small and local forms of business, trade and food and energy production is what is needed. The damage that big business has done to us will no longer be acceptable, and it will be from communities that solutions are found.

I know that some folks are frightened by this change, and that the way the media has portrayed the events makes it seem like a crisis, but while it is far from over, once matters start to settle then by thinking about ways to earn our living in ways that are sustainable, economically and environmentally, we will all find that we have a better life and a better world.

Birds on my Feeders

This morning I sat down at the computer and carried out the registry cleaning and other maintenance so I am hopping that this will resolve many of the problems. So my thanks to Nancy for the guidance on what I needed to do. While I was doing this I could see the birds on my feeders in the yard. It is great to see them returning. In the autumn when there is an abundance of seeds and berries the birds ignore my offerings, but over the last week they have returned. Robin, Blue Tit and Sparrows this morning.

Following the maintenance I returned to the computer and I looked up and saw one of the Red Kites in the distance just above the tree line. As I watched, I saw another and another. In all there were seven Red Kites in the air to the north of the village. I did a mad dash out to film them but they were gone by the time I got there. Seeing one is always good but this was brilliant, it brings out my inner eight year old.

The Owl and the Frog

With history being created around the world I thought I would return to Natural History. On Thursday night I stepped out of the back door to put out some rubbish. I noticed a small shape in the shadows and when I looked it was a common frog. I went back in quickly to get the video and as I was setting it up I also spotted the shape of something on the wall by the gate. It was a Barn Owl, who screeched at me as it took to the air. That was one dinner the owl was not getting. Had I realised what was going on I could have filmed an Owl hunting, but I missed filming the owl. But the frog I had not lost and took some footage of the frog. As soon as I get my computer problems resolved I will be posting it here.

All a nice treat, and it shows that you can never predict what will turn up.

Nationalising the Banks

When the Labour party came to government there were calls for them to renationalise the railways, as the system clearly was not working but, we were told that it would be to expensive. To nationalise the railways would require vast sums of borrowing that as a country Britain could not afford.

When Northern Rock was nationalised the bill to each tax payer was and is £1,600. Funded by extra government borrowing. In fact it nearly doubled the British governments borrowing requirement.

While yesterdays announcement regarding the package of measures to support the banks has long been trailed the details had been kept secret until then. Then the details were rather slow to emerge, in fact the coverage on the radio made me more confused as there was little of the details but the media reports were full of comment. It was clear that the media experts really did not know what was happen, so why report when you don't know or understand what is actually happening?

As I had some important work to do, all I could do was keep listening to the news in the hope of some clarity when it was announced that there had been a cut in the Banks Base Rate. Latter I heard that this was a coordinated cut in interest rates across the globe.

Finally I was able to look at the details of the banking rescue plan and the sums are enough to make my eyes water. When all the parts are added together, the package is five hundred billion pounds (About a trillion dollars). That is about a third of our total Gross Domestic Product GDP. And this whole package would cost each tax payer over sixteen and half thousand pounds if the plan fails.

However, on the whole the plan fulfils all the economic needs for the banks and the wider economy.

As the banks across the globe have been reluctant to lend to each other, the British banks needed extra capital to shore up their portfolios of assets, that combined with the loans being made to the banks, the banks should still be able to make loans to businesses and individuals.

All this is based on conventional economic thinking. Yet equally conventional economics also dictates that within any economy excessive borrowing is bad. And as this really is why this happened in the first place, people and businesses over borrowing, then this rescue plan needs to help keep the banking system lubricated but as a managed means of reducing indebtedness.

However none of this would have been needed if the banks had “Come Clean” about their exposure to this so called toxic debt. It is this unknown factor that is preventing the banks lending to each other. It could be done by act of Parliament if needed, that way all the banks, the governments, the regulators and the public could see where their money was safe. The problem is that the banks don't want to disclose this and while that situation continues, no bank is safe. As the lower a banks share price is, the more capital the bank needs under the international banking rules. It all gets very complicated.

