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Nature in the News
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I find this BWI article annoying because it blames forests for numerous problems including "loss of habitat" and "harbouring predators".Capercaillie wrote: »http://www.birdwatchireland.ie/Default.aspx?tabid=136
A good link to main causes of declines of grouse. Hunting not one of them.
On burning, it can't make up its mind whether this is good or bad. "Blanket burning" seems to be seen as bad and "rotational burning" good. But the fact is, even if you tried, you could not set fire to all the heather on a mountain simultaneously and in one go.
No mention at all of the people wandering around with guns who are too willing to shoot at anything that moves.
In this video Ray Mears visits and Old Caledonian type Scottish forest. The capercaille is strutting around in heather at the edge of a forest.
That is actually the richest type of habitat. Grassy clearings inside forests are rich in wildlife in general, and the edges of forests are great places for hares. If we had more of this habitat in Donegal, the eagles would be doing a lot better.
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I find this BWI article annoying because it blames forests for numerous problems including "loss of habitat" and "harbouring predators".
On burning, it can't make up its mind whether this is good or bad. "Blanket burning" seems to be seen as bad and "rotational burning" good. But the fact is, even if you tried, you could not set fire to all the heather on a mountain simultaneously and in one go.
No mention at all of the people wandering around with guns who are too willing to shoot at anything that moves.
In this video Ray Mears visits and Old Caledonian type Scottish forest. The capercaille is strutting around in heather at the edge of a forest.
That is actually the richest type of habitat. Grassy clearings inside forests are rich in wildlife in general, and the edges of forests are great places for hares. If we had more of this habitat in Donegal, the eagles would be doing a lot better.
Red Grouse need open heather habitats - forestry is the complete opposite of that. It's also a sheltered place for foxes, badgers, crows etc to hang out and makes it easy for them to raid any neighbouring habitat that is still suitable for grouse.
It can make up its mind about burning, you just need to do more reading. Burning for agricultural purposes involves burning full mountainsides and large parts of the landscape in general, obviously removing all vegetation and setting it all back to day zero. The burning required for grouse habitat involves a technique called 'muirburn' where strips of vegetation are burned on a 7 year rotation, so you have small patches of old and new heather and every age in between all in close quarters, so grouse and their chicks have access to seed and invertebrate food throughout the year.
Without gun clubs there would be even less red grouse in Ireland than there are now. The future looks somewhat ok for grouse here because of the interest shown and work being done by gun clubs. There is not one conservationists or scientist working on red grouse in Ireland that thinks gun clubs are the problem - its the habitat!
Just for clarification, the plantation forestry we have across Ireland is completely different to Caledonian Pine Forest. Also, and I'm sure you know this but its worth stating for clarity, red grouse and capercaillie have very different habitat requirements. And lastly, while biodiversity-rich forest like that would improve the situation in part, don't forget that it also provides a lot of shelter for prey like Hares, so while it might increase the number of Hares tenfold, a large proportion of those Hares might not be 'available' to Golden Eagles. That type of habitat would be great to see in Ireland, but ideally it would replace the commercial forestry plantations we already have rather than replace the open upland habitat that we should be managing better for species like Red Grouse.0 -
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In this video Ray Mears visits and Old Caledonian type Scottish forest. The capercaille is strutting around in heather at the edge of a forest.
That is actually the richest type of habitat. Grassy clearings inside forests are rich in wildlife in general, and the edges of forests are great places for hares. If we had more of this habitat in Donegal, the eagles would be doing a lot better.
The Caledonian forests are in a bad way as well. The Capercaillie is heading towards extinction in Scotland.0 -
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Racing extinction ( 2015)
New Documentary
Oscar-winning director Louie Psihoyos assembles a team of artists and activists on an undercover operation to expose the hidden world of endangered species and the race to protect them against mass extinction. Spanning the globe to infiltrate the world’s most dangerous black markets and using high tech tactics to document the link between carbon emissions and species extinction, Racing Extinction reveals stunning, never-before seen images that truly change the way we see the world.( 2015)
. very good.
http://www.racingextinction.com
#StartWith1Thing
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Keplar240B wrote: »Racing extinction ( 2015)
New Documentary
Oscar-winning director Louie Psihoyos assembles a team of artists and activists on an undercover operation to expose the hidden world of endangered species and the race to protect them against mass extinction. Spanning the globe to infiltrate the world’s most dangerous black markets and using high tech tactics to document the link between carbon emissions and species extinction, Racing Extinction reveals stunning, never-before seen images that truly change the way we see the world.( 2015)
. very good.
http://www.racingextinction.com
#StartWith1Thing
I watched Racing Extinction on this free (hopefully not too dodgy) movies website:
Mod Edit: Link removed - can't post links like that on boards.....
It's quite full-on, but should be mandatory viewing for every member of the human race.0 -
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_Tombstone_ wrote: »What group/farmer wants to mess at hedges in march when they could leave it a few weeks till the birdies are out?
Hardly a few weeks. The birds wouldn't be "out" until Autumn and even then cutting wrecks berry and seed supplies.
They need to get their work done before March.0 -
Moses Faithful Slime wrote: » Hardly a few weeks. The birds wouldn't be "out" until Autumn and even then cutting wrecks berry and seed supplies.
They need to get their work done before March.
Sorry, don't mind me.0 -
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