If you enjoyed reading this blog, then check out my new blog on Wordpress - you'll find it at http://marchington.wordpress.com/. The new blog is a little different - less about me and my opinions, and more about stories I'm working on for various Blaze Publishing magazines. Hope to see you there!
Wednesday, 28 December 2011
Sunday, 10 July 2011
Ferret faking it!
Ok, I give up. That jill is no more pregnant than I am. She's a big faker. She showed all the signs, she even put on a load of weight. But the time has passed and now she's getting slimmer again. Maybe she was after the extra rations, maybe she fancied a bit of peace and quiet on her own, or maybe she just enjoys the limelight. But pregnant she isn't! I'll leave the webcam on for a while, just in case. Then I'll think about what to point it at next. The vegetable patch perhaps - at least the potatoes are actually producing something!
Sunday, 19 June 2011
Gundogs in slow motion
I've been playing about with the Casio EX FH20 today, filming the dogs at 210fps - this is the result. More practice needed, but the results are promising, and it's fascinating to see how they move.
Saturday, 18 June 2011
Ferret birthcam - a web first!
Eat your heart out, Springwatch. In a groundbreaking web first we bring you... FERRET BIRTH CAM! A totally Kate Humble free zone, guaranteed.
Here, live on the web, watch this jill give birth. Maybe. In a couple of weeks' time. We hope.
She was mated (we think) on Saturday 21 May by Emma's albino rescue hob. So by normal calculations that should make the kits due on 2 July. Countdown clock here:
Click on the image above to watch the live stream (hopefully, if I've set it up right. If it's not working, drop me a line and I'll try to sort it out).
Friday, 10 June 2011
Tuesday, 31 May 2011
A turning point for conservation?
I take my hat off to Chris Packham. His taste in music may be suspect; his taste in dog breeds even worse. But... he has achieved the impossible. He has dared to challenge the high priests of conservation and produce a programme - broadcast on the BBC no less - that gets right to the heart of the problem.
Watch it here. Do it now, before it drops off iPlayer. Really - whatever you were planning to do tonight, drop it, and watch this instead. This is history being made. A turning point for conservation. We will look back at this programme and say "That's when the tide turned".
Of course, as a shooter, I'm delighted that he used the example of the grey partridge to illustrate a successful conservation project - particularly that he highlighted the excellent work of the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, and Dick Potts. Good grief, he even managed to mention game shooting in a positive light.
But this programme goes much deeper than that. It's an honest look at the reasons behind the catastrophic decline in birds, mammals, insects and wild plants in the UK during my lifetime.
There's no finger pointing and name calling. Just honest interviews with farmers who say, simply, I can't afford to farm wildlife, I have to make a living.
And, crucially, Packham exposes the nonsense of flagship single-species conservation projects run by organisations like the RSPB. Projects that may be great for drumming up political support, funds and membership, but don't tackle the root of the problem.
As an aside, it's ironic to see the RSPB taking corn buntings from the nest, hand-rearing them and then releasing them elsewhere, bragging about the fabulous conservation benefits to this threatened species. When the very idea of doing the exact same thing with hen harriers makes their blood boil with fake rage at the shooting estates that would love to work with them on such a project.
Anyway, back to the point. I have enjoyed watching the pragmatic Packham bite his tongue when soppy Kate Humble makes some infantile comment about cute n fluffy wildlife. Last night's Springwatch was a case in point - a pair of buzzards (don't they just eat worms?) had rounded up a bevy of rabbits, voles, moorhen chicks and, yes, an ickle fluffy duckling, for their young. Humble seemed close to tears; Packham just shrugged as if to say 'What do you expect?'
Now Packham has established himself as one of TV's leading conservation experts, he has the clout to say what he believes. And God bless 'im, that's exactly what he's gone and done.
I do hope I'm right, and this marks the start of a new era in conservation thinking, where we focus on the real issues, and doing something about them, rather than leaving it to organisations like the RSPB to exploit the subject for their own political and financial gain.
Watch it here. Do it now, before it drops off iPlayer. Really - whatever you were planning to do tonight, drop it, and watch this instead. This is history being made. A turning point for conservation. We will look back at this programme and say "That's when the tide turned".
Of course, as a shooter, I'm delighted that he used the example of the grey partridge to illustrate a successful conservation project - particularly that he highlighted the excellent work of the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust, and Dick Potts. Good grief, he even managed to mention game shooting in a positive light.
But this programme goes much deeper than that. It's an honest look at the reasons behind the catastrophic decline in birds, mammals, insects and wild plants in the UK during my lifetime.
There's no finger pointing and name calling. Just honest interviews with farmers who say, simply, I can't afford to farm wildlife, I have to make a living.
And, crucially, Packham exposes the nonsense of flagship single-species conservation projects run by organisations like the RSPB. Projects that may be great for drumming up political support, funds and membership, but don't tackle the root of the problem.
As an aside, it's ironic to see the RSPB taking corn buntings from the nest, hand-rearing them and then releasing them elsewhere, bragging about the fabulous conservation benefits to this threatened species. When the very idea of doing the exact same thing with hen harriers makes their blood boil with fake rage at the shooting estates that would love to work with them on such a project.