So while I have reservations I do think this rescue plan is likely to work.

The aspect that I did not like was the cut in Interest Rates, bank base rates. The only economic factor that could have justified a cut was a slowing down of economic activity. Yet the economic factors are mounting for Increasing Base Rates. First is inflation; with the rate of inflation rising slowing down demand by making borrowing more expensive would bare down on this. While I know that hits the poor harder, they will always suffer more in the long term from higher prices, so keeping inflation under control is vital. This has been something that has happened over the last ten years, in all areas but the cost of housing. I will return to this latter. Also as the banks were having difficulty borrowing monies from overseas banks, raising Interest Rates would have encouraged the inflow of capital into the UK, and hence strengthen the economy and particularly the financial services sector.

Now while it is not yet time for apportioning blame, the factor that is at the root of this problem has been the property market. In Spain where there is an over supply of homes, in Spain it has a more than a million houses than there are buyers. In the US a boom in property values drove borrowing there and while there are other factors, had there not been that housing boom there, many of the problems they face would not have happened. In Iceland the banks leant vast sums into the property market with the whole of the banking system now being nationalised. In Britain the housing, property and building sectors have driven the expansion of the UK economy for the last ten years. Thus, when the value of property started to fall, the whole of the British economy became sluggish. The biggest error made by the banks, not just here but across the world, was that they were all betting on house prices continuing to rise. Even though, they had gone well beyond anything rational.

With this rescue package in place, then via the now nationalised Northern Rock the government needs to enable people to remortgage and restructure their home loans so that people don't become homeless and loose their homes. This will lessen the pain in the short term. In the long term, then everyone needs to reduce and repay their borrowings, be that Credit Cards or other loans, it is that indebtedness that will hurt people in the long run.

This will be painful for some, but we need to learn to save for the things we want rather than borrowing for the items we desire. In the long term this really could benefit the planet as the reduced demand for environmentally damaging items will reduce.

As one of the aspects of this problem is the financial structure of the system, where a business has to be seen to extracting every last cent in profit out of the business, there is a tacit requirement to take great risks. Yet often any business that remains steady and sure is seen as not performing well, when in reality they are the businesses that will weather any financial storm. Thus, we need to see an economy emergence that is steady and stable. Some will call that boring but having banks and any other business remain in a good solid shape is better than the situation now.

Further, I can see that what will emerge will be a system that is less focused on large business but on the smaller and more localised business. In Britain so much of the retail boom was based upon using the cheap labour costs in China and other areas of the developing world. While that system helps retailers, it exports jobs. In turn it reduces the manufacturing and exporting capacity of a country. While service industries are important in the mix, when any country is to reliant upon these then it will always cause problems in the long run.

Because of the mistrust in and of big businesses, there will be an emergence of smaller businesses. They will be far more ethical and transparent about the way they do business.

In the currant situation though all we can all do now is sit back and watch the Free Market fall around us.

A Climate Change Consensus

Recently on BBC Television there was a series called: Earth - The Climate Wars.

The starting point that they chose as the beginning of the Climate Change debate was a letter written to the US president in 1972 that warned of climate change, but not of Global Warming but of a new Ice Age.

Therefore while I have a great deal of respect for the presenter, Dr Ian Stewart, my critical attention went into alert mode. As the programme was suggesting that it was only at this point in time, had the idea of man made climate change really occurred to anyone. While I was less critical of the rest of the first episode as the science was sound and accurate, the opening still rankles as it was quite wrong.

The theory of Human induced Climate Change first emerged in the Victorian era. Chemistry showed that a blanket of Carbon Dioxide helped retain heat, and burning the billions of tones of Coal that powered the Industrial revolution was creating pollution as was seen in the grime and smog that enveloped the industrial towns of Britain. Further, in the 1920s the British Interplanetary Society first proposed using algae to produce a carbon blanket on Mars so that humans could colonise our planetary neighbour, they just had to work out how to get there first. However the quality of the science was so good that NASA used it as the basis for their own plans. Therefore, the scientific basis of CO2 inducing a warming of the globe was well understood more than a century ago.

