In this week's Farmer's Weekly there is a report that a Professor Crute says that farmers must stop squabbling over whether organic farming or conventional agriculture (why do we call it conventional?) is most environmentally friendly. Professor Crute says 'The notion that this is a case of organic farming good, conventional farming bad, doesn't really get us anywhere.'.
I'm not so sure - I'd like to know the answer!
I'd totally agree that all types of farming can make further contributions to wildlife conservation, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving water quality - but if organic farming really is as good as its keenest proponents claim then shouldn't we be investing more in it? The evidence is clear that organic farming is generally (that means - on average) better for farmland birds than 'conventional' farming but is it also far kinder to the planet's climate because it produces fewer greenhouse gas emissions and stores more carbon in soils? I can imagine that it might be, but am not sure that it definitely is. Let's find out.
Yesterday evening I was a guest of the BBC at the Proms.
The first bit of music was not my cup of tea but was mercifully short. The second was a Chopin piano concerto played by Lang Lang (so good they named him twice?). One of the effects of watching music, particularly with a soloist, is that I tend to start concentrating on the player rather than the music. Lang Lang’s shiny shoes flashed in the lights, he had some distracting mannerisms but the striking thing was that his hands appeared to drift across the keyboard whilst the notes tumbled and cascaded in abundance and profusion. It was amazing to watch – rather like watching Usain Bolt apparently strolling effortlessly to a new world record. I wish there were something that difficult that I could do that well.
All very well, you may be thinking (or not!), but what does this have to do with nature? In the programme notes Lang Lang is quoted as saying that when he plays Chopin, he sees beautiful images and feels close to nature – there you go!
The last piece was Strauss’s Alpine Symphony, which describes a day’s walking in the Alps including flower-rich meadows and birdsong. This is music to bathe in – the 100+ piece orchestra sends out waves of melody. Strauss was quite clear where he stood when he talked of ‘the worship of nature, eternal and magnificent.’
Nature is inspiring - it inspires great scientists and great artists - and the rest of us too!
I've been reading a book for quite a while - some bits of it I've read about six times! Is this because the jokes are so good? or because I can't understand it? you might ask.
The answer is closer to the latter suggestion because there really aren't many jokes. But the book is an absolute model of clarity - a real tour de force. I keep re-reading bits because I am very keen to understand what it is telling me.
The book is Sustainable energy - without the hot air by David Mackay, an academic from Cambridge University. It's not about climate change, though it is very relevant, but it is about renewable energy and whether it is feasible for us to produce enough energy from a combination of wasting less energy and producing more from nuclear, wind, solar, tidal etc.
Every policy maker should read it - it should be compulsory for civil servants and ministers in the Department of Energy and Climate Change. There are many interesting messages in the book - and although there aren't many jokes it is written in a very readable way (and it is all online) - and I'm sure I'll come back to some of them over the next few weeks.
But let's just start with a graph - I like graphs. This graph shows how long a bit of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, emitted now, will stay in the atmosphere. Before you look at the graph - what's your guess for how much of a dollop of carbon dioxide will still be floating around in the atmosphere in 100 and 1000 years time? Now have a look - how close were you?
Quite a lot isn't it?
We all, I think, want to leave the world in a better state for our children and future generations. Those dollops of carbon dioxide are quite a legacy - and quite a long-lasting legacy.
Which farmer should win? You choose!
Defra produces a very interesting little booklet entitled 'UK Biodiversity Indicators in Your Pocket' and the 2009 version is out.
It's certainly not all bad news - do have a look yourself to see - but it doesn't paint a great picture either.
One of the indicators refers to farmland birds and, as we know, there has been a big decline in the overall index since 1970. This has been driven by tumbling numbers of species such as turtle dove, corn bunting, grey partridge, yellow wagtail and skylark. The index is meant to be a measure of the overall ecological health of the farmland environment - if birds are declining what does that mean for wildlife as a whole? The farmland bird index was launched back in 1999 (but the data go back much further) as a 'Quality of Life' indicator and we haven't made progress since then in terms of more farmland birds in the countryside. If I could go back to the countruyside of the 1970s I would hear many more skylarks and see many more turtle doves than I do these days. It is a quality of life issue - nature is steadily being lost from our lives.
As I say - it's not all bad - some bird species are doing well and that is to be celebrated. But the fact that so many once-common birds are now quite difficult to see in many parts of the country (and that certainly includes turtle dove and corn bunting in my part of Northamptonshire, but yellow wagtail, tree sparrow and grey partridge elsewhere) does reduce the quality of my life.
It's not all bad - but it's not all birds either! Indicator 13 (unlucky for some!) is a measure of ecosystem integrity in the North Sea - what proportion of fish are big (over 40cm)? The index has plummetted over the last 25 years - presumably largely because of over-fishing. We are seriously overexploiting the marine environment to the extent that you have to worry about whether it will be able to recover even if we see sense and dramatically ease off on fishing pressure.
And then there are non-native species such as grey squirrel, American signal crayfish and mitten crabs. There is an index which covers such species and in freshwater, marine and terretrial habitats (so, everywhere!) the index is on the rise - meaning that there are more non-native species covering a wider geographic area than before. Many of these non-native species are benign, to people and other wildlife, but a significant number cause real economic and conservation problems. It's not their fault - we brought them here!
All of the indicators I have mentioned (and there are others) are heading in the wrong direction. They paint a picture of our countryside and seas becoming more homogeneous and less diverse. Habitat specialists decline and the generalists do well, as do a range of non-native, accidentally introduced species.
It doesn't have to be like this. And the RSPB in our conservation work from nature reserves to marine policy and from working with farmers to fighting damaging developments is trying, and often succeeding, to get a better deal for birds and the rest of the natural world.