SCHACK, schack, schak!’ ‘Si-si-sisi-suu!’ ‘Tett-ett-ett!’ Such imperious calls—here those of the fieldfare, yellowhammer and meadow pipit— are among the vital signs that there’s life on Earth. Garden, woodland and farmland birds, members of the passerine family, are the natural environment’s canaries in the mine, but their melodies are being heard less and less frequently. It’s a silence that speaks volumes about the deteriorating state of British biodiversity.
SongBird Survival (SBS), a small, but valiant charity started by landowners in 2001 with the strapline ‘Saving songbirds with science’, is trying, through research, education and practical measures, to halt the decline of this country’s songbirds, which stands at about 56% since 1970.
‘My 10-year-old daughter said: “Daddy, you’ve got to save songbirds” and my eldest daughter is very keen on conservation, so that swung it,’ acknowledges Tom Streeter, chairman of the board of SBS trustees, on being persuaded by vice-chairman the Earl of Leicester to take on the role in 2017.
Fostering enthusiasm for birdwatching in primary schools is one of the SBS’s priorities. ‘If you can engage five, six, seven-year-olds with feeding birds, it will stay with them for life,’ maintains Mr Streeter. ‘Someone asked “why do we need songbirds and the dawn chorus” and my daughter answered: “It’s Nature’s voice.” If there’s an audible noise, then all is well. If it’s not there, something’s wrong.’
Denne historien er fra January 22, 2020-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra January 22, 2020-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Save our family farms
IT Tremains to be seen whether the Government will listen to the more than 20,000 farming people who thronged Whitehall in central London on November 19 to protest against changes to inheritance tax that could destroy countless family farms, but the impact of the good-hearted, sombre crowds was immediate and positive.
A very good dog
THE Spanish Pointer (1766–68) by Stubbs, a landmark painting in that it is the artist’s first depiction of a dog, has only been exhibited once in the 250 years since it was painted.
The great astral sneeze
Aurora Borealis, linked to celestial reindeer, firefoxes and assassinations, is one of Nature's most mesmerising, if fickle displays and has made headlines this year. Harry Pearson finds out why
'What a good boy am I'
We think of them as the stuff of childhood, but nursery rhymes such as Little Jack Horner tell tales of decidedly adult carryings-on, discovers Ian Morton
Forever a chorister
The music-and way of living-of the cabaret performer Kit Hesketh-Harvey was rooted in his upbringing as a cathedral chorister, as his sister, Sarah Sands, discovered after his death
Best of British
In this collection of short (5,000-6,000-word) pen portraits, writes the author, 'I wanted to present a number of \"Great British Commanders\" as individuals; not because I am a devotee of the \"great man, or woman, school of history\", but simply because the task is interesting.' It is, and so are Michael Clarke's choices.
Old habits die hard
Once an antique dealer, always an antique dealer, even well into retirement age, as a crop of interesting sales past and future proves
It takes the biscuit
Biscuit tins, with their whimsical shapes and delightful motifs, spark nostalgic memories of grandmother's sweet tea, but they are a remarkably recent invention. Matthew Dennison pays tribute to the ingenious Victorians who devised them
It's always darkest before the dawn
After witnessing a particularly lacklustre and insipid dawn on a leaden November day, John Lewis-Stempel takes solace in the fleeting appearance of a rare black fox and a kestrel in hot pursuit of a pipistrelle bat
Tarrying in the mulberry shade
On a visit to the Gainsborough Museum in Sudbury, Suffolk, in August, I lost my husband for half an hour and began to get nervous. Fortunately, an attendant had spotted him vanishing under the cloak of the old mulberry tree in the garden.