The first president to be alerted to the dangers of Climate Change was Roosevelt in the 1940s. And he took the situation seriously and instigated a project so that Sulphur was introduced into the atmosphere. Along with cloud seeding experiments this seemed to have the desired effect although the experiments were stopped in the 1960s as there had been a couple of flooding events that could have been caused by this in neighbouring states in the US. Also, as controlling the weather and climate was not as predictable or simple as first thought, and the warming wasn't seen to be happening as fast as had initially been predicted, the threat of climate change was quietly forgotten.

Where this programme was starting from though, was an important point in the scientific proof of Man Made Climate Change, as based upon the evidence it did look as if the climate was cooling. The effect of Sulphur on the climate was real, it does have a cooling effect and was also causing Acid Rain. With the majority of emissions coming from Coal fired power stations and a few cold years of temperature records to back up the hypothesis, the idea of a new Ice Age appeared to be the correct one.

I even remember the buzz at school, as in a Horizon programme on Television By Dr Paul Ehrlich based on the work of Stephen Schneider, now a professor at Stanford University. I did not see that programme but it did get discussed in class. What makes this vivid in my memory was that I was at the time reading a Science Fiction book where a planet was being transformed by adding CO2 to the atmosphere to create a greenhouse effect and when I asked as a naïve child well how can it create an ice age when CO2 was being pumped into the atmosphere, when in this book it was used to heat a climate, well I was well and truly put in my place by the teacher. To him the book was just Science Fiction and the programme was Science fact. Oh I did have some supportive teachers, not!

However, what is significant is that the people like professor Stephen Schneider, now acknowledge that they were wrong. Had they had the data available today that the US military had added Sulphur to the atmosphere, or that the sulphur from Coal was masking the effects of CO2, then the dip in temperatures would not have lead to the conclusions that the then available data did. Further, it would not have provided the seeds of doubt that has caused people to dismiss the reality of climate change.

I know myself that frequently if I spoke about Climate Change that people would dismiss it as nonsense or say that we are heading for an Ice Age. At least now I have the ability to counter them by asking why the believe that Climate Change isn't happening or if they say well I read in my newspaper that its nonsense I just ask if they have ever read a Scientific Paper on the subject.

But that's now, back in the seventies and the eighties it was different, and it was not until the heatwave years of 1976 and 1977 that I first heard Global Warming being discussed by the media. And it was the rather catchy name that the media coined for Climate Change of Global Warming that also held back anyone taking the problem seriously as Global Warming sounds like quite a nice thing to have, especially in the depths of winter.

Fortunately there were people who understood that increasing the blanket of Carbon Dioxide was not good news and back in 1945 Professor Keeling of the University of California started making the measurements needed to show that CO2 was increasing and that humans were responsible. This is government funded and his son Professor Ralph Keeling continues the work to this day. However, it was not until 1979 that the US government finally commissioned a report to look at the possible effect of Climate Change from a military scientific group called Jason.

Their report was not well received but it did draw conclusions and predictions that were latter mirrored by the IPCC (International Panel on Climate Change) report years latter. So the US government does what all good governments do with something they don't like, they commission a second opinion. That second report drew the same conclusions. Well as you folks with long memories may remember, in 1980 Regan was elected and he commissioned a third report. While this third report authored by Professor Nierenberg did agree with the two previous reports that Climate Change was happening, what was different was that he concluded that it was not Human Induced and anyway it would happen so slowly that solutions would be found long before it became a problem. Well its one way of resolving a crisis just find someone that will say what you want to hear, Climate Change solved. Or should that be ignored?

As well as Professor Nierenberg becoming the Director of the influential Scripps Institute of Oceanography, and chief spokesman for the sceptics of Climate Change.