Anyway, back to the point. I have enjoyed watching the pragmatic Packham bite his tongue when soppy Kate Humble makes some infantile comment about cute n fluffy wildlife. Last night's Springwatch was a case in point - a pair of buzzards (don't they just eat worms?) had rounded up a bevy of rabbits, voles, moorhen chicks and, yes, an ickle fluffy duckling, for their young. Humble seemed close to tears; Packham just shrugged as if to say 'What do you expect?'
Now Packham has established himself as one of TV's leading conservation experts, he has the clout to say what he believes. And God bless 'im, that's exactly what he's gone and done.
I do hope I'm right, and this marks the start of a new era in conservation thinking, where we focus on the real issues, and doing something about them, rather than leaving it to organisations like the RSPB to exploit the subject for their own political and financial gain.
Tuesday, 24 May 2011
Use and abuse of badgers
Like statistics, cute-looking animals are a gift to anyone with a political axe to grind.
You can use them to prove any point you like - they won't answer back, or worse still go running to the papers complaining about being used to score political points (always a risk if a politician invokes nurses, or single mothers, or etc, to support an argument).
I've often thought it would be fascinating to study the way the foxhunting debate polarised into a Left vs Right argument, with the welfare of the fox trampled underfoot in the rush to trade insults about privileged toffs and unwashed lentil-munchers.
Sadly I don't have the time, or the government funding, to do that sort of research myself. But... today I discovered that there's a scientist doing exactly that, only with the badger/bTB 'debate'.
I have my elder daughter Emma to thank for the tip-off. As part of her veterinary studies, she attended a lecture by Dr Angela Cassidy, from the University of East Anglia, on the media coverage of the Badger 'controversy' in the UK press.
You can download a pdf of one of Dr Cassidy's earlier talks here (This link may show the document in preview form, if I've got it right). It makes fascinating reading.
She appears to find that the badger issue polarises people into rural vs. urban, left-wing vs. right-wing. Discussion tends to focus on culling rather than disease and its control. There is strong evidence of lobbying creating coverage in the media at key moments, such as in the lead-up to the General Election. And new scientific evidence tends to cause arguments about the science itself - the protagonists entrench their positions and argue about the validity of the science, rather than taking the opportunity to reconsider the best course of action.
There's also an interesting section on the use of imagery by different groups - cute n cuddly badgers by one side, vicious snarly badgers by the other. And she looks at the presentation of the badger as 'good' and 'bad' by groups with different perspectives over the years, going back through Tommy Brock and his ilk to the days long before badgers were associated with disease.
It's hard not to find yourself drawn in, even reading Dr Cassidy's work, and ask yourself "Is she pro or anti?" That's kind of beside the point. Her work is a valuable insight into the way something that should be a straightforward, practical debate gets hijacked, and becomes the focus for a much deeper disagreement between groups with opposing agendas; and the media tricks both sides resort to in their attempt to win the day... while the cattle, the farmers, and the badgers, continue to suffer.
This isn't the first time animals have been used this way, and it certainly won't be the last. We would do well to understand the phenomenon.
You can use them to prove any point you like - they won't answer back, or worse still go running to the papers complaining about being used to score political points (always a risk if a politician invokes nurses, or single mothers, or etc, to support an argument).
I've often thought it would be fascinating to study the way the foxhunting debate polarised into a Left vs Right argument, with the welfare of the fox trampled underfoot in the rush to trade insults about privileged toffs and unwashed lentil-munchers.
Sadly I don't have the time, or the government funding, to do that sort of research myself. But... today I discovered that there's a scientist doing exactly that, only with the badger/bTB 'debate'.
I have my elder daughter Emma to thank for the tip-off. As part of her veterinary studies, she attended a lecture by Dr Angela Cassidy, from the University of East Anglia, on the media coverage of the Badger 'controversy' in the UK press.
You can download a pdf of one of Dr Cassidy's earlier talks here (This link may show the document in preview form, if I've got it right). It makes fascinating reading.
She appears to find that the badger issue polarises people into rural vs. urban, left-wing vs. right-wing. Discussion tends to focus on culling rather than disease and its control. There is strong evidence of lobbying creating coverage in the media at key moments, such as in the lead-up to the General Election. And new scientific evidence tends to cause arguments about the science itself - the protagonists entrench their positions and argue about the validity of the science, rather than taking the opportunity to reconsider the best course of action.
There's also an interesting section on the use of imagery by different groups - cute n cuddly badgers by one side, vicious snarly badgers by the other. And she looks at the presentation of the badger as 'good' and 'bad' by groups with different perspectives over the years, going back through Tommy Brock and his ilk to the days long before badgers were associated with disease.
It's hard not to find yourself drawn in, even reading Dr Cassidy's work, and ask yourself "Is she pro or anti?" That's kind of beside the point. Her work is a valuable insight into the way something that should be a straightforward, practical debate gets hijacked, and becomes the focus for a much deeper disagreement between groups with opposing agendas; and the media tricks both sides resort to in their attempt to win the day... while the cattle, the farmers, and the badgers, continue to suffer.
This isn't the first time animals have been used this way, and it certainly won't be the last. We would do well to understand the phenomenon.
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