Now I have no problem with people challenging the science or asking questions of the data, as only from and by checking an hypothesis can we ensure that the data and hence the conclusions are correct. After all if there are faults in the data then this would effect the effects of a changing climate.

The sceptics raised three basic questions the first was: Is the earth actually warming?

A fair question, but as around the globe weather stations have recorded weather and temperature readings over at least a century and some data goes back even further. This indeed did show a rise in temperature But there was a potential flaw in the results as where cities have grown and expanded this creates what's called an “Urban Heat Island” and this could be effecting the data, showing a greater rise than was actually happening. Therefore, to confirm the data and to expand the data set to include the whole planet data from satellites would be used.

The readings for the first half of the 1980s agreed with the thermometer readings but for the second half of the 1980s the data did not show any increase in fact it looked like there was a fall in the global temperature Now one of the data sets must be wrong, but witch one? The solution was actually in the friction of the earth as over time a satellite will fall closer to the earth lowering its altitude and this drag also slowed the satellites These two effects on the satellites meant that the equations used to unify the data were wrong, when corrected though the satellites data confirmed the thermometer results and yes the Earth was warming. That was that argument over.

Then the Sceptics said but in the past things were warmer, historical accounts show that places like Greenland and Britain were warmer. According to historical texts Greenland was reputed to be a green and fertile land. It could be that it was propaganda to get settlers to move there a thousand years ago. Also in the Middle ages we apparently were growing grapes for wine in Britain. Now had there been the Internet in the Middle Ages I suspect that the pictures of Greenland would have been similar to now, and I bet the British wine reviews were not complimentary.

So a way had to be found to measure what the temperature was over the last thousand years or more. This was done by Dr Michael Mann of Penn State University. By using what are called Climate Proxies it is possible to determine the temperature in past years. By reading the growth rings of some very ancient trees, Bristle Pines one set of data was produced. Then using corals from the Red Sea, and snows from the mountains of Peru other data sets were established. This produced the famous Hokey stick graph. However, it failed to find this warmer period in the middle ages.

Other scientists have repeated this using other climate proxies and confirmed the data, but all Dr Michael Mann got for his troubles, from the sceptics, was abuse and accusations of scientific fraud.

Well that proves that there was no Middle Age heat wave, but just like Ronny Regan before the sceptics threw their bottle out of the pram at the facts not fitting their desires.

Well the sceptics had one last argument that Climate change was not caused by human activity but by the Sun. Now as all our weather and the climate is driven by the Sun, so this theory could not be dismissed. Also when historical data was looked at there did appear to be a correlation to sunspots and temperature. The theory was that the solar wind produced by sunspots was deflecting the effects of cosmic rays. In the 1750s in Britain there was what is called the little Ice age when in winter the Thames would freeze over and ice fairs would be held on the frozen river. This coincided with a period when there was little to no sunspots, so the theory was worth examining. When the data was examined there did appear to be a correlation. That was until 1980 when the two data sets diverged and sunspot activity decreased and the temperature rose and did not fall as would have happened had the theory been accurate. It is worth noting that the sceptics still use this data but exclude the sunspot data that doesn't support their claim that its the sun. It is such a shame that the facts just ruin the the theory that it is nothing to do with human activity. Coincidently the little Ice age was caused by volcanic activity on the other side of the Earth, and was nothing to do with sunspots.

However, while I am personally disgusted by the people that have buried their heads in the desert sands, and give a blanket denial that Climate Change is real and that its the result of human activity, their actions have ensured that the science that shows that climate change is happening and that its man made is completely watertight. Yet all the delays to action that the sceptics caused, leave us with far less time to tackle the problem. The enforced rechecking of the science has highlighted a problem that no one expected. That of a rapid shift in the climate. From looking at Ice Cores there is now proof that in the past there has been sudden increases in the globes temperature. Professor Jim White of University of Colorado, discovered that in several points in the planets history there have been rapid jumps, one in particular was a jump of five degrees Celsius in a single season. We don't know what caused this jump, but it shows that a changing climate may not be the slow and gradual process that all had assumed. Incidently, it was the debris of dead beetles in soils from around the globe that pointed to the time period that climate scientists needed to look. As in one layer there were the bodies of beetles that thrived in cold and then a layer of beetles that needed warmer conditions, but with no intermediate stages.

Had Thalidomide or any drug had the same rigours scrutiny that Climate Science has had to endure then many tragedies would have been avoided. One thing that is reassuring though is that even the real scientists that were sceptics now agree that Climate change is real and that it is man made. The problem still remains that this doubt that they created has infected large portions of the population.

Therefore, we all still need to counter the doubters, but at least the real scientific community is united. The next problem is the politicians. Even those that claim to be trying to tackle Climate Change are still not being consistent or always following policies that really will make a difference.

Nor should we allow ourselves to be detracted by other problems, in fact if economic policies had been based upon sustainability and not hubris, that difficulty would never have arisen.

The one thing that the science has shown us is that the impacts we will see from Climate Change is that it will produce effects that we never expected. Professor Konrad Steffen of the University of Colorado works on the glaciers in Greenland and every year they are learning new and unexpected aspects of the effects of global climate change. Many of these effects are just not in the computer models for the climate. Therefore, any predictions regarding the impacts and the timing of these impacts will be wrong. It will and is happening faster and potentially more dramatic than anyone could have ever expected.

Real positive change is coming, it will not be easy but only if we make it difficult for ourselves. There is no quick fix for this, nor will there be some sudden scientific new discovery that will solve the problems. I personally think that once we really start to take on the challenge of dealing with climate change, we will all gain and start to shape a positive, caring and brighter future.

Grove Snail

Here is a film of the White lipped Grove Snail. The Grove Snail, while a common mollusc has a great deal of variability in the banding on the shell so it can be difficult to determine the species. It is a scientifically important species, as it is one of the species that proves Evolution and natural selection.

The banding provides camouflage from thrushes, it main predator. The greater the variation in the banding the better hidden the mollusc is in the grass. Thus more likely to breed and hence the snails evolve to avoid predation. As agricultural practices have changed over the past century so the variation has kept pace with these changes, thus providing an example of evolution in action.

Trouble with Technology

This is a bit of a catch up posting, recently I posted regarding the Large Hadron Collider. Well as you folks may have heard in the news it has had to be shut down because of a fault. Well today I have been playing catch up on stories like that and it turns out that it was a leak of Helium. Now as you may know if your breath in helium it gives you a high pithed voice, so I just wonder what it was that alerted the folks in CERN to that.

Talking of faults, I have been having problems with my computer. It is not any virus or spy wear as I have checked carefully. I keep an active check on that and regularly, at least once a week, run an active scan. I first noticed the problem when trying to download some of the varied podcasts that I listen to via I tunes. Therefore, I thought that the problem may have been with the site. Then I started not being able to log on to Blogger, and when I checked they knew that there was a problem there, so again I ignored the problem, as inconvenient as it was, thinking it was out of my control.

However, the problems seemed to be getting worse and files seemed to becoming corrupted. I am careful to back things up, but it was becoming annoying. Then to top it all I was not able to upload video to the computer. So I did a full system check and again no problems were apparent. So I finally called out a chap to look at the machine. Well it looks as though the mother board on this computer is not well at all. I did buy this as pre owned, and it turns out that a repair has been made to the board, it had a split or break and this was, or should I say is, what's causing the problem. He did a fine job removing the excess solder that he thinks was bridging circuits. The upshot is that I need a new computer. Oh (Add your own expletive). I guess I know how the scientists at CERN felt, but with a deeper voice.

Roe Deer

I was up early this morning and I saw something quite remarkable. On the window of my office, back bedroom, was a slug. As its a first floor room I was surprised to see it there. But it was what happened next that surprised me. In the early morning I have a pair of Magpies that visit my yard. I often put out some cat food for the hedgehog that comes and if the Hedgehog doesn't eat it, one of the fox cubs would, and if any was left over then the magpies would clean it away. Well this morning, one of the magpies flew up to the window and harvested the slug from the glass. It was over in a split second and I wished I had had a camera ready to record the incident. But while I did have the camera there I was just checking that I had everything ready to go out. I was just not expecting that.

My main reason for getting up early was that I wanted to get out to try and film the Roe Deer. I had seen that the deer were active at a location, footprints in the mud and with the rut going on, I thought I could have a better than normal chance of filming them. So I went to a pre selected point and set up. The hoof prints indicated that they were traversing this route daily. I do use camouflage clothing, something I have gotten myself a reputation for wearing, and not one bit of pink was visible. Also I was standing between two bushes so that my outline was masked. I was reasonably sure that my sent was not going to be a problem, and as my jacket reeks of Badger, even if the wind eddied the wrong way I should have been fine.

I waited about half an hour when suddenly a large lurcher came up, suddenly finding me there he barked his head off at me. Normally, I find a quiet gentle word and offering to allow a dog to get my scent is all that's needed to calm a dog down. Not this one it was growling and snapping at me. So I growled back and he ran off. He was not on a lead and the owner was no where in sight.

Therefore I settled down to waiting again. I must have been there for the best part of three quarters of an hour when suddenly three or four Roe Deer came bounding past me. I switched on the camera, then suddenly I was bowled over straight into the mud. The camera and tripod splashed into the pool of muddy water too.

I reacted quickly and pulled the camera out of the water, I had the camera covered with a plastic bag to protect it from the rain and that seems to have saved it, but as I looked up I saw the dog, the Lurcher, chasing the Deer. I also looked behind me and saw the glimpse of a man half hidden in the bushes. I called out if that was his dog? At this he came out. He said he didn't know I was there, and yes that was his dog. While I must have looked odd, dressed head to foot in camouflage, it was not until he realised I had a camera did he recall the dog. As soon as he had done that he picked up what may have been a shotgun and went off.

It was clear that I was not going to get anything this morning and I needed to get the camera dried off too. It appears to be undamaged, but my greater worry is that poachers are back in the local wood. In the past the Roe Deer disappeared because of Poaching, so I hope that this possible poacher realises that he has been seen and that its not worth returning.

As for me, why is it that I keep doing an impression of a wart hog?

Cattle in Conservation

Because the landscape in the UK countryside is shaped by the activity of man, using domestic animals to manage nature reserves is vitally important. In the past traditional farming and agricultural methods created habitat that wildlife was able to utilise.

At Seaton Snook, a nature reserve near Tees Mouth, cattle are used as they eat the long grass. This in turn encourages new fresh growth of new grass and of other herbage that in turn provides habitat and food for the invertebrates that are the start of the food chain.

As Tees Mouth is an important National Nature Reserve, this provides food for the birds in spring and summer, while the fresh growth vegetation encouraged by the cattle grazing in turn provides grazing for migrant geese and swans in the winter.

Free Trade and the Paulson Plan

Firstly, following my posting regarding the Paulson Plan there was an anonymous comment that wished I was in congress. I would not wish that on my worst enemy! As I am not American, I'm English with Scottish and Jewish heritage (explains a lot that does), I don't think I could be elected. Further I know I don't have all the answers. Personally I look for answers that are fair and would genuinely help people.

Also as an Atheist I doubt that I could get elected, as while there is supposed to be a separation of church and state, religion plays a large role in politics in America. Lastly I would hate to be placed in the public eye as I have enough oddities and mannerisms that I would soon become a figure of fun and ridicule, and I thought that was Sarah Palin's job. So please put that nomination paper away.

However being serious, I hope that people don't punish the politicians to harshly on this one. Had I not studied Economics at University (not from direct choice), I doubt that I could have understood enough to work out that the Paulson plan, now signed into law, looked like a bad deal. I am sure that most of the representatives voted yes reluctantly and more in hope that this will help than knowledge. Speed never makes for good laws.

What made me think that this was not a good idea is that simply in Britain we have been doing something similar with nationalising two of our bad banks. Also we have put in to our banking system the equivalent of three hundred and fifty billion pounds. It make a change for America to follow us British. As our economy is smaller than the US economy, and we have already put in the same amount that the US are now going to, with little real effect, it looks like that money will go down the crapper, as my commentators so colourfully put it.

Personally I think that in both the US and the UK that only when personal and government debt is substantially paid off will we get through this. What is annoying is that it will hurt people that have been careful more than the reckless. Additionally it will hit much harder the poor, as these things always do. How we can afford to pay for the investment in sustainable technology I just don't know.

If it were that businesses were always sensible, fair and ethical then regulation would never be needed. But the reality is that people (who run businesses) will always bend or break the law to make a profit. It is part of the greed culture that business installs. I have previously posted on specific examples of this, where businesses have paid a pittance for logging rights when the trees are actually worth thousands of Dollars each, is just one example of the lack of ethics in trade. Equally there has been a recent example of down right illegal activity where in China dairies have added Melamine to watered down milk to make more profit. The Melamine increases the protein, but it causes kidney stones particularly in children. All this is illegal but it goes on all the time. Here in the UK there are regular prosecutions of food businesses that are breaking the rules all in the name of profit.

The name “Free Trade” is an oxymoron, as in reality rules and regulation are always needed in a market. Also all governments will manipulate a market by regulation, taxes or via subsidies. Had there been an emphasis on Fair Trade, none of this would have happened. While it would also prevent most individuals getting super rich, it would mean that trade and exchange would benefit many and not the few.

Any politician that clears away regulation is naïve, nay stupid, as regulation is normally needed to stop the naïve from doing stupid things. You only need to look at what happened in Russia following the collapse of the Soviet Union to see what an unfettered Free Market is really like. If we had true free trade we would have Illegal drugs made legal, People sold into Slavery, and many other abuses.

Once this matter is part of history I have no doubt that many of the banks and bankers will have been discovered to have done many unethical and illegal things. This is why there really needs to be a system of fair trade adopted to prevent anything like this happening again.

Lastly if politicians adjusted the emphasise to Quality of life rather than Standard of living then we really could start to tackle the majority of the problems around the globe.

Sea Eagles

Recently on Farming Today BBC Radio Four, there was a report that Scottish Crofters had lost two hundred Lambs to the Sea Eagles that have been reintroduced to Scotland. Even as I heard this claim I had my doubts about the veracity of the claim.

Now there is no doubt that Sea Eagles could take a Lamb, they are enormous birds, with a seven to eight foot wingspan and Europe's largest, what perplexed me was just how many were taking all these Lambs. For two hundred to be taken in a year there would need to be a population in the area of thirty plus.

While I am not an expert on this bird, also known as the White Tailed Eagle, I had no doubt that the RSPB who are experts would not have created that level of over population. Based upon my experience (limited) of the feeding needs of Golden Eagles who need about 450 to 500 grams per day then the Sea Eagles would have a similar need.

So I started doing my own research and there appears to be no truth to the story at all, or at least greatly exaggerated. However, the RSPB has commissioned an investigation into this to see if the reintroduced birds are adversely effecting the crofters.

However, even the BBC are now pulling back from the original report as the evidence just is not there.

There are always people that see wildlife as a threat to their lively hood, but often the facts do not bare out their fears. In fact the reality is that by preserving the top predators you conserve all aspects of an environment. I have previously posted about the experience in the Yellowstone National Park, and as I am currently reading an article by a Yale Professor I may well be posting more on this at a latter date. But while I do understand that in small scale farming any loss has a greater impact than it would on a large scale farmer, blaming the Sea Eagles for losses when it blatantly can not be true, there are three birds in the location, only distracts from what could be the real problem.

I just hope that the RSPB have not been forced to waste thousands of pounds looking into a non existent problem. Further, I hope that the BBC feels shame for reporting prejudice as facts.

I hope that one day soon I will get the opportunity to see these magnificent birds for myself, and hunting rabbits and hares that are their prey.

The Paulson Plan

Today I have no shortage of subjects that I could talk about today, but as the Paulson plan is to important to ignore.

Now I can understand why this plan was put forward, as if there is not the cash in the banking system to oil the economy then the ordinary people will suffer. And it is better to pay higher taxes than have no job at all. However, the plan as being presented is all about a business as usual approach rather than really dealing with the causes of the problem.

It may be useful to think of the economy as being like a fan. The money is flowing through by people and businesses buying and selling and by borrowing and lending. The only problem is that while this fan is still turning, and I guess your ahead of me here, the fan is slow and sluggish because its covered in manure.

While it is a simplification, the problem is that of people defaulting on their mortgages. Then the simple thing to do would be to restructure the loans. This would help stabilise the housing market and that in turn would reduce the risk that further foreclosures would happen. Are but this is where the problem lays, the original lender no longer owns that mortgage. It has been split up into thousands of fragments, mixed with other loans, and sold as bundled securities to all the other banks.

These are the toxic assets that the under the Paulson plan the US Treasury would be buying. Well under that plan the lunatics really have taken over the asylum. As all that is really happening is the US government plans to give the banks billions for junk securities. It will do nothing to stop foreclosures, and even when the a property is sold to clear the debt, the US treasury may not get a cent from this as remember each of these mortgages have been fragmented.

The real way that this seven hundred billion dollars could be used is to buy up the homes of some of the people who are facing loosing their homes. I know that the plan that the senate have agreed is less than that, but it could be more than seven hundred billion dollars as the real cost.

By following my suggestion, or something akin to it, is the American government, and hence the people, would get the tangible asset of the property, and as I have said before, there would be an income from rent too. Who knows in time those properties could even make the government a profit. Also, it means the banks will get the cash the system needs and with the reduction in foreclosures this will induce, the pressure on the banks will reduce too. By helping the people, the banks are helped indirectly. If the Paulson plan were followed all that happens is the banks get a short term boost.

One of the reasons why the Paulson plan is such a bad one is that Paulson is a Banking insider. All that the PP will do is let the banks start lending the treasuries money and not their own. The banks are not lending to each other at the moment. They obviously know something we don't. In fact I leant someone twenty pounds and I became the fourth largest bank in the UK.

I realise that my musings here will have as much influence as the beat of a butterflies wing to creating a hurricane. However, there was one aspect of the debate in the House of representatives that I feel is worthy of comment. One of the republicans said that the PP was the rocky road to Socialism. While I don't think that governments are ever that good at running businesses, there are times when a government has to intervene in markets. And while I personally think that republican representative was talking nonsense about socialism, it should be clear to anyone with half a brain that the Free Market has not worked. my suggestion of acquiring the homes of people will please him even less. But only by helping the poor now will America avoid the future costs of having millions becoming homeless.

Additionally, while the US government talks a lot about the free market, recently they (The Bush Government) increased the subsidies to farmers growing corn and other agricultural support payments.

The reason why this matters is that if the US economy goes into a depression, along with the rest of the world, is that this depression will imped progress towards greening the economy. While any recession will slow down the dangerous emissions that are changing our climate, only with investment in changing the way we do things, can we work towards a better, more sustainable future.

One last bit of interesting news that I discovered while researching another topic relates to this. I was looking into the reasons why oil prices went up the way they did. When there was no rational reason for this. Also in a BBC report it emerged that one hedge fund lost one and half billion dollars when the price started to fall. The type of event that crocodile tears were invented for. But this got me thinking about who else was speculating on oil. It may not surprise you that it was the American investment banks. Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs et al who were playing the market at the time. Is that where all the money went? If they lost money, billions of it playing the commodity markets, then giving them more money, tax payers money, is like giving a gambler money and asking them not to go to the bookmakers.